Management Style and Workshop ApproachesThe following table shows three main workshop approaches and the way in which they can be linked to four main management styles. Note that there is a move from the emergent, Process Approach towards the preordained Product Approach as we move down the table. This could also be seen as a move from a bottom-up, participatory approach towards a top-down, autocratic approach.
The above typology is, however, perhaps a bit too clean cut and ‘academic’ to fully capture what can happen in reality. The different approaches can be used through time to generate an ‘official’ way of doing things. An example of this is the manner in which the new official financial system for secondary schools (in Lesotho) is being generated. This began with a survey of schools to discover and describe their present systems. This was followed by a largely non-directive workshop for Principals during which their present patterns of conceptualization were mapped and various alternatives were discussed. We are presently at the stage where most of the options have been discarded through a process of negotiation and discussion such that consensus has been reached on the ‘official’, ‘correct’ way of performing these technical procedures. Thus, until such time as the system no longer seems effective, it will be appropriate to run largely didactic workshops on this topic ie participants will be ‘told’ how to do it. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||