What are Charles Handy's Gods of Management?

charles handy is a british

management theorist and philosopher who

ran the sloan

school of management program at the

london business school

in handy's 1978 book the gods of

management

handy set out for organizational

cultures

or models for how organizations operate

and that's what we'll look at in this

video

handy suggested that if you want to

understand

an organization you need to understand

the people who lead it

and the culture they create and in his

model

the gods of management he identifies

four types of leadership four types of

culture four

organizational models which he relates

to the olympian gods in the ancient

greek mythology

and perhaps that's not so surprising

because handy was himself

originally a classics scholar

the four archetypes handy chooses are

dependent upon two things

firstly the level of formality within

the organization

and secondly the level of centralization

or decentralization

of the power within the organization

that gives us a chart that looks

something like this

the power culture at the top left is

sometimes

also called the club culture and it's

named for the greek god zeus

who was the chief amongst the gods he

was powerful

he was capricious and he was always

minded to exercise his

power in the club culture or the power

culture

we see organizations led by a single

powerful and often charismatic

individual

who wants to get things done their way

this dominant executive will usually

control access to all resources

and have a low level of tolerance for

what they perceive as

under performance we often see this

culture

in startups where one dominant founder

is in charge

or in established organizations where a

highly charismatic individual

takes over the reigns of power not

surprisingly we also see this

in political parties and in crime

families

the roles culture is named for the god

apollo

who stands for stability and structure

and rules these sorts of

rule-based cultures are a hallmark

of established bureaucratic

organizations where everybody has a

clear role to play within the

organization

and a clear process to follow in the way

that they do it

people know what's expected of them and

an individual's

authority to make decisions and choices

is conferred

by the level of seniority of their role

those roles are often constrained and

have strong boundaries around them

as a result apollo cultures and to a

lesser extent zeus cultures

find it very hard to adapt to changing

situations

they most closely reflect shine's

authority ethic that we saw in an

earlier video

the next two cultures are more closely

aligned

to shine's individual freedom ethic

the first of these more decentralized

cultures is the

task culture handy

linked the task culture to athena the

goddess of wisdom

who is also seen as a good problem

solver

the task culture is all about getting

the jobs done

and solving the problems that are

inherent in that challenge

as a result athena cultures tend to be

meritocratic if you can get things done

if you can make progress

then you will be recognized and well

rewarded

teams within an athena culture can be

quite fluid with people coming together

and dispersing as the need arises

remember we're focused on task and

therefore the athena culture

is closely related in many ways to the

ad hocracy

that henry mintzberg talked about and

that we'll examine

in more detail in a subsequent video

task cultures tend to be innovative with

far

less routine than our roles cultures

as a result authority is far less

important than knowledge expertise

experience and the ability to influence

and persuade the people around you

so we find the athena culture in

organizations like consultancies

and research organizations

handy's fourth god of management is

dionysus

the god of wine and festivity dionysus

stands for

personal freedom and lack of formality

and this

is the person culture

the person culture is all about me me me

and as a result we get a trade-off

between on the one hand

high levels of creativity and innovation

and the other hand

somewhat destructive levels of

competition and discord

and argumentation everyone wants to be

right

there's little infrastructure within a

person organization the organization

itself is nothing more than a home

for a bunch of individuals for the

culture therefore to work

the home needs to provide some

motivation for individuals to stay it

has to indulge

their creativity and provide them with

the development and growth that they

crave

but also to be constructive it has to

find ways

to mediate between these highly

individualistic

workers here you'll find people who care

more about their own

individual career and position within

the organization and they do about the

organization itself

this is very much the land of law firms

and accounting practices

where everyone is in it for themselves

and when they reach the top they become

a partner

and they simply have a louder voice in

advocating

for their own personal priorities

for me handy's gods of management is one

of the

very best models of organizational types

the four types it identifies resonate

well

and you'll find good examples of each of

those types

in every major city

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