After all, if you're treated disrespectfully or with suspicion, if rules are applied without nuance or care, you’ll likely feel resentful or afraid and behave negatively in response.

This arouses further doubts for your manager, who tightens their authoritarian grip in an attempt to drive the results they require.

Together, you can get locked in a destructive cycle – and a slump in productivity quickly follows the one in morale.

Under Pressure

There is, of course, a time to focus almost exclusively on the data and the dollars; the action not the feelings.

When a crisis hits your workplace, market or community, everyone needs to move quickly and effectively to douse the literal or metaphorical flames. But they're more likely to do so if day-to-day business is operated humanely and, at best, inspirationally.

When Balance Is Bad

Blake and Mouton’s “Middle of the Road” leader tries to balance the needs of their people and the need to perform.

But, as the name suggests, this is a bland compromise and not a successful strategy.

Neither, according to this model, is the relaxed “Country Club” approach a winner. Team members might feel welcome, that they belong, but they might lack a sense of urgency or a desire to attend to details. Inevitably, quality slips and opportunities are missed.

Leading by Example

Some years ago, I was lucky enough to work directly with the Founder of Mind Tools, James Manktelow. He taught me many things, not least about strategy, process, systems, and people. And to him, these were all inextricable parts of business. They weren't in competition or in conflict. Rather, each enabled the other.

James personified the Blake Mouton “Team Manager.” In that framework’s terms (and the language can be confusing), that’s a leader who constantly strives to grow their organization’s results and their people’s wellbeing.

This means that intelligent, creative, collaborative people can design effective systems and operate them with confidence, skill, respect, and initiative. Their work serves them and their customers well, and delivers the strategy, which is clear and inspirational enough to motivate and direct the continued evolution of the organization.

Management in the Real World

It was a joy to see this theory enacted and to be part of the success that resulted. And it's been an honor ever since to share the practicalities of such an empowering and honest approach through my role in Mind Tools’ Content team.

In my time here, I've been delighted – often awestruck – to see members and colleagues alike grow in confidence and develop their abilities.

They've taken on extra responsibilities and devised whole new areas of work that have brought organizational performance up a level. And they've supported one another through thick and thin.

When they wake up in the morning, they're looking forward to work, with all its possibilities. Who wouldn't want a taste of that?

What's Next?

If you want to develop your management skills, and to understand where leadership fits into the mix, read our extended article, What Is Leadership?

Then try the self-assessment quiz, What's Your Leadership Style?, to find out how you could adapt to different situations at work.

And be sure you’re Avoiding Managerial Self-Sabotage!

Tip of the Week

How to Find Work-Employee Fit: Boredom Isn’t Always Bad

By Melanie Bell, Mind Tools Writer and Editor

I was out with friends recently when a couple of them mentioned being bored at work.

I was reminded of a picture book I read as a child, Babette Cole’s “The Trouble With Dad,” in which the inventor father finds his day job so boring that he spends his free time building fantastic robots in his garage.

Is boredom always a bad thing? Certainly, as is the case in that beloved story, it can lead to inventiveness.

And sometimes, as André Martin notes in his book “Wrong Fit, Right Fit: Why How We Work Matters More Than Ever,” it can be a sign that a work role is a natural fit for someone’s skills.

A job that uses your competences can feel easy. And, Martin says, sometimes that leads to employees mistaking ease for boredom, believing that what they’re doing is not ambitious enough.

This is in contrast to what he terms a wrong fit job, where you often feel wrong-footed and incompetent, or a position where you’re simply disengaged and don’t care much about the outcome.

If you’re wondering if your somewhat dull job is challenging enough, or if it’s a case of “so easy it’s good,” ask yourself: Is there something better out there? Or are you taking a “right fit job” for granted?

There’s no shame in committing to a “boring” job!

Learn more about finding the right job-worker fit, whether you’re an employer or employee, in our Expert Interview on “Wrong Fit, Right Fit: Why How We Work Matters More Than Ever.”

Pain Points Podcast

Giving interviews is never easy. How do you know you’re asking the right questions? How can you really tell how the interviewee will fit into the company or succeed in the role?

Join the Pain Points podcast team this week as they discuss giving interviews – sharing tips and tricks on getting it right as well as stories of their own, sometimes painful, experiences.

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News Roundup

This Week's Global Workplace Insights

The Workplace Has “Love Languages” Too

Many of us have participated in team-building workshops that brought in working style or personality frameworks to help us understand how to better collaborate with our colleagues.

But how about using a model that’s normally applied to romantic relationships? Enter Gary Chapman’s “love languages.”

This model was popularized in 1992 as a way of helping couples to understand the way that they prefer to express and receive affection. And, as Huffington Post reports, the five love languages have work equivalents.

Chapman and psychologist Paul E. White coauthored a book about the languages of appreciation in the workplace, with the aim of helping managers and employees to show appreciation effectively.

So, do you feel most appreciated through words of affirmation, quality time, tangible gifts, appropriate physical touch (note the word “appropriate”), or acts of service?

A lot of workplace feedback is delivered verbally, but more than half the people on your team might feel more valued if their performance were recognized in a different way.

For in-depth information on this model, check out our Book Insight on Chapman and White’s “The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People.”

Anger Drives Results

Anger might sound like the exact opposite of appreciation. But Metro reports that it, too, can have a powerful impact on productivity.

Research from the American Psychological Association found that anger helped participants to achieve goals more effectively in challenging situations – more than feelings of happiness, sadness or emotional neutrality.

What does this mean for work, where conventional wisdom dictates that we should keep our emotions under wraps?

Metro quotes Good Shout facilitator Nicola Kemp, who suggests that anger can fuel creativity. And Natalie Trice, a life coach, describes anger as our body’s signal to take action.

Women especially are often socialized to be “nice” rather than outspoken. But giving voice to anger can be a productive force for creating positive change.

For more information about anger in the workplace, see our article Understanding Anger.

See you next week for more member-exclusive content and insight from the Mind Tools team!