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succeed; what exactly does being a winning organization mean and what
does it take to get there? In the past companies placed a great amount of
emphasis on the numbers and how to achieve those numbers. The people
who actually helped achieve those numbers were graded on their technical
skills, productivity, and budgets. Employees were moneymaking machines
and how they achieved those numbers was not a concern of their managers
as long as the numbers were being met. Organizational behavior studies
have become more important today than in previous years because
corporations must learn to adapt to the rapidly changing business cultures
that have stemmed from a competitive and fast-paced market.
Organizational behavior was a topic that was not discussed until an
employee's behavior changed, productivity changed, or sales decreased. In
today's business world, managers are paying more attention to how
employees react to situations rather than if they respond. They are
beginning to view organizational behavior as an intricate piece of training
and development of the workforce. Soft skills were never a part of
management training and it was rare that managers were commended for
having those skills. In the business world today, I feel organizational
behavior is an essential tool for managing effective teams. If you
can zone in on an employees' personality, creativity, and
adaptability, motivating that employee the way they need to be
motivated is never a gray area and a guaranteed success.
Have you ever got up in the morning and thought, "I really don't want to go to work
today"? I think we all have at some point in our lives. You may also have had times
when you have thought or said, "I hate my job, I hate where I work." These feelings
have nothing to do with you, your job or your workplace. The problem lies in the
fact that your supervisor or manager has no idea how to manage organisational
behaviour!
So what is organisational behaviour? Put simply, it is the way in which people react
to other people and situations in a workplace. A good manager will observe
employees so that they are placed in suitable positions within the organisation. If an
employee is happy in their position and the situations they have to deal with, they
will be more productive. This is not only good for the business but it also gives the
employee job satisfaction.
For example, if you had an employee who was a young, shy, softly spoken girl, you
would not put hr in the role of debt collection. Instead, you might place her in a low
stress customer service position that would suit her nature as well as help her to
build self-confidence in dealing with customers.
From this, we can see that organisational behaviour is not just about keeping
employees happy. It is about putting people in a position that suits their personality
and experience as well as helping employees to grow in a way that they become
more of an asset to the business.
Aside from recognising the importance of placing employees in positions that will
make them happy and productive, you also need to recognise people's reactions to
other people. You may have an employee who is quite happy to have you stand
behind them, looking over their shoulder while they show you something. Others,
however, may feel intimidated or uncomfortable by this, in which case it would be
better for you to sit beside them rather than stand over them. If you can't recognise
when a person is feeling uncomfortable in a situation, you will find that they will
become distracted and thus less productive.
These are just some of the basics of organisational behaviour, but as you can see,
they can have a huge impact on a person's happiness and productivity in the
workplace. Good managers will learn about organisational behaviour to ensure that
they can get the most out of their employees and keep them happy at the same
time.
Importance of OB
Organizational behavior is a fairly new discipline, dating back to the early 20th
century, although some experts suggest that it came into existence right after the
U.S. Civil War. Organizational behavior has evolved from early classical
management theories into a complex school of thought, and it continues to change
in response to the dynamic workforce in which today's businesses operate.
The task concept centered around the idea that if managers planned workers' tasks
at least one day in advance, production would increase. Taylor devised a differential
piece-rate system based on two different rates of pay. His system was simple:
workers who did less than the expected output received a low rate of pay. Those
who exceeded the standard earned more money. That was a radical idea for the
time. It separated the worker from the machine and indicated that employees could
control how much they produced. Taylor also suggested in his approach that money
motivated workers. This, too, was a unique idea. This approach became known as
Theory X, and it would later be distinguished from other theories that took a
different view of worker motivation and human nature. What Taylor did not do,
however, was take into account group behavior. He, like most classical managers,
had no concept of the importance of workers as members of groups. The next wave
of theorists, the human relations experts, addressed the issue of group behavior.
THE HAWTHORNE EXPERIMENTS
Perhaps the most significant experiments were the Hawthorne experiments. The
studies began in 1924 at the Hawthorne Works, part of the Western Electric
Company, located in Cicero, Illinois. The researchers' original goal was to measure
the effect of illumination on output. In simplified terms, what they actually learned
was that an individual's work performance, position, and status in an organization
are determined not only by the individual, but by group members, too. They also
learned that workers formed cliques that affected their production and that there
were certain codes of conduct members of individual cliques were expected to
follow. The Hawthorne studies opened the door to more experiments by other
human relationists.
The next group to take center stage in the organizational behavior arena postulated
that a manager's role was not to control workers, but to facilitate employee
performance. According to human resources experts, people work to make a living,
but their efforts go far beyond just laboring. They also work to fulfill certain needs,
e.g., contributing to organizational objectives, attaining a feeling of
accomplishment, and using their creativity in the work environment. Managers were
well advised to keep all these needs in mind when dealing with workers. According
to the human resources theorists, managers should apply mutual goal-setting and
problem-solving approaches to their workforce members. Their approach has been
termed Theory Y.
the fusion process, in which the first three modify and shape one another
Each part is essential. None can exist alone in the system. This system approach is
the basis for modem organizational theory, which is founded on behavioral science
studies.
There are three behavioral sciences: psychology (the study of individual behavior),
sociology (the study of social behavior within societies, institutions, and groups),
and anthropology (the study of the origin, cultural development, and behavior of
humans). Each has made important contributions to the study of organizational
behavior.
In regard to individuals and groups, researchers try to ascertain why people behave
the way they do. They have developed a variety of models designed to explain
individuals' behavior. They investigate the factors that influence personality
development, including genetic, situational, environmental, cultural, and social
factors. Researchers also look at personality types such as authoritarian (people
who adhere closely to conventional values) and dogmatic (people who are
extremely rigid in their beliefs). They want to find out what causes a person to form
either type of personality and learn whether one or the other—or neither—is a
positive trait for people in the business world.
Researchers have also studied a number of concepts, including:
Halo effect—the use of known personal traits as the basis for an overall evaluation
They evaluate perception versus reality, individuals' locus of control (whether they
believe they or outside forces are in control of their lives), and common problems
resulting from these personality traits and characteristics. Finally, they look at an
individual's attitudes and correlate them to job satisfaction and job performance.
Perhaps the most basic issue scholars have addressed in the area of group behavior
is the definition of "group." They have agreed that there is no one definition.
Therefore, they have looked more at why people join groups, types of groups, and
group activities and goals. Studies have focused on group norms, individuals'
behavior within groups and how it changed, their roles within groups, and what
groups could accomplish that individuals could not. Many researchers believe that a
group is more than the sum of the individual members, even though its goals,
interactions, and performance are determined primarily by the individuals within it.
The other three types of power also have advantages and disadvantages. For
instance, legitimate power, which exists as part of a manager's position in the
hierarchy, is often ignored by workers who do not respect the individual filling the
role. Referent power, which is based on the manager's charisma, influences only
those individuals or group members who are swayed by the charismatic leader.
Finally, expert power, which is power acquired from experience and learning, is a
positive force, but only to the degree managers can convince individuals and group
members that their leadership skills go beyond expertise alone.
Many researchers have suggested viable ways that organizations could restructure
jobs and relationships to stimulate job satisfaction and productivity simultaneously.
They have devised better communications programs, identified the elements that
create stress, and explained how it could be better managed.
Quality circles, which are team approaches to identifying and resolving work-related
problems, became popular in some businesses. So, too, did participative
management efforts, which gave a wider variety of people opportunities to
comment on—and implement—new ideas in the workplace. One prominent
organizational behavior scientist, William Ouchi, recommended that American
companies integrate more Japanese management concepts into their management
practices. His approach became known as Theory Z.
ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE
For example, one of the most visible trends in corporate America since the 1980s
has been the rise of sudden mass layoffs at large corporations, or downsizing. This
clearly represents one of the largest kinds of changes a company might face, and
its scope affects not only the workers who lose their jobs but also those who remain.
Researchers have found that downsizing can have both positive and negative
effects on the employees who stay on. In some cases, for example, layoffs can
induce employees to work harder and engage in other behaviors that benefit the
company. One obvious explanation is that these workers might fear losing their jobs
if they don't improve their performance, but there are likely other reasons as well,
such as a move to fill a performance vacuum left by the departing workers. Still,
other workers may respond by diminishing their performance; they may be
demoralized by the corporate policies and may lower their mental and emotional
investment in their jobs.
More broadly, scholars like psychologist Kurt Lewin have identified basic models for
managing change in organizations. In Lewin's widely cited three-step process,
outlined in his 1951 classic Field Theory in Social Science, management must first
"unfreeze" the status quo in the organization, facilitate a move to a new set of
practices or environment, and then solidify or "refreeze" the new practices or
environment into a permanent state. The process of unfreezing the current status
involves introducing new policies or initiatives that begin to actively move
employees away from the old way of doing things and/or removing policies or
practices that tie them to the old. The second step, the shift to the new practices, is
the formal implementation of the changes, for example, reorganizing a division or
closing a branch office. Third, during refreezing management must solidify the
changes by ensuring all the policies and practices are now geared toward
maintaining the new equilibrium, and not throwbacks to the supplanted practices or
lingering transition measures that create an atmosphere of instability or
uncertainty.
Today, organizational behavior scientists are dealing with a wide range of problems
confronting the business world. For instance, they continue to study downsizing,
career development in the global economy, social issues such as substance abuse
and changes in family composition, and the global economy. They are trying to
determine just what effects such factors are having on the workplace and what can
be done to alleviate associated problems.
[ Arthur G. Sharp ]
FURTHER READING:
Mishra, Aneil K., and Gretchen M. Spreitzer. "Explaining How Survivors Respond to
Downsizing: The Roles of Trust, Empowerment, Justice, and Work
Redesign." Academy of Management Review, July 1998.