Theory X vs Y

Today we solved a problem. Normally not much to write about, except today we solved it for the second time. That's red flags for me. What to do?

Fortunately I just finished Peter Drucker's book on People and Performance. He's written a zillion books on management and is oft cited, so going in I had high expectations.

Drucker constantly compares the history of the world as measured by the standard of living. Being a big fan on case studies, I ate it up. In the book, he discusses Theory X and Theory Y:

Theory X assumes that people are lazy, dislike and shun work, have to be driven, and need both carrot and stick. It assumes that most people are incapable of taking responsibility for themselves and have to be looked after. Theory Y assumes that people have a psychological need to work and that they desire achievement and responsibility and will find them under the right conditions.

Depending on one's assumptions, different action is required. If I assume Theory X to be valid, then a good coarse beating is in order. If Theory Y, then I recognize the problem is not with the person with whom I am angry. Eg. If only everyone knew everything in my head...well they don’t...and probably my head is filled with bunk anyway. Point is - if Y is valid - what to do?

Let us examine the root cause. The problem was not lack of documentation. After we solved it the first time, we wrote it down in the instructions. Clearly more writing or yelling at people to read the manual won't help.

The problem is that it's a complicated procedure with a hundred steps. If you mess up any of them, game over start again. We’re reading instructions off a web page. That’s dead documentation. The root cause is lack of living documentation. There's only so many things a human can do without messing up, and it's for sure less than a hundred. The ideal solution is self-documenting code - that is: automate it.

So now we ask: How likely is it to occur again? Very. What's the cost of failure? A few hours. What's the cost of our solution? A few hours. Hmm...seems like we're gonna fix this. The question now is when, and that's another topic.

So theory X vs Y - to which do you ascribe?