Incest 0000i-xiv FM 1 - William L. White

Organizational Responses to Distressed Workers 17
• The cognitive approach
• The training approach
• The environmental approach
• The systems approach
Note that each approach described has profound repercussions on those
experiencing professional distress and on the future incidence of professional
distress in the organization.
Ideally, this schema will provide managers an opportunity to review
their own assumptions about worker distress and to assess their own supervisory
responses to those experiencing professional distress. Undertake
this self-examination in a spirit of openness, and check the natural
tendency for defensiveness. The criticism of various approaches is based
on the knowledge that many of us have exemplified some of these styles
at different stages of our managerial careers.
2.1 The Authoritarian-Moral Approach:
Professional Distress as Bad Character
The authoritarian-moral approach to professional distress reflects what
Douglas McGregor called the “theory X” philosophy of management.
Theory X is based on the assumption that most people dislike work, lack
ambition, are essentially passive, avoid responsibility, resist change, and
are self-centered and unconcerned with the needs of the organization.
The role of the manager is thus to direct, motivate, manipulate, persuade,
control, reward, and punish the worker to effectively respond to
the needs of the organization (McGregor 1967, 1973).
Within the organization managed by the propositions of theory X,
even the existence of professional distress is adamantly denied through
such flippant phrases as, “There’s no such thing as stress, only staff
who don’t want to work.” Behavior indicative of professional distress
is viewed as emerging from character flaws in the worker. While the
authoritarian-moral approach is usually applied to workers on an individual
basis, it may be broadened to encompass stereotyped responses
to particular subgroups of workers. In the latter case, distress-related
behavior of the individual worker is seen as justifying the manager’s
view of the unreliable and irresponsible character of a group of workers,
most often women, people of color, or older workers.
Organizational managers who typify the authoritarian-moral approach
are intensely invested in their work and have great difficulty