One of the significant concepts in contemporary management is participative management (PM), their origin of which is traced by most writers in the academic literature to the post-World War II writings of scholars, such as Kurt Lewin, Douglas McGregor, Chris Argyris, H. Igor Ansoff, and Michael Porter (Kaufman , 2001). However, a number of management scholars have also written at more length on the origins and history of PM, such as Carroll and Schuler (1983) said that participatory management can be traced to the early 1960s, the writings of behavioral scientists, such as Douglas McGregor and Rensis Likert. Furthermore, Stanton (1993) believes that the origins of PM to two behavioral scientists, Lester Coch and John French, who wrote in the late 1940s but on the issue of organizational change (Kaufman, 2001). Another opinion is stated that the writings of social psychologist, Kurt Lewin, inspired the concept of participatory management Cotton (1994).

Participation as a management style was suggested in the classical Hawthorne experiments of the 1930s. The experiments represent that when small groups of workers feel their work environment is supportive, gain more satisfaction and work better (Crane, 1979). Another story explained the origin of participatory management as the idea of industrial democracy, stated by Rockefeller, gained currency in the late 1910s and translated to idiom of participatory management in management field (Kaufman, 2001). However, researchers in the academic field had little success in interesting management in this concept (Chang and Liu, 2008).

“Participative management should be looked at as an evolution of the organization that will ultimately lead to achievement of corporate objectives” (Yohe, 2003). In the 21st century, research shows that employees are starting to make more demands on their employers. They want to be parts of a team and they want more involvement in decision-making (Shagholi and Hussin, 2009). Undoubtedly, today, in order for an organization to be successful, it should care its employees as important assets and keep them satisfied. Since the increasing pressure of world stiff competition and the complexity of decisions, organizations should shift to more cooperation and participation to increase their performance. It seems that PM as an alternative to the traditional ”command and control” (Kaufman, 2001) likely be applied in a great number of organizations in future, as the improvement in this case can be seen.

Shifting to Employee participation

“Employee empowerment or participative decision making is neither a new or simple management concept”. Employee participation is a complex management tool which can be effective in improving performance, productivity and job satisfaction when applied properly (Nykodym et al. 2008). With increasing globalization, industry is under intense pressure to produce high quality, specialized ‘high-tech’ products and services, all of which require a flexible and highly trained workforce. The one of the intent of participation is developing cooperative and strong workforce. (Howcroft and Wilson 2003) Employee participation can be interpreted in three distinct ways. First, it can be seen as ‘industrial democracy’. Second, it may represent that subordinate employees involve more in one or more aspects of organizational decision making. Third, it may show a specific evolutionary development to promote greater employee influence within the organization. Salamon (1992) (Huang, 1997)

Why participative management?

On the basis of Likert’s findings, Keith Davis in his supportive model mentioned that when employees feel a sense of participation and task involvement (in a psychological supportive climate), they will identify with the organization, take responsibility, and strive to contribute to the organization’s objectives (Crane 1979). So, it seems that in order to reach the goals in the organization with better performance, participatory management can be a good choice. Participation will provide employees, who are motivated and trained to initiate their own decisions, to work effectively in teams (Howcroft and Wilson 2003). Another important reason for social transformation to participation is that participation as both a means and an end seeks to strengthen people’s capacity to make decisions and their ability to create an environment for change (Vernooy, Qiu, and Jianchu 2008).

What is the meaning of participatory management?

Styles of leadership

Management style is believed to be another determinant of system success and user participation (Lu and Wang 1997). Different level of leadership styles leads to different levels of job satisfaction. Subordinates feel more satisfied when leaders show high levels of consideration and supportive behavior (Chen and Silverthorne 2004)

The four quadrants in SLT represent four basic leadership styles: high task and low relationship

(S1, telling); high task and high relationship (S2, selling); low task and high relationship

(S3, participating); low task and low relationship (S4, delegating) (Chen and Silverthorne 2004). In addition, Likert broke management styles into the four systems in related to the extent of employee’s participation (Shagholi and Hussin 2009).

There are several styles of leadership such as: autocratic, bureaucratic, laissez-faire, charismatic, democratic, participative, situational, transactional, and transformational leadership (Mosadeghrad 2003b, 2004). Not everyone agrees that a particular style of leadership will result in the most effective form of organizational behavior (Mohammad and Rad, 2006). Victor Vroom and Philip Yetton found that to be effective, leaders should fit their style to the demands of the situation (Controversy, 2008), but participative leadership is one of the alternatives that if it be selected in appropriate situation, it can perform a miracle in the organization.

Participatory management definition

Participative management is a practice that managers use as an attempt to satisfy employees and increase productivity (Yohe 2003). By ‘participatory’ means various types and degrees of involvement of employees in, control over, and decision making in an activity (Vernooy, Qiu, and Jianchu 2008) “Participative management, rooted in the management approach, focuses on decentralization of educational decision making and sharing of power” (Sidener, 1995). As the term of participation becomes famous, the definitions and meanings of the term have grown diverse and each research concentrated on some of the specific dimensions of this concept (Somech 2002). All of the areas, methods and forms of participation illustrate the fact that participative management is a multidimensional concept (Nykodym et al. 2008).

It seems that participatory management has been suggested as a critical means to transform the culture of a typical governmental bureaucracy (Jongjoo, D, and Houston 2009). Bolman and Deal (1997), implied that that participatory management is a popular remedy because they find more opportunities to participate in decision-making about their work and working conditions.

Generally, participatory management theory assumes that employee prefer to affect their work by playing a role in making decisions about their work. So, by the means of participatory management, it is tried to balance the involvement of both superiors and subordinates in information-sharing, problem-saving and decision making (Jongjoo, D, and Houston 2009). Most authors agree that conferring greater decision-making authority and responsibility to front-line employees is the essence of participatory management, so” they, too, have some involvement (albeit often at a nonstrategic level) in the control and coordination of the basic activities and functions of the enterprise” (Cotton, 1994). “Participatory management typically requires greater sharing of information, rewards, and power with front-line employees, as well as considerably greater investment in training” (Kaufman, 2001)

It is indicated that participative management is one of the most important as well as most widely utilized strategies for developing organizations (Anon 1997) which emphasize on the employee development (Anonymous, 2007). (Glosser, 2001) believes that participatory groups is more than putting individuals in groups, it needs not only physical presence, but also mental involvement of them. The theme of participative management involves employees’ ability, skill and interest in business decision making. Participatory management is characterized as a style under which managers have complete trust in subordinates, and much of the decision making is accomplished by group participation.(Shagholi and Hussin 2009)

Definitions of PM also vary. Participative management is a kind of management style in which the subordinates share a significant degree of decision-making power with their superiors (Robbins, 1991: 243). “Participative management is a term used to describe an approach to management in which the subordinates, in a particular situation, are allowed and encouraged to participate in decisions which will affect them” (Crane, 1979). Knoop (1995) defines participative management as joint decision making or a least shared influence in decision making by a superior and his or her employees (Benoliel and Somech 2010)

Participatory manager

Ten characteristics declared for participatory manager which ranked in order from the most to the least participative are as follows: