FACULTY OF COMMERCE

Graduate Programs

MBA 105

ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR

STUDY MANUAL

Compliled from various sources and authors

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Module Outcomes:
· Analyse the various human behaviours in relation to the well-founded scientific and classic
behaviour theories.
· Demonstrate expertise in the acquired tools especially in people management, and if need,
be use them for conflict management.
Course Content
• Developments in early management thoughts using the Scientific and Classical
management approaches.
• Organisational behaviour in our dynamic and changing world.
• Organisational process, communication and people management.
• Groups and group processes.
• People in organisations.
• Leadership and the management of performance, the management of conflict,
motivational and interpersonal skills.
• Job satisfaction and its relationship to performance.

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UNIT 1: WHAT IS ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR?

Introduction

Managers need to develop their interpersonal or people skills if they are going to be effective
in their jobs. Organizational behaviour (OB) is a field of study that investigates the impact
that individuals, groups, and structure have on behaviour within an organization, and then
applies that knowledge to make organizations work more effectively. Specifically, OB
focuses on how to improve productivity, reduce absenteeism and turnover, and increase
employee citizenship and job satisfaction.

We all hold generalizations about the behaviour of people. Some of our generalizations may
provide valid insights into human behaviour, but many are erroneous. Organizational
behaviour uses systematic study to improve predictions of behavior that would be made from
intuition alone. Yet, because people are different, we need to look at OB in a contingency
framework, using situational variables to moderate cause-effect relationships.

Organizational behaviour offers both challenges and opportunities for managers. It

recognizes differences and helps managers to see the value of workforce diversity and
practices that may need to be changed when managing in different countries. It can help
improve quality and employee productivity by showing managers how to empower their
people as well as how to design and implement change programs. It offers specific insights to
improve a manager’s people skills. In times of rapid and ongoing change, faced by most
managers today, OB can help managers cope in a world of “temporariness” and learn ways to
stimulate innovation. Finally, OB can offer managers guidance in creating an ethically
healthy work climate.

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What Manager’s Do

A. Importance of Developing Managers’ Interpersonal Skills

• Companies with reputations as a good place to work—such as City of

Windhoek, NAMPOWER, Ministry of Justice, Air Namibia, TRansNamib,
Namibia Brewery- have a big advantage when attracting high performing
employees.

• A recent national study of the U.S. workforce found that:

• Wages and fringe benefits are not the reason people like their jobs or
stay with an employer.
• More important to workers is the job quality and the supportiveness of
the work environments.

• Managers’ good interpersonal skills are likely to make the workplace more
pleasant, which in turn makes it easier to hire and retain high performing
employees.

Definitions:

Manager: Someone who gets things done through other people.

They make decisions, allocate resources, and direct the activities of
others to attain goals.

Organization: A consciously coordinated social unit composed of two

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 or more people, that functions on a relatively continuous basis to
achieve a common goal or set of goals.

B. Management Functions

. French industrialist Henri Fayol wrote that all managers perform five
management functions: plan, organize, command, coordinate, and control.
Modern management scholars have condensed to four: planning,
organizing, leading, and controlling.

1. Planning requires a manager to:

• Define goals (organizational, departmental, worker levels)

• Establish an overall strategy for achieving those goals
• Develop a comprehensive hierarchy of plans to integrate and coordinate
activities.
Plans are prepared to give guidelines to managers for what they are
going to do in the department for a period of 1 to 12 months or 1 to 5
years. Advantages:
• Planning promotes cooperation between the various departments
and individuals in an institution.
• Planning gives direction to an institution and helps to formulate
objectives and shape plans how to achieve objectives.
• Planning forces managers to look to the future. This eliminates
crisis management, threats, and weaknesses in the environment
and takes steps to overcome them.
Barriers to planning include:
• Human factors can cause plans to fail
• Ineffective organizational systems
• Management’s attitudes towards planning
To overcome barriers to effective planning includes:
• Information must be sufficient, correct, reliable and relevant
• Planning must start long before implementation

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 • Planning must always start at top management level
• Planning must be within the framework of the main objective
and policy of the institution
• Planning procedures should be systematic

2. Organizing requires a manager to:

• Determine what tasks are to be done

• Who is to be assigned the tasks
• How the tasks are to be grouped
• Who reports to whom
• Where decisions are to be made (centralized/decentralized)

3. Leading requires a manager to:

• Motivate employees
• Direct the activities of others
• Select the most effective communication channels
• Resolve conflicts among members

4. Control requires a manager to:

• Inspect an institution or person
• Submit reports or accounts
• Arrange official to report to or answer questions posed by the
controlling or supervising officials.

B. Management Functions (cont.)

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C. Management Roles

• In the late 1960s, Henry Mintzberg studied five executives to determine

what managers did on their jobs. He concluded that managers perform ten
different, highly interrelated roles or sets of behaviors attributable to their
jobs.

The ten roles can be grouped as being primarily concerned with

interpersonal relationships, the transfer of information, and decision
making. (Exhibit 1-1)

• Interpersonal roles

• Figurehead—duties that are ceremonial and symbolic in nature

• Leadership—hire, train, motivate, and discipline employees
• Liaison—contact outsiders who provide the manager with information.
These may be individuals or groups inside or outside the organization.

• Informational roles

• Monitor—collect information from organizations and institutions

outside their own
• Disseminator—a conduit to transmit information to organizational
members
• Spokesperson—represent the organization to outsiders

• Decisional roles

• Entrepreneur—managers initiate and oversee new projects that will

improve their organization’s performance
• Disturbance handlers—take corrective action in response to unforeseen
problems
• Resource allocators—responsible for allocating human, physical, and

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 monetary resources
• Negotiator role—discuss issues and bargain with other units to gain
advantages for their own unit

D. Management Skills

1. Robert Katz has identified three essential management skills: technical,

human, and conceptual.

2. Technical skills

· The ability to apply specialized knowledge or expertise. All jobs require

some specialized expertise, and many people develop their technical
skills on the job.

3. Human skills

· The ability to work with, understand, and motivate other people, both
individually and in groups, describes human skills.
· Many people are technically proficient but interpersonally incompetent.

D. Management Skills

4. Conceptual skills

· The mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex situations

· Decision making, for example, requires managers to spot problems,

identify alternatives that can correct them, evaluate those alternatives,
and select the best one.

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E. Effective vs. Successful Managerial Activities

1. Fred Luthans and his associates asked: Do managers who move up most
quickly in an organization do the same activities and with the same emphasis
as managers who do the best job? Surprisingly, those managers who were the
most effective were not necessarily promoted the fastest.

2. Luthans and his associates studied more than 450 managers. They found that
all managers engage in four managerial activities.
· Traditional management—Decision making, planning, and controlling.
The average manager spent 32 percent of his or her time performing this
activity.

· Communication—Exchanging routine information and processing

paperwork. The average manager spent 29 percent of his or her time
performing this activity.

· Human resource management—Motivating, disciplining, managing

conflict, staffing, and training. The average manager spent 20 percent of
his or her time performing this activity.

· Networking—Socializing, politicking, and interacting with outsiders. The

average manager spent 19 percent of his or her time performing this
activity.

3. Successful managers—defined as those who were promoted the fastest.

· Networking made the largest relative contribution to success.

· Human resource management activities made the least relative

contribution.

4. Effective managers—defined as quality and quantity of performance, as well

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 as, commitment to employees:

· Communication made the largest relative contribution.

· Networking made the least relative contribution.

5. Successful managers do not give the same emphasis to each of those activities
as do effective managers—it almost the opposite of effective managers.

6. This finding challenges the historical assumption that promotions are based on
performance, vividly illustrating the importance that social and political skills
play in getting ahead in organizations.

F. A Review of the Manager’s Job

1. One common thread runs through the functions, roles, skills, and activities
approaches to management: managers need to develop their people skills if
they are going to be effective and successful.

Organizational Behavior:
Definition:
Organizational Behavior: OB is a field of study that investigates the impact that
individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior within organizations for the
purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organization’s
effectiveness.

A. Organizational behavior is a field of study.

1. OB studies three determinants of behavior in organizations: individuals,

groups, and structure.
2. OB applies the knowledge gained about individuals, groups, and the effect of
structure on behavior in order to make organizations work more effectively.
3. OB is concerned with the study of what people do in an organization and how

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 that behavior affects the performance of the organization.
4. There is increasing agreement as to the components of OB, but there is still
considerable debate as to the relative importance of each: motivation, leader
behavior and power, interpersonal communication, group structure and
processes, learning, attitude development and perception, change processes,
conflict, work design, and work stress.

Replacing Intuition with Systematic Study

A. Introduction

1. Each of us is a student of behavior:

A casual or commonsense approach to reading others can often lead to erroneous
predictions.

You can improve your predictive ability by replacing your intuitive opinions with
a more systematic approach.
The systematic approach used in this book will uncover important facts and
relationships and will provide a base from which more accurate predictions of
behavior can be made.
Behavior generally is predictable if we know how the person perceived the
situation and what is important to him or her.
While people’s behavior may not appear to be rational to an outsider, there is
reason to believe it usually is intended to be rational by the individual and that they
see their behavior as rational.

2.There are certain fundamental consistencies underlying the behavior of all

individuals that can be identified and then modified to reflect individual
differences.

· These fundamental consistencies allow predictability.

· There are rules (written and unwritten) in almost every setting.
· Therefore, it can be argued that it is possible to predict behavior.
3. When we use the phrase systematic study, we mean looking at gathered
information under controlled conditions and measured and interpreted in a

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 reasonably rigorous manner.
4. Systematic study replaces intuition, or those “gut feelings” about “why I do
what I do”
and “what makes others tick.” We want to move away from intuition to analysis
when predicting behavior.

Contributing Disciplines to the OB Field

A. Introduction

1. Organizational behavior is an applied behavioral science that is built upon

contributions from a number of behavioral disciplines.

2. The predominant areas are psychology, sociology, social psychology,

anthropology, and political science.

3. Exhibit 1-3 overviews the major contributions to the study of organizational

behavior.

B. Psychology

1. Psychology is the science that seeks to measure, explain, and sometimes

change the behavior of humans and other animals.
2. Early industrial/organizational psychologists concerned themselves with
problems of fatigue, boredom, and other factors relevant to working conditions
that could impede efficient work performance.

3. More recently, their contributions have been expanded to include learning,

perception, personality, emotions, training, leadership effectiveness, needs and
motivational forces, job satisfaction, decision making processes, performance
appraisals, attitude measurement, employee selection techniques, work design,
and job stress.

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 C. Sociology

1. Sociologists study the social system in which individuals fill their roles; that is,
sociology studies people in relation to their fellow human beings.
2. Their greatest contribution to OB is through their study of group behavior in
organizations, particularly formal and complex organizations.

D. Social Psychology

1. Social psychology blends the concepts of psychology and sociology.

2. It focuses on the influence of people on one another.
3. Major area—how to implement it and how to reduce barriers to its acceptance

E. Anthropology

1. Anthropology is the study of societies to learn about human beings and their
activities.
2. Anthropologists work on cultures and environments; for instance, they have
helped us understand differences in fundamental values, attitudes, and behavior
among people in different countries and within different organizations.

F. Political Science

1. Frequently overlooked as a contributing discipline.

2. Political science studies the behavior of individuals and groups within a
political environment.

Challenges and Opportunities for OB

A. Introduction

1. There are many challenges and opportunities today for managers to use OB
concepts.

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B. Responding to Globalization

1. Organizations are no longer constrained by national borders.

2. Globalization affects a manager’s people skills in at least two ways.
· First, if you are a manager, you are increasingly likely to find yourself in a
foreign assignment.
· Second, even in your own country, you are going to find yourself working
with bosses, peers, and other employees who were born and raised in
different cultures.

C. Managing Workforce Diversity

1. Workforce diversity is one of the most important and broad-based challenges

currently facing organizations.
2. While globalization focuses on differences between people from different
countries, workforce diversity addresses differences among people within
given countries.
3. Workforce diversity means that organizations are becoming more
heterogeneous in terms of gender, race, and ethnicity. It is an issue in Canada,
Australia, South Africa, Japan, and Europe as well as the United States.
4. A melting-pot approach assumed people who were different would
automatically assimilate.
5. Employees do n ot set aside their cultural values and lifestyle preferences when
they come to work.
C. Managing Workforce Diversity (cont.)

6. The melting pot assumption is replaced by one that recognizes and values
differences.
7. Members of diverse groups were a small percentage of the workforce and
were, for the most part, ignored by large organizations (pe-1980s); now:
· 47 percent of the U.S. labor force are women
· Minorities and immigrants make up 23 percent

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 · More workers than ever are unmarried with no children.
8. Workforce diversity has important implications for management practice.
· Shift to recognizing differences and responding to those differences
· Providing diversity training and revamping benefit programs to
accommodate the different needs of employees

D. Improving Quality and Productivity

1. Total quality management (TQM) is a philosophy of management that is driven

by the constant attainment of customer satisfaction through the continuous
improvement of all organizational processes. Total Quality Management / TQM is
an integrative philosophy of management for continuously improving the quality
of products and processes.

TQM is based on the premise that the quality of products and processes is the
responsibility of everyone involved with the creation or consumption of the
products or services which are offered by an organization, requiring the
involvement of management, workforce, suppliers, and customers, to meet or
exceed customer expectations.

2. Implementing quality programs requires extensive employee involvement (

3. Process reengineering asks the question: “How would we do things around
here if we were starting over from scratch?”
· Every process is evaluated in terms of contribution to goals
· Rather than make incremental changes, often old systems are eliminated
entirely and replaced with new systems.
4. To improve productivity and quality, managers must include employees.

E. Responding to the Labour Shortage

1. If trends continue as expected, the U.S. will have a labour shortage for the next
10-15 years (particularly in skilled positions).
2. The labour shortage is a function of low birth rates and labour participation
rates (immigration does little to solve the problem).

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3. Wages and benefits are not enough to keep talented workers. Managers must
understand human behaviour and respond accordingly.

F. Improving Customer Service and People Skills

1. The majority of employees in developed countries work in service jobs—jobs

that require substantive interaction with the firm’s customers. For example, 80
percent of U.S. workers are employed in service industries.
2. Employee attitudes and behaviour are directly related to customer satisfaction
requiring management to create a customer responsive culture.
3. People skills are essential to managerial effectiveness.
4. OB provides the concepts and theories that allow managers to predict
employee behaviour in given situations.

G. Empowering People

1. Today managers are being called coaches, advisers, sponsors, or facilitators,

and in many organizations, employees are now called associates.
2. There is a blurring between the roles of managers and workers; decision
making is being pushed down to the operating level, where workers are being
given the freedom to make choices about schedules and procedures and to solve
work-related problems.

3. Managers are empowering employees.

· They are putting employees in charge of what they do.
· Managers have to learn how to give up control.
· Employees have to learn how to take responsibility for their work and make
appropriate decisions.

H. Coping with “Temporariness”

1. Managers have always been concerned with change:

· What is different today is the length of time between changes
· Change is an ongoing activity for most managers. The concept of

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 continuous improvement, for instance, implies constant change
· In the past, managing could be characterized by long periods of stability,
interrupted occasionally by short periods of change.
· Today, long periods of ongoing change are interrupted occasionally by
short periods of stability!
2. Permanent “temporariness”:
· Both managers and employees must learn to live with flexibility,
spontaneity, and unpredictability
· The jobs that workers perform are in a permanent state of flux, so workers
need to continually update their knowledge and skills to perform new job
requirements.
3. Work groups are also increasingly in a state of flux.
· Predictability has been replaced by temporary work groups, teams that
include members from different departments and whose members change
all the time, and the increased use of employee rotation to fill constantly
changing work assignments.
4. Organizations themselves are in a state of flux.
· They reorganize their various divisions, sell off poor-performing
businesses, downsize operations, subcontract non-critical services and
operations to other organizations, and replace permanent employees with
temporaries.

I. Stimulating Innovation and Change

1. Successful organizations must foster innovation and the art of change.

2. Companies that maintain flexibility, continually improve quality, and beat their
competition to the marketplace with innovative products and services will be
tomorrow’s winners.
3. Employees are critical to an organization’s ability to change and innovate.

J. Helping Employees Balance Work-Life Conflicts

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 1. The creation of the global workforce means work no longer sleeps. Workers
are on-call 24-hours a day or working non-traditional shifts.
2. Communication technology has provided a vehicle for working at any time or
any place.
3. Employees are working longer hours per week—from 43 to 47 hours per week
since 1977.
4. The lifestyles of families have changes creating conflict: more dual career
couples and single parents find it hard to fulfil commitments to home, children,
spouse, parents, and friends.
5. Employees want jobs that allow flexibility and provide time for a “life.”

K. Improving Ethical Behaviour

1. In an organizational world characterized by cutbacks, expectations of

increasing worker productivity, and tough competition, many employees feel
pressured to engage in questionable practices.
2. Members of organizations are increasingly finding themselves facing ethical
dilemmas in which they are required to define right and wrong conduct.
3. Examples of decisions employees might have to make are:
· “Blowing the whistle” on illegal activities
· Following orders with which they do not personally agree
· Possibly giving inflated performance evaluations that could save an
employee’s job
· Playing politics to help with career advancement, etc.
4. Organizations are responding to this issue by:
· Writing and distributing codes of ethics
· Providing in-house advisors
· Creating protection mechanisms for employees who reveal internal
unethical practices
5. Managers need to create an ethically healthy environment for employees
where they confront a minimal degree of ambiguity regarding right or wrong
behaviours.

Coming Attractions: Developing an OB Model

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A. Overview

1. A model is an abstraction of reality, a simplified representation of some real-

world phenomenon.
2. There are three levels of analysis in OB:
· Individual
· Group
· Organizational Systems Level
3. The three basic levels are analogous to building blocks; each level is
constructed upon the previous level.
4. Group concepts grow out of the foundation laid in the individual section; we
overlay structural constraints on the individual and group in order to arrive at
organizational behaviour.

B. The Dependent Variables

1. Dependent variables are the key factors that you want to explain or predict
and that are affected by some other factor.
2. Primary dependent variables in OB:
· Productivity
· Absenteeism
· Turnover
· Job satisfaction
· A fifth variable—organizational citizenship—has been added to this list.

C. Productivity

1. It is achieving goals by transferring inputs to outputs at the lowest cost. This

must be done both effectively and efficiency.
2. An organization is effective when it successfully meets the needs of its
clientele or customers
· Example: When sales or market share goals are met, productivity also
depends on achieving those goals efficiently

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3. An organization is efficient when it can do so at a low cost.
· Popular measures of efficiency include: ROI, profit per dollar of sales,
and output per hour of labour.
4. Productivity is a major concern of OB: What factors influence the
effectiveness and efficiency of individuals, groups and the company?

D. Absenteeism

1. Absenteeism is the failure to report to work.

2. Estimated annual cost—over $40 billion for U.S. organizations; $12 billion
for Canadian firms; more than 60 billion Deutsch Marks (U.S. $35.5 billion)
each year in Germany

3. A one-day absence by a clerical worker can cost a U.S. employer up to $100

in reduced efficiency and increased supervisory workload.
4. The workflow is disrupted and often important decisions must be delayed.
5. All absences are not bad. For instance, illness, fatigue, or excess stress can
decrease an employee’s productivity—it may well be better to not report to
work rather than perform poorly.

E. Turnover

1. Turnover is the voluntary and involuntary permanent withdrawal from an

organization.
2. A high turnover rate results in increased recruiting, selection, and training
costs; costs estimated at about $15,000 per employee.

3. All organizations have some turnover and the “right” people leaving—under-
performing employees—thereby creating opportunity for promotions, and
adding new/fresh ideas, and replacing marginal employees with higher skilled
workers.
4. Turnover often involves the loss of people the organization does not want to
lose.

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F. Organizational citizenship

1. Organizational citizenship is discretionary behaviour that is not part of an

employee’s formal job requirements, but that nevertheless promotes the
effective functioning of the organization.
2. Desired citizenship behaviours include:
· Constructive statements about work group and organization
· Helping others on their team
· Volunteering for extra job activities
· Avoiding unnecessary conflicts
· Showing care for organizational property
· Respecting rules and regulations
· Tolerating occasional work-related impositions.

G. Job satisfaction

1. Job satisfaction is “the difference between the amount of rewards workers

receive and the amount they believe they should receive.”
2. Unlike the previous three variables, job satisfaction represents an attitude
rather than a behaviour.
3. It became a primary dependent variable for two reasons:
· Demonstrated relationship to performance factors
· The value preferences held by many OB researchers

4. Managers have believed for years that satisfied employees are more
productive, however:
· Much evidence questions that assumed causal relationship
· It can be argued that advanced societies should be concerned not just with
the quantity of life, but also with the quality of life
· Ethically, organizations have a responsibility to provide employees with
jobs that are challenging and intrinsically rewarding.

H. The Independent Variables

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1. Organizational behaviour is best understood when viewed essentially as a set
of increasingly complex building blocks: individual, group, and
organizational system.
2. The base, or first level, of our model lies in understanding individual
behaviour.

3. Individual-level variables:
· People enter organizations with certain characteristics that will influence
their behaviour at work.
· The more obvious of these are personal or biographical characteristics
such as age, gender, and marital status; personality characteristics; an
inherent emotional framework; values and attitudes; and basic ability
levels.
· There is little management can do to alter them, yet they have a very real
impact on employee behaviour.

H. The Independent Variables (cont.)

4. There are four other individual-level variables that have been shown to affect
employee behaviour:
· Perception
· Individual decision making
· Learning
· Motivation
5. The middle level of our model lies in understanding behavior of groups.
6. Group-level variables:
· The behavior of people in groups is more than the sum total of all the
individuals acting in their own way.
· People behave differently in groups than they do when alone.
· People in groups are influenced by:
a. Acceptable standards of behavior by the group
b. Degree of attractiveness to each other

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 c. Communication patterns
d. Leadership and power
e. Levels of conflict

7. The top level of our model lies in understanding organizations system level
variables
8. Organizational behavior reaches its highest level of sophistication when we
add formal structure.
9. The design of the formal organization, work processes, and jobs; the
organization’s human resource policies and practices, and the internal culture,
all have an impact.

I. Toward a Contingency OB Model

1. The model does not explicitly identify the vast number of contingency
variables..
2. We will introduce important contingency variables that will improve the
explanatory linkage between the independent and dependent variables in our
OB model.
3. The concepts of change and stress are included in Exhibit 1-7, acknowledging
the dynamics of behavior and the fact that work stress is an individual, group,
and organizational issues.

Summary and Implications for Managers

1. Managers need to develop their interpersonal skills.

2. OB is a field that investigates the impact of individuals, groups, and structure on an
organization.
3. OB focuses on improving productivity, reducing absenteeism and turnover, and
increasing employee citizenship and job satisfaction.

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UNIT 2 UNDERSTANDING WORK TEAMS

Introduction

Teamwork is defined as "a joint action by a group of people, in which each person
subordinates his or her individual interests and opinions to the unity and efficiency of the
group." The most effective teamwork is produced when all the individuals involved
harmonize their contributions and work towards a common goal.

Difference Between Work Groups and Teams:

Work Groups Teams

Individual accountability Individual and mutual accountability

Come together to share Frequently come together for discussion, decision

information and perspectives making, problem solving, and planning.

Focus on individual goals Focus on team goals

Produce individual work Produce collective work products

products

Define individual roles, Define individual roles, responsibilities, and tasks to

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 responsibilities, and tasks help team do its work; often share and rotate them

Concern with one's own Concern with outcomes of everyone and challenges
outcome and challenges the team faces

Purpose, goals, approach to Purpose, goals, approach to work shaped by team

work shaped by manager leader with team members

Groups

We define a group as a human communication system made up of at least three people

coming together for achieving goals. Each person on the group influences one another and is
influenced by one another—much like tossing a pebble in a pond, you can watch how that
action has a ripple effect on the water. If the pebble were akin to human behavior, you can
see how the actions of one member in the group affects the other members of the group and
the success or failure of the group as a whole in achieving their goals.

Differences between groups and teams

A group is informal and meets to solve short-term problems. A team solves long-term
problems and includes more coordination and structure.

Work groups function on three levels:

• Dependent level

• Independent level

• Interdependent level

Dependent-level work groups

Dependent-level work groups are the traditional work unit or department groups with a
supervisor who plays a strong role as the boss. Almost everyone has had some experience
with this work setup, especially in a first job.

Independent-level work groups

Independent-level work groups staff members work on their own assignments with general
direction and minimal supervision. Sales representatives, research scientists, accountants,

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lawyers, police officers, librarians, and teachers are among the professionals who tend to
work in this fashion. People in those occupations come together in one department because
they serve a common overall function, but almost everyone in the group works fairly
independently. If members of an independent-level work group receive the managerial
guidance and support they need on the job, such a work group can perform quite well.

Interdependent-level work groups

Members of an interdependent-level work group rely on each other to get the work done.
Sometimes members have their own roles and at other times they share responsibilities. Yet,
in either case, they coordinate with one another to produce an overall product or set of
outcomes. When this interdependence exists, you have a team. And by capitalizing on
interdependence, the team demonstrates the truth of the old saying: The whole is greater than
the sum of its parts.

Types of teams are:

The problem-solving team is usually an assemblage put together to solve a particular

problem or improve activities within their own department. Once they conduct research and
arrive at a proposed solution, they present their findings to the proper person or panel who
may or may not implement the recommended course of action.

Formal self-managed work teams operate independent of a supervisor and are given
authority to complete an assignment, coordinate across departments, and allow team
members to select tasks they would like to undertake manage and execute themselves. At the
end, they are all held accountable equally.

Cross-functional teams on the other hand are comprised of members from a diversity of
specialized backgrounds. For example, a content delivery network account representative
may request a conference call with a customer, to which he may invite a solutions engineer, a
channel sales director, an account development representative, and a professional services
member. The expertise and information each brings to the table will aid in a smoother more
efficient sales process that is not only practical but may spur the customer to request a
purchase order.

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The virtual team is composed of members that are dispersed in different areas, but are still
able to work together by using technology to assist them in accomplishing their
communications objectives.

Creating effective teams

Twelve Ways to Build an Effective Team

1. Clarify the common goals and purposes. Make the team’s purposes clear. Take the time
to articulate the team’s performance goals and how the team contributes to the company’s
success.

2. Clarify each person’s role in achieving the common purpose. Define each person’s
job in terms of its contribution to the group’s and the company’s overall goals. This must be
done in specific terms, not in vague generalities.
3. Put team members in touch with the people who use what they do. Confirm the needs
of the team’s external or internal customers or clients on an ongoing basis. For example,

4. Pay attention to conflicts when they arise. It’s natural for conflict to arise when people
work in groups. Conflict, handled well, can actually produce constructive ideas. Sometimes
team members will annoy each other, step on each other’s toes, or hurt each other’s feelings.
Honest disagreements can become personal and heated. Work processes that seemed efficient
can break down. It’s important to recognize that some degree of conflict among co-workers is
normal. Let problems come to the surface.

5. Establish clear ground rules so that people can have their say without being
interrupted, rushed, mocked, or intimidated. Encourage employees to solve problems
themselves when they can so that you aren’t always in the middle of every conflict between
team members. However, if they cannot solve them, it’s important that they can count on you
to coach them through a problem-solving framework that allows them to build conflict
resolution skills for the future.

6. Remember your leadership role. While you need to encourage your employees to feel a
healthy “ownership” of the team’s work, you need to avoid trying to be “just one of the

27
team.” Hold each employee responsible for meeting goals and for solving or helping to solve
problems.

7. Make sure team members interact at meetings. Encourage team members to ask each
other for help and to offer it to each other, without channeling it all through you. Synergy on
teams is achieved when team members feel comfortable speaking up with suggestions that
build on the creativity of other team members. This requires collaboration not competition.
Dominance of a group by a manager or supervisor can limit the chances a group has to
achieve real synergy.

8. Allow team members to have input into their jobs. When you can, give your employees
flexibility on how they meet their work goals. Encourage employees to make suggestions
about changes in what they do and how they do it, based on their direct and daily experience
of what works, what doesn’t work, and what could work better. Of course, the only way to
encourage employees to make suggestions over the long run is to show them that you will act
on some of their suggestions.

9. Make sure there is room for minority or unpopular views. Teams can easily slip into
“group thinks,” especially when they are successful. Those who see flaws in the way the
group does things, or who see improvements that could be made, may be politely ignored or
even treated with hostility.

10. Appraise and reward the team as a whole. As with an individual performance review,
compare the team’s performance to what was expected of it. Plan small celebrations of the
team achieving important milestones. Acknowledgments of incremental successes can be
more motivating than big end-of-project rewards..

11. Appraise and reward each employee individually, including a review of his or her
teamwork. As members of a team, the expectations and criteria for their performance include
showing a spirit of cooperation, developing conflict resolution skills, engaging in good
communication with others, and being willing to help others solve problems or get through
crunch efforts. if feasible, encourage all team members to provide meaningful feedback to
one another.

28
12. Communicate team successes. If possible, let the whole company know what your team
has accomplished. Include a specific description of what you did, why it’s important to the
company, and what challenges had to be overcome. Name people who made key
contributions, including those outside your group.
Turning individuals into team players

Following a restructure of our organization we have a small number of managers who now,
after many years working as individual decision makers, have to learn to work together, be
resourceful, share, and be innovative and creative for each other. This is because:

• Team skills are needed and valued by employers.

• To develop the interpersonal skills necessary in understanding teams.

• To capitalize on complementary skills leading to improvements in productivity and

performance.

• Synergy is building a force that is greater than the sum of its parts.

• A team generates positive synergy through coordinated effort which results in a level
of performance that is greater than the sum of the individual inputs.

Teams are appropriate in organisation when:

• Sundry specialized knowledge

• Varied experience

• Multiple skills

• Extended abilities

• Prudent judgments are needed.

Why Teach Teams?

• Team skills are needed and valued by employers

• Team skills are needed and valued by employers

• Teams require strong interpersonal skills

29
 • Team members complement each other in their work

• Team members have multiple skills

• Improved problem solving and better judgment

Successful teams must have the following skills distributed among its members:

• Technical expertise skills

• Problem solving/decision making skills

• Communication skills

Role Perspectives

• Role perception is how the individual believes he or she is to act in a given situation.

• Role expectation is what others believe or expect of us is our role.

• Role conflict may occur when the role perception and the role expectation are not
congruent.

• Social Loafing or Coasting - is the tendency for individuals to put forth just enough
effort to get by when working with teams.

Features of High Performance Teams:

• Specific goals

• Commitment to common purpose

• Leadership and structure

• Individual and joint accountability

• Appropriate evaluation and reward systems

• High mutual trust

Diversity within a team provides:

• Varied judgment

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 • Varied experiences

• Multiple skills

When the above are required, diversity will improve performance.

• Creator. .Initiates creative ideas

• Promoter. .Champions ideas

• Assessor. .Offers insightful analysis

• Organizer. .Provides structure

• Producer. .Provides direction

• Controller. . Enforces rules

• Maintainer. .Fights external battles

• Advisor. .Encourages others

• Linker. .Coordinates and integrates

What About Gender Differences in Teams?

• For a given task, the differences between men and women in team leadership
roles and team performance are not that great.

• The environmental differences between cultures can create, on average,

fundamental differences between groups of people.

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UNIT 3 FOUNDATIONS OF GROUP BEHAVIOUR

• crowd "hysteria"

• spectators - when a group of people gathered together on purpose to participate in an

event like theatre play, cinema movie, football match, a concert, etc.

• public - exception to the rule that the group must occupy the same physical place.
People watching same channel on television may react in the same way, as they are
occupying the same type of place - in front of television - although they may
physically be doing this all over the world.

Why do people join groups?

Reasons are:

32
 • Companionship – groups provide members to simply be in the company of other
people.

• Survival and security – From a historic or evolutionary perspective our ancestors

would partake in group experiences for hunting and defence.

• Affiliation and status – membership into various groups can provide individuals with
certain socials status' or security.

• Power and control– with group membership comes the opportunity for leadership
roles; individuals who feel they need to exert their power and opinions over others can
have such experiences within group settings.

• Achievement – groups have the capability to achieve more than individuals acting
alone.

Defining characteristics of groups: They are:

• Interdependence: In order for an individual of the collective to accomplish their part

in the assigned task they depend, to some degree, on the outputs of other members of
the collective.

• Social interaction: In order to accomplish the goal some form of verbal or nonverbal
communication is required to take place amongst the members of the collective.

• Perception of a group: All members of the collective must agree they are, in fact,
part of a group.

• Commonality of purpose: All the members of the collective come together to serve
or attain a common goal.

• Favoritism: Members of the same group tend to be positively prejudiced toward

other members and tend to discriminate in their favor.

Types of groups:

Group types are routinely distinguished by the work that the groups do:

• Production groups consist of front line employees who produce some tangible
output. Autonomous production groups are self-directed or self-managing while semi-
autonomous production groups typically have a dedicated supervisor who oversees all
operations.

33
 • Service groups consist of employees that work with customers on a repeated basis,
such as airline teams, maintenance groups, sales groups, call centres, etc.

• Management groups consist of an executive or senior manager along with managers

that report directly to him/her. Management groups are often able to organize
themselves towards goals such as policy making, budgeting, staffing, and planning.

• Project groups are generally cross-function groups of individuals brought together

for the duration of a specific, time-limited project. Project groups are usually
disbanded once the project is complete.

• Action and performing groups are groups that typically consist of expert specialists
who conduct complex, time-limited performance events. Examples include musical
bands, military crews, surgery teams, rescue units or professional music groups.

• Advisory groups consist of employees that work outside of, but parallel with,
production processes. Examples include quality circles, selection committees, or other
advisory groups pulled together to make recommendations to an organization.

Group structure includes:

A role can be defined as a tendency to behave, contribute and interrelate with others in a
particular way. Roles may be assigned formally, but more often are defined through the
process of role differentiation.

Group norms are the informal rules that groups adopt to regulate members' behaviour.
Norms refer to what should be done and represent value judgments about appropriate
behaviour in social situations. Although they are infrequently written down or even
discussed, norms have powerful influence on group behaviour.

Group values are goals or ideas that serve as guiding principles for the group. Like norms,
values may be communicated either explicitly or on an ad hoc basis. Values can serve as a
rallying point for the team. However, some values (such as conformity) can also be
dysfunction and lead to poor decisions by the team.

Communication patterns describe the flow of information within the group and they are
typically described as either centralized or decentralized. With a centralized pattern,
communications tend to flow from one source to all group members. Centralized
communications allow consistent, standardization information but they may restrict the free

34
flow of information. Decentralized communications allow information to be shared directly
between members of the group. When decentralized, communications tend to flow more
freely, but the delivery of information may not be as fast or accurate as with centralized
communications. Another potential downside of decentralized communications is the sheer
volume of information that can be generated, particularly with electronic media.

Status differentials are the relative differences in status among group members. Status can
be determined by a variety of factors, including expertise, occupation, age, gender or ethnic
origin. Status differentials may affect the relative amount of pay among group members and
they may also affect the group's tolerance to violation of group norms (i.e. people with higher
status are given more freedom to violate group norms).

Stages of group development:

The most common of these models is Tuckman's (1965) Stage Model. It breaks group
development into the following five stages.

• Forming: As the group convenes, conflict is usually low to non-existent as everyone

tries to determine their individual role and the personalities of fellow team members.
This stage is often marked by agreeable neutrality while the group takes form and
begins to navigate the unknown.

• Storming: Storming occurs after the group overcomes the sense of uncertainty and
begins to actively explore roles and boundaries. Chaos, pronounced efforts to
influence others, and instances of conflict and/or enthusiasm are common.

• Norming: Norming in groups indicate that norms and role ownership are emerging.
Generally this means that conflict and chaos is decreasing or has ended.

• Performing: Originally noted as the final stage, performing occurs when the team
completes their primary task(s).

• Adjourning: Tuckman (1977) refined the model to include a fifth stage to address
how the group begins to disengage and move on to new tasks potentially beyond the
team.

Impact Of Group Properties On Performance

The mere presence of others

35
Perhaps the most fundamental feature of groups is the presence of other people. Some
interesting research has focused on the effects of the mere presence of others on an
individual's task performance. In these studies, an individual asked to perform a task without
interacting with others who are present. Results of such studies indicate that having others
nearby tends to facilitate performance on relative simple and well-rehearsed tasks. However,
for fairly complex tasks, the presence of others can have a determinant effect. The positive
effect of others being present is called the social facilitation effect, while the detrimental
effect is termed the social inhibition effect.
Size

Group size has detectable effects on group performance. In larger groups, the potential
impact and contribution of each individual are somewhat diminished, but the total resources
of the group are increased. Administering a larger group also creates unique problems for
managers.

Composition
How well a group performs a task depends in large part on the task-relevant resources of its
members. The diversity versus redundancy of members’ traits and abilities, then, is an
important factor in explaining group performance. Groups composed of highly similar
individuals who hold common beliefs and have much the same abilities are likely to view a
task from a single perspective. Such solidarity can be productive, but it may also mean that
members will lack a critical ingredient for unravelling certain kinds of problems.

Roles
Every member of a group has a differentiated set of activities to perform. The set of expected
behaviours relating to an individual's position within a group is called a role. Although the
term role seems familiar enough (we can each easily define the roles of school teachers,
managers, students, and others) it can be viewed in several different ways.

A person's expected role is the formal role that is defined in a job description or manual. A
perceived role is the set of activities that an individual believes he or she is expected to
perform. Finally, an enacted role is a person's actual conduct in his or her position.

36
Status
Status is the social ranking or social worth accorded an individual because of the position he
or she occupies in a group. Although we typically speak of status as a single notion, it is in
fact made up of numerous factors, such as salary, title, seniority, and power. However, a
difference on only one of these dimensions is often sufficient to confer status. For example, a
group of tool-and-die makers may all have equivalent job titles, but the oldest member of the
department, due to his seniority, may enjoy higher status and, as result, greater deference.

Norms
Norms are rules of conduct that are established to maintain the behavioural consistency of
group members. They may be written (as in a code of professional ethics) or unwritten.
Deviation from norms is frequently punished by ostracism and verbal attacks.

Cohesiveness
Cohesiveness is the extent to which members are attracted to a group and desire to remain in
it. Cohesiveness is sometimes described as the sum of all forces acting on individuals to
remain in the group. As the term implies, Cohesiveness pertains to how group members
"stick together". Listed below are the factors that induce and sustain Cohesiveness in groups
and the effects of Cohesiveness on group members and the organisation.

Factors that induce and sustain Group Cohesiveness

1. Similarity of attitudes and goals
2. Threats: The presence of external threats can help to increase group cohesion in that
sharing a mutual fate can lead to greater awareness of interdependence
3. Unit size
4. Reward systems
5. Work unit assignments
6. Isolation

The Effects of Cohesiveness

1. Satisfaction
2. Communication
3. Hostility

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4. Productivity
5. Resistance to change

Use of Groups in Organisations

Modern organisations rely on groups to perform many activities such as the following:
Task Forces and Committees

Two formal embodiments of an organisation's desire to have a task handled by a group are
the task force and the committee. Task forces are usually formed to handle a fairly specific
problem.
Committees, or standing committees, are typically designed to operate over a long period of
time in order to handle a continuing need or problem.

Boards and Commissions

Boards typically comprise individuals who are elected or appointed to manage an institution.
For example, the stockholders of a corporation will select a board of directors to manage
company operations.
Commissions resemble boards in that members of commissions also possess decision-making
authority for larger organisational issues. However, they are usually appointed by
government officials rather than elected. Examples of commissions include the Competition
Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

38
UNIT 4 FOUNDATIONS OF ORGANIZATION STRUCTURE

Introduction

Specifically, there are six key elements that managers need to address when they design an
organizational structure:

• Work specialization - the degree to which tasks in the organization are subdivided
into separate jobs. Division of labour and the early auto assembly plants in the US are
examples of this.

• Departmentalization - the basis by which jobs are grouped together. The most
common ways of doing this is by function (e.g., manufacturing, marketing) type of
product, geography or territory (e.g. east coast office, west coast office)

• Chain of command - the unbroken line of authority that extends from the top of the
organization to the lowest echelon and clarifies who reports to whom.

• ·Span of control - the number of subordinates a manager can efficiently and

effectively direct.

• Centralization/Decentralization - the degree to which decision making is

concentrated at a single point in the organization. Decentralization is when decision
discretion is pushed down to lower-level employees.

• · Formalization - the degree to which jobs within the organization are standardized.

3 Common Organizational Designs:

• The Simple Structure

• The Bureaucracy

• The Matrix Structure

3 New Design Options:

• The Team Structure – the use of teams as the central device to coordinate work
activities.

• The Virtual Organization – a small, core organization that out sources major business
functions

39
 • The Boundary less Organization – an organization that seeks to eliminate the chain of
command, have limitless spans of control, and replace departments with empowered
teams.

Why Do Structures Differ?

Consider the mechanistic model and the organic model. The mechanistic model is
characterized by extensive departmentalization, high formalization, a limited information
network, and centralization. The organic model is flat, uses cross-hierarchical and cross-
functional teams, has low formalization, possesses a comprehensive information network,
and relies on participative decision making. Structure differ because:

Strategy:

• Innovation, creativity, cost minimization, and imitation.

Organization Size:

• An organization’s size significantly affects its structure. For example: culture,

structure, human resources, policy and technology.

• The relationship isn’t linear, rather size affects structure at a decreasing rate.

Technology:

• How an organization transfers its inputs into outputs.

• Every organization has at least one technology for converting financial, human, and
physical resources into products or services.

• The common theme that differentiates technologies is their degree of routineness.

Environment:

• Institutions or forces outside the organization that potentially affect the organization’s
performance. For example. Economic, social, political and technological.

• Forces inside the organisation include: the company, suppliers, consumers,

compitetors, publics.

Organizational Designs and Employee Behavior:

40
It is difficult to generalize what will work best for all employees. For example, work
specialization may lead to higher productivity but can reduce job satisfaction. Individual
differences, experience, and the work task are key. The Job will be affected by:

Hrm challenge, technology challenge, global challenge, and sustainability challenge.

Individual will affect the organisation by:

Abilities

Knowledge

Personality

Values

Summary and Implications for Managers:

An organization’s internal structure contributes to explaining and predicting behaviour.

• An organization’s structure reduces ambiguity for employees.

• The specific effect of structural designs on performance and satisfaction I moderated

by employees’ individual preferences and cultural norms.

• Managers should be reminded that structural variables like work specialization, span
of control, formalization, and centralization are objective characteristics that can be
measured by organizational researchers. However, most employees do not perceive
structure the same way as researchers do. Instead, they observe in an “unscientific”
fashion (see “implicit models of organizational structure”

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UNIT 5 LEADERSHIP

Introduction
Although many different definitions have been offered for leadership, most definitions
contain certain common elements. A distillation of these elements suggests that leadership
can be defined as a process through which a person tries to get organisational members to do
something, which the person desires. In other words, it is the process of directing the
behaviour of others towards the accomplishment of organizational objectives. It is the role of
the leader to obtain the commitment of individuals in achieving these goals. Thus, leadership
must be viewed as an influence process concerned with communicating vision and the hope
of achieving it.

The basic characteristics of leadership are to get people to work together effectively as a
team, to inspire their loyalty towards the group and to make a significant contribution to the
achievement of objectives. Leadership consists of interaction between personalities and
circumstances as interpreted by the group. The leaders determine how instructions are to be
carried out and encourage subordinates to high levels of performance.
To be a successful leader of subordinates, public managers must display and be aware of
certain leadership charactestics. They must have the necessary ability to influence the
behaviour of subordinates. The abilities and traits include:

Power motive: successful leaders enjoy being in position of power. They try to expand their
power, they think about how they can influence other people’s behaviour, and they care about
their personal status in relation to those around them.
Achievement motive: they enjoy achieving.
Problem-solving ability: they are resourceful and enjoy solving problems.
Self-confidence: leaders must be self-confident without being overbearing. This inspires
confidence in subordinates.
Internal locus of control: effective leaders believe that they are the primary cause of what
happens to them.
Sense of humour: humour helps to relieve tension and boredom and reduce hostility in the
workplace.
Vision: this is particularly important in the top managers, since they must visualize where the
institution is going.

42
Courage: managers need courage when it may be necessary to express ideas that deviate
from the norm.

Approaches To Leadership

The Trait Approach

Prior to the 1950s, researchers sought to understand leadership by comparing leaders with
followers and effective leaders with ineffective leaders. This search for features of leaders, or
leader traits, was prompted by a belief that leaders somehow possessed distinguishing traits
that set them apart from other people. The logic of this approach is very simple and
straightforward: To understand what makes some individuals more effective as leaders,
merely measure such people on a large number of psychological, social, and physical
attributes and note how they differ from most others.

As the research progressed (mostly during the 1930s and 1940s), the number of traits of
suspected importance began to grow. Moreover, the results became increasingly mixed and
did not follow a clear pattern. Finally, in 1948, Ralph Stogdill published a review of the trait
researchers' findings that was no devastating that it seriously curtailed the amount of trait
research that would subsequently be conducted.

The Behavioural Approach

As interest in the trait approach to leadership declined, researchers focused their attention on
leaders actions rather than on their attributes. These studies of leader behaviour tried to
identify specific styles of leader conduct and attempted to discover whether leader behaviour
was associated with employee attitudes and performance.

Ohio State Leadership Studies is one of the earliest studies of leader behaviour. It sought to
determine whether a democratic style of leadership is more effective than an authoritarian or
a laissez-faire style. These researchers proposed that consideration and initiating structure are
two primary dimensions of leadership that parallel the styles of task and employee
orientations. Initiating structure is the extent to which a leader defines and structures the
work, which he and his subordinates perform, with an eye toward successful task

43
accomplishment. Consideration is defined as the extent to which the leader has job
relationship that rely on mutual trust, respect for subordinates, and sensitivity to subordinates'
feelings.
Contingency Approaches

The behavioural approach to leadership styles was fairly popular into the mid-1960s, at which
time there was a growing-recognition that leadership could not be explained solely in terms
of leader behaviour and that features of the context in which leadership occurred (e.g.
subordinate and task attributes) also needed to be examined in order to gain a more complete
and accurate understanding of leadership.

Fiedler's contingency model:

Fred Fiedler was one of the earliest proponents of a leadership model that explicitly
incorporated situational features. The underlying assumption of his contingency model of
leadership effectiveness is that group performance is a function of the combination of a
leader's style and several relevant features of the situation.
Three factors are believed to underlie situational favorableness. In order to relative
importance, they are (1) leader-member relations, (2) task structure, and (3) position power.

Leader-member relations: reflect the extent to which a leader is accepted and generates
positive emotional reactions from his subordinates.

Task structure: is the degree to which the job at hand can be clearly specified.

Position power: is the extent to which a leader has resource to formal sanctions.

Implications of the contingency model:

Perhaps the most basic conclusion to be drawn from Fiedler's model is that a leader who is
effective in one situation may be ineffective in another. Managers need to recognise this fact
and understand the limitations that a situational may place on them.

Path-Goal Theory

44
Martin Evans and Robert House have proposed another perspective on how leaders can be
effective. Their path-goal theory suggests that leaders can affect the satisfaction, motivation,
and performance of group members in several ways. A primary means is by making rewards
contingent on the accomplishment of performance goals.

In order to accomplish these ends, a leader may be required to adopt different styles of
leadership behaviour as the situation dictates. In other words, the leader’s style should be
appropriate to the needs of his/her subordinates and the situation task characteristics. House
has identified four distinct types of leader behaviour.

1. Directive leadership involves giving specific guidance to subordinates and asking them to
follow standard rules and regulations.
2. Supportive leadership includes being friendly to subordinates and sensitive to their needs.
3. Participative leadership involves sharing information with subordinates and consulting
with them before making decisions.
4. Achievement-oriented leadership entails setting challenging goals and emphasizing
excellence while simultaneously showing confidence that subordinates will perform well.

The Hersey-Blanchard Situational Theory:

Of the various contingency approaches to leadership, the Hersey-Blanchard situational theory

has been the least researched. Yet it is widely used in management training programs. The
theory is closely based on the leadership styles generated by the Ohio State model. The
unique contribution of the model lies in its emphasis on matching a particular leadership style
to the "maturity" of the followers.

Subordinated maturity is defined as the capacity to set high but attainable goals, the
willingness to take on responsibility, and the possession of relevant education and/or
experience. Maturity is judged in relation to a given task. Subordinate maturity contains two
components: job maturity, or technical knowledge and task-relevant skills, and psychological
maturity, or feelings of self-confidence and the willingness and ability to accept
responsibility.

45
The Vroom-Yetton Leadership Model:

Victor Vroom and Philip Yetton developed a very promising model that deals with one
specific facet of leadership; how to select a leadership style for making a decision. The
Vroom-Yetton model suggests that there are five decision-making styles, ranging from highly
autocratic to highly participative. In order of increasing participation, the five styles are:

· Autocratic I (Al) - A manager solves a problem using the information that is available to
him. This implies that the manager solves the problem himself and merely informs his
subordinates.

· Autocratic II (All) - A manager obtains additional information from subordinates and then
decides by himself.

· Consultative I (C1) - A manager shares the problem with subordinates on an individual

basis and their ideas and suggestions are obtained. Again, the manager chooses a solution
to the problem at hand. In this case, the manager asks subordinates for information and
unilaterally makes his decision, which may or may not reflect their viewpoint.

· Consultative II (CII) - A manager shares the problem with subordinates as a group. The
final decision may or may not reflect subordinate input.

· Group II (G Il) - A manager shares the problem with subordinates as a group and
delegates the final decision to subordinates to make. However, the manager acts as a
chairperson who focuses and directs discussion but does not impose his or her will on the
group. True subordinate participation, in a democratic sense, is sought.

Graen's Vertical Dyad Linkage Model:

The vertical dyad linkage model of leadership proposed by George Graen and his associates
provides a further perspective on the leadership process. In some respects, this model is

46
similar to the other approaches we have considered, in that it focuses on the influence of
subordinates on leader behaviour and the topic of subordinate participation in decision-
making. In all other ways, however, the model is unique.

The model contends that each linkage, or relationship, that exists between the leader and the
subordinate is likely to differ in quality. Thus, the same supervisor may have poor
interpersonal relations with some subordinates and fairly open and trusting relations with
others. In each work unit, these pairs of relations, or dyads, can be judged in terms of whether
an individual is relatively "in" or "out" with the supervisor. Members of the in-group (or,
more correctly, in-subgroup) are invited to share in decision making and are given added
responsibility. Members of the out-group, however, are supervised within the narrow terms of
their formal employment contract.

A Comparison of the major Leadership Models

The major models of leadership have many similarities and differences. The similarities
include a general focus on leader behaviours as being primarily oriented toward either task
accomplishment or social supportiveness.

Model Leader Situational Outcomes/

Behaviours Variables Criteria

Ohio State/ Initiating structure None Satisfaction

Blake-Mouton Consideration Performance
Grievances
Turnover

Fiedler's Task oriented Leader-member Performance

Contingency (low LPC) relations
Model Relationship Task structure
oriented {high LPC) Position power

47
Path-Goal Directive Task structure Satisfaction
theory Supportive Subordinate Motivation
Participative characteristics Performance
Achievement
oriented

Hersey-Blanchard Concern for people Subordinate Effectiveness

Concern for task maturity

Vroon-Yetton Autocratic Decision quality Quality of

Participative Decision decision
Acceptance Acceptance of
decision by
subordinate

Vertical dyad Differential Subordinate Satisfaction

Linkage treatment of competence Performance
Subordinates Subordinate Turnover
loyalty

Substitutes for Leadership

Steven Ken and John Jermier have suggested, somewhat controversially, that leader
behaviour may sometimes be unnecessary or superfluous because factors in the situation offer
sufficient aid to subordinates. Such factors might include subordinated ability, training, or
experience. The notion that leaders may not play a crucial role in all settings can help to
explain why some work groups do quite well despite the presence of a poor leader. In other
words, there can be situations where leadership is unimportant or redundant.

Kerr and Jermier have suggested two types of variables to account for case in which
leadership may be unimportant or redundant: leadership substitutes and leadership
neutralizes. The presence of a leadership substitute will make leadership redundant or
unnecessary, while the presence of a leadership neutralizer prevents a leader from taking
action in some fashion.

48
UNIT 6: PERSONALITIES AND ORGANISATIONS

Introduction
In Organizational Behaviour, an attitude is defined as an idea charged with emotion that
predisposes a set of actions to a specific group of stimuli. This definition covers the three
essential components of an attitude: the cognitive, the affective and the behavioural.

The cognitive, or knowing, component of an attitude is represented in our definition by the

word "idea". By an idea, we mean that some category we use our thinking is an essential
feature of an attitude. The affective, or emotional, component of an attitude is noted in the
phrase "charged with emotion". The emotional component of an attitude is its most critical
feature and is reflected in such comments as "I like...," "I dislike...," and “I hope..." The
behavioural component of an attitude refers to a predisposition to act in a particular way. In
our definition of an attitude, it is represented by the phrase "predisposes a set of actions to a
specific group of stimuli".

Measuring Attitudes

Attitudes are not directly observable. Their existence and nature must be inferred. Thus,
people who study attitudes (such as organizational behavior researchers, social psychologists,
marketing researches, political scientists, communication researchers, and pollsters cannot
examine attitudes directly, but must instead consider the three aspects of attitudes.

Graphic Scales: The most commonly used device for studying attitudes is the graphic scale.
Since Rensis Likert first advocated such scales in 1932, they have become exceedingly
popular. A graphic, or Likert, scale asks a person to indicate his degree of agreement with a
statement by checking one of five possible positions: strongly agree, agree, undecided,
disagree, or strongly disagree. A sample Likert scale question would be:

Inflation has too great an effect on the economy.

Strongly disagree: ——: —--: ——: —--: —--: Strongly agree

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 1 2 3 4 5

Semantic Differential Scales are another useful attitude measure. These scales ask for
ratings based on a pair of adjectives that are opposite in meaning. The following semantic
differential scale items could be used to assess a person's feelings toward the movement for
women's equality.

Women's Equality Movement

Ineffective: ——:——:-——:——:——: Effective
1 2 3 4 5

Foolish: ——:——:——:——:——-: Wise

1 2 3 4 5

Attitude Formation

Attitudes are acquired through learning. Their sources can be divided into three categories:
direct experience, social communication, and emotional conditioning.

Direct Experience: Our direct and personal involvement with the objects in our environment
creates our attitudes, either positive or negative. Interestingly, simple exposure to an object
having no strong prior emotional value attached to it is sufficient to enhance one's attitude
toward the object.

Social Communication: We also develop attitudes from social communication. Few of us

have ever actually met the president of a Fortune 500 company or a union official. Yet all of
us have attitudes toward such individuals that are based on messages transmitted to us by
others.

Emotional Conditioning: Attitudes also can be formed via emotional conditioning. Pairing a
neutral stimulus with a positive or negative event can arouse physiological reactions. This
process suggests that attitudes are sometimes formed for reasons not always rational. For
example, we may come to endorse a particular point of view in part because the source of the
message is highly attractive or entertaining.

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Attitude Change

People are constantly trying to change each other's attitudes. Advertisers want to change the
public's attitudes toward their client’s products. Union leaders, managers, and employees
attempt to influence others' attitudes in favor of their points of view.

The Components of Attitude Change:

Four factors are involved in attitude change: the source, the message, the medium, and the
audience. The process of attitude change follows five steps: attention, comprehension,
yielding, retention and action.

Source factors refer to aspects of the presenter of an attitude change attempt (intent to
persuade, attractiveness. Message factors are the specific structure and content of what is
transmitted in a persuasive appeal (e.g., whether or not one or two sides of an issue are
presented). Medium factors involve the effects of the channel that is employed (printing
material, a face-to-face appeal. Audience factors deal with the influence of individual
characteristics (e.g. aspects of the personality of the target person).

Source Factors: The source of an attempt at attitude change can have a significant influence
on the magnitude and direction of the change. The initial degree of liking that an audience
feels for the source is also important. Generally, the more a person likes the source of a
persuasive appeal, the greater the likelihood of attitude change in the hoped for direction.
This can be explained from the perspective of balance

theory. Balance theory proposes that we try to maintain a fair degree of order or consistency
among our beliefs. We can portray many simple situations involving attitude change attempts
using a triangular model.

Message Factors: The influence of both the content and the structure of messages has been
heavily researched. One content factor that has been intensely studied is the power of
playing on people's fears. Portraying fearful situations is a potent means of inducing attitude
change.

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Medium Factors: During the 1960s and early 1970s, attitude researchers were greatly
interested in the ways that media affected people's attitudes. More recently, researchers have
become more skeptical about the once-popular notion that the medium has greater impact on
an audience than has the message itself.

Audience Factors: Individual differences have been examined in connection with the
magnitude of attitude change. The more commonly studied audience factors include age
{both chronological age and mental age), sex, self-esteem, and prior beliefs.

Attitudes And Actions

The link between verbal statements and behaviors is not simple, or always direct. In some
situations you may notice a good deal of inconsistency between what people say and what
they do.

Mental states and behaviors may be controlled by different mechanisms. Verbal statements
are often made in response to very different constraints and pressures than are behavioral
expressions. Such additional forces as norms, changes in group affiliation and salience, and
the opportunity to engage in specific behaviors influence actions.

When the strength of a group's norms and the strength of an individual’s desire to
comply with such influences are taken into account, attitudes can be used to predict actions
with surprising accuracy. The degree of accuracy is especially great if the time horizon for
the prediction is not extremely distant.

PERCEPTION
Perception is the process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory
impressions in order to give meaning to their environment. In other words, perception is the
selection and organisation of environmental stimuli to provide meaningful experiences to the
perceiver. Thus, in most cases what we perceive can often be very different from reality. The
main factors that have to be considered here are the perceiver, the target and the situation.

The Perception of others

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Even though our experience of those around us seems very direct and immediate, careful
analysis of what is involved in perceiving others show that the process of recognizing and
understanding others (that is, person perception) is quite complex.

Many people also erroneously assume that the perceptual process is a largely passive, or
totally receptive, process dictated by the attributes of the observed person or object. People’s
perception, however, can be influenced by many factors such as personality, motivation and
past experiences.

Accuracy in perceiving others

There is great value in being able to accurately assess the emotions and personality
characteristics of others. Being able to tell whether others are experiencing a particular
emotion enables us to gauge the effects of our words and actions. Knowing something about
an individual's personality traits can be highly useful in interpersonal relations. All of us to
some extent engage in reading the emotional styles and personality traits of others.

Facial expressions are very important because most of us are able to identify certain
emotional states from facial expressions. Several of these facial expressions are universally
recognised.

Of all the nonverbal cues that are used in perceiving and judging others, eye contact is among
the most important. Generally, the more eye contact that occurs between two people, the
more favourable the relationship is likely to be judged by others. Eye contact that is carried to
extremes, however, such as staring, is socially arousing and disruptive.

Obstacles to accurate Perception

There are many barriers to the precise perception of others' behavior. Each barrier is a
possible source of misleading or distorted information.

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Stereotyping: Stereotypes are judgments of others that are based on group membership.
Such attributes as sex, race, ethnic group, and age are the basis of commonly held
stereotypes.

The Halo Effect: The halo effect occurs when a perceiver uses a general impression of
favorableness or unfavourableness as the basis for judgments about more specific traits. In
essence, the perceiver's evaluation is influenced by an overall impression. The halo effect
explains why a subordinate who is liked by a superior can do no wrong in the superior's eyes,
while a subordinate who is disliked may have difficulty obtaining a favourable review from
the same superior.

Projection: We have a tendency to describe our own feelings and attributes to others. This is
known as projection. It is a defense mechanism that helps us to protect ourselves from
unpleasant or unacceptable truths. An individual's emotional state has been shown to
influence his or her perception of that emotional state in others.

Perceptual Distortion: In addition to defending our ego by projecting feelings and attributes
onto others, we may simply deny that something occurred or that we witnessed something.
Similarly, we may modify or distort what we report in an attempt to avoid an unpleasant
reality. Or we may deliberately pay attention only to what we want to see. These acts are
forms of perceptual distortion.

Subliminal Influences: Lastly, our perception of others may be affected by factors that we
are not fully aware of. Influences that are below our threshold of awareness are called
subliminal influences.

LEARNING
The Nature Of Learning

Learning is a fairly permanent change in behavior that occurs as a result of experience. Thus,
the learning process concerns how we learn.

A distinctive feature of this definition is the term change. In order to say that learning has
occurred, a change, or modification, of behavior must be evident. The change in behavior

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must also be more than temporary. It should also be possible to attribute this change to the
occurrence of an event.

A. Theories Of Learning

The Behaviourist models of learning include

(i) classical conditioning, and
(ii) operant conditioning.

Classical Conditioning
Classical conditioning is the process by which individuals learn reflex behaviour, that is, in
which an individual responds to some stimulant that would not ordinarily produce a response.

Early in the twentieth century, Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, conducted research on
digestive glands. In the course of his research, Pavlov discovered that both learning
processes and direct physiological stimulation controlled a laboratory dog’s secretions of
saliva. He noted that the sound of approaching footsteps, as well as the simple sight of food
would cause a dog to salivate.

Pavlov was concerned with classical conditioning that sought to demonstrate that the reflexes
could be taught to respond to new situations and stimuli enabling previously unconnected
events to be linked together or associated.
B. Instrumental or Operant Conditioning

Operant conditioning is the process by which individuals learn voluntary behaviour, that is, in
which desired voluntary behaviour leads to a reward or avoids a punishment. Operant
conditioning, thus, focuses on the consequences of behaviour, particularly where it is
rewarded, un-rewarded or punished.

In operant conditioning, reinforcement is used in conjunction with a response. There are two
kinds of reinforcements: positive and negative. Positive reinforcement is any event used to
increase the frequency of a response (for example, praise for the successful completion of a
task).

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Negative reinforcement is any event that, when removed, increases the frequency of a
response {for example, a loud buzzer that sounds when a worker fails to monitor a machine's
operation and only goes off when the worker responds appropriately.

C. Classical Conditioning Versus Operant Conditioning

Classical conditioning and operant conditioning possess some interesting similarities and
differences. The similarities stem from the shared perspective that performance is enhanced
by pairing desirable outcomes with behavior and diminished with the removal of such
associated outcomes. One major difference between the two types of learning lies in classical
conditioning's focus on relatively reflexive and simple responses.

By contrast, operant conditioning focuses on fairly voluntary and complex responses. In

essence, operant conditioning is concerned with training a person to produce a particular
response {that is, a reflexive action), while operant conditioning is concerned with eliciting
the response from a person (that is a voluntary action).

D. PERSONALITY

Personality is defined as the sum total of ways in which an individual reacts and interacts
with others. It is the relatively enduring individual traits and dispositions that form a pattern
distinguishing one person from all others. This is by no means a universally accepted
definition. In fact, there are nearly as many definitions of personality as there are theories of
personality. Nonetheless, for our purposes, this definition will suffice.

Sources Of Personality Differences

1. Heredity - do we inherit our personality or does the environment in which we develop

influence it? Evidence both points of view are valid.

2. Culture - different cultures have different underlying values and beliefs that will affect the
way people develop.

3. Family - family background will affect the way we develop.

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4. Group Membership - the groups we associate with will also have some impact.

5. Life Experiences - what we go through life.

Psychoanalytic Approach To The Study Of Personality

Psychoanalytic Approach focuses on the unconscious bases of behaviour and is associated

with the work of Freud. Freud considered with elements of personality:

(i) Structure id (primitive, pleasure seeking urges) and the ego (linking the id to reality) and
super ego (representing social values and morality and governed by conscience and the ego
idea.

(ii) Development - overlapping stages of childhood where the ego and super ego develop.
Failure to complete these stages may to lead to personality disorders.

(iii) Dynamics - awareness that behavior may have unconscious causes (e.g. repression
anxiety reduced by pushing it into the unconscious) and displacement of aggression.

PERSONALITY TRAITS APPROACH

Different personalities will have different attitudes (patterns of feelings, beliefs and behaviour
directed towards specific persons, groups, ideas, issues, objectives etc.)
Personality Traits Approach seeks to identify and classify features that individuals have in
common.

Merits of Personality Traits

1. It assists managers in assigning work roles.

2. It assists managers in deciding group composition.
3. Indicating the leadership style under which an individual will perform best.
4. It serves to emphasise the similarities and differences between individuals and groups.
5. They have proved more effective where related to work characteristics and used for self-
awareness rather than judgmentally.

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Major Difficulties in Studying/Assessing Personality and approaches taken
There are many different techniques for measuring personality attributes. Among them are
personality ratings, situational tests, inventories, and projective techniques.
Personality Ratings: A well-known device for assessing personality is the use of ratings.
The most frequently used formats of such ratings are five-point and seven-point scales, with
adjectives as endpoints. Such rating scales may not yield reliable assessments because the
meanings associated with the endpoints and midpoints are not clearly defined. Thus, different
rates may interpret the same scale differently.
Situational Tests: Situational tests (or behavioral tests) involve the direct observation of an
individual's behavior in a setting that is designed to provide information about personality.
Personality Inventories: Personality inventories are perhaps the most widely used method of
assessing personality characteristics. Typically, inventories ask the respondent to indicate
whether a statement pertains to or is true of himself or herself.
Projective Techniques: Projective techniques are designed to probe the more subtle aspects
of an individual's personality. Projective tests may be used to uncover personality because
only overt behaviour can be observed.
Other Difficulties in studying Personality
1. Infringement of individual privacy (Data Protection Act implications).
2. When promotion or selection is at stake candidates tend to tell the tester what he/she thinks
they want to hear, rather than fully truthful answers.
3. They are prone to fake responses; some tests have lie scales,
4. Competing theories provide alternative explanations of the same behaviour.
.

Personality tests are used extensively for such reasons:

(a) Recruitment
(b) Short Listing
(c) Promotion
(d) Re-deployment
(e) Career Counseling
(f) Redundancy Counseling
(g) Management Development

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Important Dimensions of Personality
There are an enormous number of human traits. It has been estimated that there may be as
many as 5,000 adjectives that could be used to describe personality traits. In terms of
relevance to organizational behavior, however, the number of important personality traits is
much smaller. Consequently, for now we will limit our discussion to three dimensions of
personality: locus of control, authoritarianism, and the work ethic.

Locus of Control: Julian Rotter proposed that the likelihood of an individual's engaging in a
particular act it is function of (1) the person's expectancy that the act will yield rewards and
(2) the personal value of those rewards to the individual. Locus of control is the extent to
which individuals believe that control over their lives lies: within their own control, or in
environmental forces beyond their control.

Authoritarianism: Another frequently studied personality dimension is authoritarianism

(that is, a blind acceptance of authority). Given the importance of power relations in
organizational settings, the topic of authoritarianism is clearly a pertinent one.

Dogmatism is defined as a system of beliefs that is organized around an acceptance of

absolute authority and intolerance toward others. Dogmatic individuals tend to be closed-
minded and inflexible. Highly dogmatic managers are likely to reach decisions in relatively
little time, after a limited search of data. They are also likely to be extremely confident
about the quality of their decisions.

The Work Ethic: The work ethic embodies a cluster of beliefs, including a belief in the
dignity of all work, contempt for idleness and self-indulgence, and a belief that if you work
hard, you will be rewarded. The measurement of this predisposition is typically done through
inventories asking respondents to describe their own beliefs and behaviors. Individuals who
subscribe to the work ethic have been found to be more accepting of authoritarian leadership.

The Predictive Utility of Personality Measures

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A number of studies have been conducted that use personality data to predict employees'
performances. The results of these studies typically are modest. Usually, the correlation
between a personality trait and performance is low but positive.

UNIT 7. STRESS IN ORGANISATIONS

Introduction
From our daily experiences, we all know that conflict-filled situations produce feelings of
physical and psychological discomfort. When a person is confronted with a situation that
poses a threat (as when extreme conflict arises), the form of physiological and emotional
arousal he/she experiences is termed stress.

Stress is a dynamic condition in which an individual is confronted with an opportunity,

constraint or demand related to what he or she desires and for which the outcome is perceived
to be both uncertain and important. In other words, it is strain experienced by an individual
over a period of time, which impairs the ability of the individual to perform their role.

Causes Of Stress
1. Personal Factors
Type A Personality: Some people are most stress-prone than others. Especially susceptible
are individuals who display a cluster of traits known as type A personality. Type As tends to
be impatient, competitive individuals who feel that they are constantly under time pressure.
They also tend to be aggressive, try to accomplish several things at the same time, and have
difficulty relaxing.

In contrast, individuals with the type B personality are relatively more mild-mannered, in
less of a hurry, and far less competitive.

Changes in one's life: Another personal factor that can produce stress is both the magnitude
and the frequency of changes in an individual's life. For example, a major change such as
getting fired or the death of a spouse can have a strong impact on a person's health.

2. Organizational Factors

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Responsibility for others: Having responsibility for others, in general, can lead to a greater
stress.

Working conditions: The work environment also plays a role in determining the amount of
stress an employee experiences. Certain occupations are noted for the high levels of stress
they entail.

The Effects of Stress on Employee Performance

Physical Problems: A high level of stress has been associated with a host of physical
disorders, including heart disease, arthritis, ulcers, high blood pressure, and high levels of
cholesterol. There is also some suspicion that stress may be linked to cancer.

Job Performance: Despite the drawbacks of stress, its complete or near absence may be less
than ideal for performance. In situations where stress is low or absent, employees may not be
sufficiently aroused or involved in their tasks. Instead, to maximize performance, low levels
of stress are preferable because, in moderate amounts, stress can stimulate individuals to
work harder and accomplish more.

Alcoholism and Drug Abuse: Both alcohol and drug abuse are linked to higher levels of
stress among employees. In addition to threatening their own well-being, employees who
attend work while under the influence of alcohol or drugs pose a serious threat to the well-
being of their coworkers because they are more prone to on-the-job accidents.

Absenteeism, Turnover, and Dissatisfaction: A correlation has also been found between
dissatisfaction and work-related stress. Because these studies of stress as a predictor of
turnover, absenteeism, and dissatisfaction have all been correlational in nature, it is difficult
to state conclusively what factors are responsible for their relationship.

Mass Psychogenic Illness: Perhaps one of the strangest suspected responses to the
experience of stress are the occurrence of mass psychogenic illness.

Burnout: Burnout is a reaction to prolonged and energy-depleting difficulties. Its primary

symptoms include feeling drained or used up. It typically affects people who are highly

61
conscientious and work in the helping professions, such as police officers, schoolteachers,
social workers, and nurses.

Coping with Stress

Helping a person maintain the level of stress that is best for him or her is the goal of various
stress management techniques. By and large, the techniques we will consider focus primarily
on the reduction rather than on the increase of stress.

Flight or Fight: Flight and fight are two reactions that can serve as a primary means of
successful coping.

Exercise: Physical exercise, including participation in sports, enables a person to develop

resistance to the detrimental effects of stress.

Social Support: One means of resisting stress is to have a strong network of social supports.

Job Redesign: Jobs can be redesigned to minimize the creation of stress. One approach to job
redesign that seeks to reduce assembly-line pressures and the dull repetitive aspects of such
work is job enrichment.

Relaxation Techniques: Relaxation techniques such as progressive relaxation, yoga, and

Transcendental Meditation rely on the idea that relaxation of the major voluntary muscles
reduces anxiety levels.
Developing a new philosophy of life: One technique for coping with stress is to develop a
philosophy of life that incorporates a more tolerant and broader view of life.

UNIT 8 Motivations

Introduction

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Motivation refers to the inner state of mind, which initiates, energises and directs or channels
behaviour toward the attainment of goals. The motivation process comprises the following
interdependent elements:

a) Need: a physiological or psychological need could arise because of lack of food

and/or water.
b) Motive: an individual needs something to motivate (drive) him to take action, which
he believes will satisfy him.
c) Behaviour: the individual’s need, will lead to a specific behaviour.
d) Consequence: the consequence of behaviour may be positive or negative, e.g. a
hungry person who eats will no longer be motivated as he/she will not need food any
more.
e) Satisfaction/dissatisfaction: the consequence of behaviour could lead to satisfaction or
dissatisfaction.
f) Feedback: satisfaction is usually short-lived.

The Nature Of Motivation

Motives cannot be directly observed; they can only be inferred from the behaviour of others.
This difficulty can easily lead to errors in interpretation. In addition, motives are dynamic, or
constantly changing. The changes result from the rise and fall of a motive's importance, as it
is variously satisfied or unsatisfied. To complicate things further, some motives do not
decrease in importance when a desired goal is attained. The complexity of motivational
processes is perhaps matched by the complexity and variety of approaches that have been
offered to explain motivation.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF MOTIVATION THEORIES

Each of the following approaches fall into one of two categories: content theories or process
theories. Content theories focus on what motivates people to perform. They are concerned
with identifying the different rewards that people seek in their work, the theories of Maslow,
Herzberg, and McClelland are essentially content theories. The other theories that will be
examined are more concerned with how rewards control behaviour. These theories focus on

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the dynamics, or process aspects, or work motivation. Expectancy, equity, reinforcement, and
social learning are examples of process theories.

Hedonism

In the 1800s, philosophers such as Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill proposed that most,
if not all, individual behaviour could be explained by the principle of hedonism. This
principle holds that people will seek pleasure and avoid pain. According to Bentham and
Mill, people are fairly rational when choosing between alternative courses of action, and their
decisions reflect a careful weighing of costs and benefits.

Instinctual Theories

From about 1890 to 1920, instinctual views of motivation were popular. The writings of
William James and Sigmund Freud endorsed the view that instincts (that is, inborn or innate
predispositions) largely determine an individual's interpretation of and response to situations.
One of Freud's major contributions to this discussion was his emphasis on the role of
unconscious motives (motives of which an individual is unaware).

Achievement Motivation Theory

The Thematic Apperception Test: One legacy of the instinctual approach is the use of story-
telling techniques to uncover dominant needs (that is, recurring concerns for goal attainment).
While devising his own lengthy instinct-related list, Henry A. Murray created a test for
establishing the presence and strength of various needs. Specifically, Murray compiled a set
of drawings cut out of stories in magazines. Even without their associated stories, the
drawings cut out of stories in magazines. Even without their associated stories, the drawings
were intriguing and provocative. For example, one drawing showed a man who was
apparently outraged and about to run out of a room, while a woman attempted to restrain him
from committing what might be a rash act.

The McClelland Studies

64
David McClelland used story-telling techniques to explain content needs. McClelland,
however, focused on a more limited set of needs: the need for achievement, the need for
affiliation, and the need for power.

Maslow's Hierarchy Of Needs Theory

One approach that is widely known by managers is clearly set out by Abraham Maslow. He
devised a model for explaining the essential or priority needs for human needs. Maslow
incorporated McClelland's emphasis on the importance of social acceptance, personal control,
recognition and achievement, but he went several steps further by proposing additional sets of
needs and suggesting a rational order for them.

Deficiency needs

a) Physiological needs: This most basic level of Maslow's hierarchy includes the needs for
food, water, sleep, oxygen, warmth and freedom from pain. If these needs are sufficiently
met, the second set of needs will emerge.

b) Safety needs: These needs relate to obtaining a secure environment in which an individual
is free from threats. Society provides many devices for meeting these needs: insurance
policies, job-tenure arrangements, savings accounts, and police and fire departments.
c) Social needs: The third set includes the needs for affection, love and relationships.

5. Self-actualisation

4. Recognition (self-esteem)

3. Social needs (relationships

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 2. Physical needs (shelter, goods, clothing)

1. Psychological needs (food, health)

Growth needs

d) Esteem needs: If the deficiency needs are reasonably satisfied, a concern for self-respect
and the esteem of others may arise.

e) Self-actualization needs: This category includes the desire for self-fulfillment. Personal
development may be expressed in many different ways-for example, maternally, athletically,
artistically, or occupationally.

Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory

One of the most widely known and influential views of work motivation is Fred Herzberg's
two-factor theory. He developed Maslow’s hierarchy of needs model further by making a
clear distinction between lower and higher order needs which he called the satisfiers and the
dissatisfiers. The satisfiers usually pertain to the content of the job and included such factors
as career advancement, recognition, sense of responsibility, and feelings of achievement.
Herzberg called these motivator factors. The dissatisfiers more often stem from the context in
which the job was performed. They relate to job security, company policies, interpersonal
relations, and working conditions. Herzberg called these hygiene factors.

Herzberg reasoned that motivator factors had the potential to motivate workers to higher
levels of performance because they provided opportunities for personal satisfaction. While
the absence of these factors would not make employees unhappy, it would leave them feeling
somewhat neutral toward their jobs.
Expectancy Theory

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Expectancy theory (or perhaps more properly, theories, since a variety of expectancy
approaches have emerged during recent decades) represents an attempt to explain worker
motivation in terms of anticipating rewards. These theoretical models assume that people
make rational decisions based on economic realities. Many researchers are attracted to
expectancy theory because it tries to bring together both personal and situational influences.

Effort-Performance Expectancy (E- P) Theory

In deciding on a course of action, employees will consider whether their effort will translate
into a desired accomplishment. If the obstacles are such that they cannot reasonably expect
their effort to lead to an acceptable level of performance, their motivation to perform will be
diminished.

Performance-Outcome Expectancy

Another consideration is whether a given level of performance will result in the obtainment
of a particular outcome. The more strongly a person believes that performance will lead to a
positive outcome (or the avoidance of a negative outcome), the more likely it is that he or she
will be motivated to higher levels of performance.

Valence (V)

The outcomes that an employee receives can be evaluated in terms of their value or
attractiveness. Expectantly theorists, however, prefer to use the special term valence, to
denote this attractiveness. The valence that an individual attaches to an outcome is a very
personal matter that cannot be accurately predicted by other people.

Reinforcement Theory

The principles of operant conditioning can also be used to explain work motivation. The
allocation of rewards in exchange for specific behaviours can have a powerful effect on
subsequent behaviour.

Equity Theory Approach

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Feelings of fairness, or equity can serve as a powerful stimulus to increase or decrease effort.
J. Stacy Adams has proposed a theory that attempts to explain the influence of such feelings
on employee behaviour. Adam's equity theory assumes that people will strive to restore
equity if they feel an imbalance exists. Basic to equity theory is the belief that employees
continuously monitor the degree of equity or inequity that exists in their working relations by
comparing their own outcomes and inputs with those of another highly similar person. In the
context of equity theory, outcomes are anything that employee view as being provided by
their jobs or the organisation. Outcomes include pay, an office with a window, access to the
executive washroom, the size of one's ashtrays, use of a company car, and so on. Inputs
include all the contributions that a person makes to the employment relationship.
Equity theory approach envisages that employees make comparisons of their job inputs and
outcomes relative to those of others. We can perceive what we get from job situation
outcomes in relation to what we put into it (inputs) and then compare the outcome input ratio
with those of relevant others.

If inequities are perceived, the worker can choose to:

(a) Change inputs - i.e. do not put in so much effort.

(b) Change outcomes.
(c) Distort perceptions of self and others.
(d) Choose a different reference.
(e) Leave the field-quit the job.

Social Learning Theory

Social learning theory is one of the more recent approaches to motivation. The desire to
imitate models can be very powerful. Modeling first manifests itself in childhood, when
children imitate adults and other siblings. In organisations, a desire to imitate superior
performers or supervisors may be strong in some individuals. Certainly, the taking of roles
and the imitation of previously witnessed behaviour illustrate the subtle influences of social
learning.

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The Importance of Motivation

1. Individual performance is a function of ability, motivation and situational factors.

2. The less the workforce is motivated, the more controls management has to exercise.
3. The concept of motivation enables an individual to make causal attributions and explain
other behaviour to him/her.

Methods Of Motivation which an Organisation Might Employ

1. Job enrichment

A job redesign approach that upgrades the job-task mix in order to increase significantly the
potential for growth and achievement.

Advantages
1. It increases individual freedom to decide pace and methods of work.
2. Allows the worker to feel responsible for own work performance including provision of
feedback.
3. It increases the worker's involvement in the organisation e.g. consultation over changes,
4. It involves a vertical extension of the job.
5. It aims to make it fuller and more personally challenging.
6. It creates extra tasks by creating opportunities for greater achievement and recognition.

2. Autonomous work groups

An autonomous work group is a self-managing work group that is given responsibility for a
task without day-to-day supervision and with authority to influence and control both group
members and behaviour of individuals.

Advantages

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1. It provides a strong link between group and organisational needs and the motivation
proves itself. They set their own performance goals and determine the methods employed to
achieve them.
2. The group is responsible for all aspects of achievement but has the means to control
successful achievement of goals.
3. Intrinsic motivation is provided through the autonomy provided within the context of a
group with task interdependence, social and esteem needs are more likely to be fulfilled.

Indicators Of De-Motivation

1. Regressive behaviour - not co-operating, reverting to childish or primitive behaviour.

2. High rate of absenteeism, arriving late, leaving early, avoiding responsibility.
3. Aggressive behaviour on behalf of the frustrated individual, e.g. abusive language,
malicious gossip might be directed towards a supervisor.
4. No efforts to achieve organisational goals and objectives.
5. Persisting in fixated behaviour that has no adaptive value in the situation - e.g. inability to
accept new ideas.
6. Displaced aggression directed not at the source of frustration, which might not be clear
and identifiable but as a scapegoat, (subordinate/staff or inanimate object).

Causes Of De-Motivation

1. Poor supervision or inadequate working conditions may cause de-motivation (Herzberg's

2 factors theory).
2. De-motivation will occur where expectancy is low (expectancy theories of motivation).
3. Perceptions of inequity - ratio between broadly defined inputs (skills) and outputs (pay)
do not compare with a preferred benchmark. Individuals will seek negative adjustment if this
persists.

4. Failure to satisfy basic needs (Alderfer's Erg theory).

5. Conflict between individual goals and organisation goals. Lotham and Locke developed
goals setting theory by developing management by objectives and motivation theory.

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Methods To Overcome De-Motivation
1. Providing incentives to encourage competition on clearly defined criteria.
2. Involving staff in induction processes.
3. Introducing greater autonomy in handling problems through job enriching.
4. Providing regular feedback on results and appraisals against known performance criteria.
5. Involving all those subordinates affected before implementing change.
6. Improving communications flows.

UNIT 9 JOB SATISFACTION

Introduction

Emotional reactions to work experiences are inevitable. One's thinking, feeling, and action
tendencies {that is, one's attitude) toward work is termed job satisfaction. As is true of all
attitudes, a person's level of job satisfaction is formed via experience. While a worker's
attitudes are influenced by the job itself, communications from others can also play an
important role. Furthermore, a worker's expectations about a job can greatly influence his or
her interpretation and evaluation of work-related experiences.

The Importance Of Job Satisfaction

Modern managers recognize that an organization’s performance should be measured in

human dimensions, as well as in terms of return on investment, market share, profit after
taxes, and the like. A variety of reasons support the desirability of attending to workers'
satisfaction. Perhaps the foremost reason is a moral one. Given that most people must
work, and that most people will spend the majority of their adult lives at work, it can be
argued that employers have a moral obligation to make the experience personally rewarding
(or, at a minimum, not painful or dehumanizing). Workers' physical and mental well-being
appear to be correlated with job satisfaction, in that more highly satisfied workers have better
physical and mental health records.

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Job satisfaction can also play an important role in a company's ability to attract and retain
qualified workers. An organization's very survival rests heavily on this ability, and a
company that is known to mistreat its personnel will have difficulty in drawing the best
people to staff its positions. Low levels of job satisfaction have been related to such problems
as turnover, absenteeism, union-organizing activity, and the filing of grievances. Because
such problems can be costly and disruptive to an organisation, they cannot be lightly
dismissed. Thus, job satisfaction is exceedingly important for the well being of the
organisation as well as for the individual.

Measuring Job Satisfaction

In-depth interviews and questionnaires are sometimes used to measure job satisfaction, but
the most commonly used method is the anonymous survey.

Sources Of Job Satisfaction

Several studies have been conducted on the topic of job satisfaction, or morale, as it was
more frequently termed in previous years. Their results tend to point to much the same
conclusions. For example, certain variables are consistently correlated with job satisfaction.
One of the most important variables is job level.
Satisfaction is higher among workers in higher-level positions, while satisfaction tends to be
lowest among holders of jobs that can be characterized as hot, heavy, or dangerous, such as
work in steel mills and unskilled jobs.

Length of service and race are also frequently correlated with job satisfaction. Individuals
with less time on the job and black workers are, in the aggregate, somewhat more dissatisfied
than "long-termers" and white workers. Evidence of sex differences in job satisfaction levels
has been mixed.

It is likely, however, that rising expectations of women in the labor force will produce
differences in job satisfaction between the sexes.

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Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Sources of Satisfaction: All sources of job satisfaction fall into two
categories: intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic sources originate from within the individual and
have psychological value.

Extrinsic sources of satisfaction originate from outside the individual; they come from his or
her environment.

Expectations

Satisfaction is very personal experience that depends heavily on an individual's expectations.

Expectations can have a powerful influence on a person's level of satisfaction. For example,
new employees often have unrealistically high expectations. In the time between being
offered a job and the first day of work, new employees may fantasize about how rapidly they
will rise in the new organisation, what immediate working conditions will be like, and so on.
Once on the job, however, they may experience a shock when confronted with a number of
harsh realities.

The Search For Trends In Job Satisfaction

Based on magazine articles, television, and movies, we might be tempted to conclude that
most workers are dissatisfied with their jobs. However, available evidence indicates that
such a conclusion would be in error.

Despite this reassuring evidence, some alarmists argue that worker satisfaction is declining
and that the resulting rise in worker alienation could lead to worker revolt. It is perhaps the
implicit threat of a worker revolution that makes the prospect of declining satisfaction a topic
of widespread concern.

Due to increasing levels of education, expectations in the work force are rising. If better-
educated workers do not obtain better jobs, it is conceivable that job satisfaction could
decline over the coming year.

Consequences Of Job Dissatisfaction

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Withdrawal Behaviors: Individuals are usually drawn to situations that are rewarding, while
they tend to withdraw from situations that are unrewarding or painful.

Absenteeism: Studies of absenteeism have often found that less satisfaction employees are
more likely to miss work.

Tardiness: It is also generally believed that chronic tardiness tends to reflect employee
satisfaction. Of course, it cannot be assumed that chronic tardiness is invariably due to
dissatisfaction, because intervening factors, such as car pooling or preparing a large family
for school each morning, often play a role.

Turnover: Studies have shown, with a fair degree of consistency that dissatisfied employees
are more likely to quit. This specific influence of dissatisfaction on the decision to quit may
be only moderate, however, because a variety of other factors are also involved.

Early Retirement: Another topic of recent interest is the relationship between job
satisfaction and the decision to take early retirement. One might expect that the choice of
whether to take early retirement would be influenced by level of job satisfaction.
Union Activity: Increased interest in union activity has long been accepted as a consequence
of employee dissatisfaction, but empirical evidence in support of this notion has only recently
been obtained.

Job Satisfaction And Productivity

Most people believe that satisfied workers are more productive workers. They reason that
satisfied employees are inclined to be more involved with their work and, therefore, are more
productive. Empirical research, however, has not identified much support for this proposal.
In fact, the available evidence suggests that the relationship between job satisfaction and
productivity is a very weak one.

Because people tend to overestimate the influence of job satisfaction, they underestimate
other factors such as machine pacing and productivity that contribute to productivity. These
forces often restrict the range of individual productivity.

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Besides, satisfaction and performance are potentially correlated as a consequence of their
being causally related. Three variations on this argument have been raised. The first
viewpoint contends that satisfaction causes performance. This proposal was the underlying
premise for the human relations approach, which assumes that if you make workers happy,
they will reciprocate by being more productive. To date, no evidence clearly demonstrates
that workers feel a strong urge to reciprocate with high performance in exchange for a felt
concern for their feelings.

The second viewpoint holds that performance causes satisfaction and that a high performers
tend to be more satisfied than low performers. It is usually suggested that performance
influences satisfaction via the receipt of equitable rewards.

A third viewpoint contends that satisfaction and performance influence each other. According
to this viewpoint, the impact of job satisfaction directly influences performance based on the
belief that performance will be rewarded equitably.

The Importance Of A Positive Correlation Between Job Satisfaction And Productivity

If superior performers are receiving greater rewards that poorer performers, satisfaction levels
should be higher among superior performers than among poorer performers. The
consequence of such a state of affairs is that satisfaction and performance will be positively
correlated. Managers should therefore strive to create linkages between performance and
satisfaction by offering highly attractive, equitable rewards that are tied to performance.

Job design

More recently, management scholars have recognized that the job simplification can improve
productivity up to a point. Beyond that point, worker dissatisfaction can set in. Workers then
become hostile toward the task and the employer, and consequently reduce their efforts or
increase labor costs via absenteeism or turnover. The challenge, as many managers see it, is
to find the ideal level of simplification that maximizes productivity without risking worker

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discontent. In practice, most managers have been more likely to focus on increasing
productivity at some cost to worker satisfaction. To be sure, a level of worker discontent that
risks causing a wildcat strike or serious insubordination is to be avoided. But levels short of
that extreme may be incurred in order to increase short-run production.

Methods Of Job design

The first serious attempt to break from the principles of job simplification occurred during the
1940s and 1950s. This approach, called job enlargement, involves an increase in the variety
of an employee's activities. In essence, a job is extended to include additional elements
without really altering its content. Job rotation is a related notion in the area of job redesign.
In job rotation, the task stays the same, but the personnel who perform the task are
systematically changed. Many organisations use job rotation as a training device to improve
worker's flexibility.

Job Characteristics Theory

Richard Hackman and Greg Oldham have proposed a comprehensive theory of job
enrichment that attempts to explain how various job dimensions affect worker behaviour. The
job characteristics theory also accounts for the possible influence of individual differences on
the desire for enriched work. According to the model, a number of work outcomes, such as
desire to perform well (that is, high internal work motivation) and satisfaction, are influenced
by the experience of three critical psychological states.
These three states - the meaningfulness of work, felt responsibility, and knowledge of results
of job - are all critical in the sense that the absence of any one of them will not foster the
desired outcomes. Specifically, a sense of the meaningfulness of work is enhanced by the
presence of:

1. Skill variety: the extent to which a job requires that different duties of performed involving
a number of different skills.

2. Task identity: the extent to which a person is permitted to complete a 'whole' or identifiable
piece of work from start to finish.

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3. Task significance: the extent to which a job affects the lives of others (i.e. is the job of
some value to others in the organisation or the world?)

Responsibility is enhanced by the presence of

4. Autonomy: the extent to which a job offers independence and self-determination for the
scheduling of work and the performance of associated tasks.

5. Feedback from the job: the extent to which the conduct of the job provides clear and direct
information on the effectiveness of the worker's performance.

Other Job design Approaches

In addition to job enrichment, some other work design techniques that are also growing in
popularity include flexible working, involvement, empowerment, the modified workweek and
quality circles

Flextime refers to a work schedule that gives employees some discretion in arranging their
working hours. Most frequently, the employer specifies a period of time during the day when
all employees must be present-the core time. Employees may then schedule the rest of their
work hours according to their own preferences.

Modified workweek plans attempt to design alternatives for the currently prevalent 8-hour
day, 5-day workweek. The most commonly adopted design is the 4-day, 10 hours per day
workweek, or 4-40 scheme. The impact of the 4-40 schedule has been mixed. While
employees can enjoy longer stretches of uninterrupted leisure time and less commuting they
are more likely to be fatigued from working longer shifts.

Quality Circles

In recent years, quality circles have begun to appear in a growing number of firms in the
United States. Quality Circles are employee committees of eight to ten workers who meet
once a week (usually on company time) to discuss production and product quality problems.
Although the notion of quality circles originated in the United States, it took root in Japan

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after World War II (after being introduced in Japan by American consultants). Recently, the
use of quality circles has been reintroduced to the United States, partly due to a fascination
with Japan's business success.

In a quality circle program (1) membership is voluntary (employees must not be coerced into
participating), (2) circle members are trained in problem-solving techniques, (3) members
develop solutions to problems that they submit to management through formal presentations,
and (4) members monitor the outcome of their solutions.

Although all quality circles share certain common elements, programs may vary on a number
of features. While there is very little hand evidence to indicate exactly which details are
critical to a quality circle's effectiveness.
If top management does not fully endorse and support a circle program, its lack of enthusiasm
will be detected and duplicated by others. As a result, the circle program will probably not
receive the serious support it needs from lower-level supervisors.

Second, successful programs are more likely to have group facilitators - usually senior
workers rather than supervisors - who have been specially trained in both group relations and
problem-solving strategies.

Third, members of circles must be assured that they will not lose their jobs or have their
responsibilities reduced as a result of their suggestions.
Fourth, recognition must be given to individuals and circles for suggesting workable
solutions to operational problems.

Obstacles To Job design

The introduction of a job design program, like any change effort, is seldom a simple task.
Numerous obstacles are likely to arise, and some of the greatest resistance is likely to come
from the employees themselves. Frequently, employees, as well as managers, are comfortable
with the informal power systems that already exist. They thus view job design as an intrusion
on the existing social order. Unions also tend to oppose job design, except this is
accompanied by monetary reward.

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UNIT 10 CONFLICT

Introduction
Conflict is the process that results when one person (or a group of people) perceives that
another person or group is frustrating, or about to frustrate, an important concern. Conflict
involves incompatible differences between parties that result in mutual opposition.

Changing Views of Conflict:

How social scientists and managers view the topic of conflict has changed over the years.
Until the mid-1940s, it was popular to consider conflict as harmful and unnecessary. The
existence of conflict was regarded as a sign that something was wrong and required
correction, According to this traditional view, conflict serves no useful purpose because it
distracts managers' attention and saps energy and resources.

In recent years, management scholars have shifted their view of conflict. Today, conflict is
seen as inevitable in every organisation and oftentimes necessary to ensure high performance.
The conflict can be harmful in some instances is not denied, but emphasis is placed on
recognizing that some forms of conflict can be useful in achieving desired goals. According
to this perspective, conflict can encourage a search for new tactics and strategies, and help
overcome stagnation and complacency. Conflict as a device for directing effort is, therefore,

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sometimes a desirable state. The focus of his contemporary view is on the successful
management of conflict rather than its total elimination.

Sources and Causes of Conflict:

Conflict can spring from a variety of sources. Robbins suggests that these sources can be
grouped into three general categories: communication, structural and personal behaviour
factors.

Communication factors

Managers typically attribute a sizable proportion of the conflicts that arise in organisations to
poor communication. Incorrect, distorted, or ambiguous information can create hostility. For
example, a manager may fail to communicate clearly to his subordinates regarding who will
be responsible for performing a distasteful task while he is away on vacation. Upon his
return, he may find that his subordinates are 'at each another's throats" and that the task
remains to be done.

Structural factors

Size: in a review of studies examining the relationship of conflict to organisational size,

Robbins found fairly consistent evidence suggesting that conflict is greater in larger
organisations.

Participation: One might expect that greater subordinate participation (for example, in
decision making) would reduce conflict. From a human relations perspective, one might even
argue that inviting subordinates to participate can satisfy a possible drive to be fully involved.
Research on this topic, however, has shown that just the opposite is true; when subordinate
participation is greater, levels of conflict tend to be higher.

Line-Staff Distinctions: In surveys of managers, one of the most frequently mentioned

sources of conflict is the distinction between line and staff units within the organisations.
Line units perform jobs that are directly related to core activities of the organisation. In a
manufacturing setting, the production department would be a line unit, while in a customer-

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oriented setting, the marketing or sales department might be considered line. Staff units
perform jobs that support the line function. Examples of staff departments include research
and development, public relations, personnel, and marketing research.

Reward Systems: If one party obtains rewards at the expense of another party, conflict can
be easily generated. This form of conflict can arise among individuals and groups, as well as
among entire organisations.

Resource Interdependence: Typically, groups must compete for the resources of their
organisation. With a growing supply of money and other resources, such as space, equipment,
and materials, conflicts may not arise.

Power: The distribution of power within an organisation can also be a source of conflict. If a
group feels that it possesses far less power than it should, or if it believes that another group
holds an excessive amount of power, it is likely to challenge the existing order. The workers
are pressing for more say in decisions which affect their lives.

Personal Behaviour Factors: Another source of conflict lies in differences among

individuals. Some people's values or perceptions of situations are particularly likely to
generate conflict with others.

Other Sources of Conflict

1. Money - the ratio of profits to wages might lead to a conflict between workers and
managers.
2. Job - rates of pay are different for each job and sometimes one group claims a
job possibly to safeguard their future security, or loss of earnings, if the job is given to
others.
3. Goals - managers are concerned with efficiency and workers with security.
4. Environmental factors - downward fluctuations in the market for a product are a
threat to workers security.
5. Nature of work itself - the socio-technical system organizes men in a particular way
which often leads to conflicts.

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The Role of A Manager in Classifying Conflicts

A manager can examine conflicts at several different levels. Conflict that exists within an
individual is termed intrapersonal, while conflict between two people is termed interpersonal.

Intrapersonal Conflict: A common form of intrapersonal conflict in everyday life involves

choices between mutually exclusive goals.
Researchers have used a number of contrived situations in laboratory settings to determine
which factors influence the tendencies to compete or cooperate when conflict exists. One
such contrived conflict scenario is called the Prisoner's dilemma.

Approach - Approach Conflict: Approach-approach conflict arises when an individual must

choose between two attractive alternatives.
In an approach-approach conflict, the individual must decide whether to approach or avoid a
single goal that has both positive (attractive) and negative (unattractive) qualities. This is not
an uncommon circumstance in organizational settings, where many goals have mixed
outcomes for an individual.

Avoidance - Avoidance Conflict: Avoidance-avoidance conflict involves a choice between

two equally unattractive options. For example, a person may have a physical disorder that is
very uncomfortable, such as ulcers. Yet the person may have a strong fear of going to the
hospital for surgery.

Strategies for Reduction and/or resolution of Conflict

Superordinate Goals: Providing higher-level, or superordinate, goals to antagonistic parties

can help to avert or reduce the level of conflict. When people share a common superordinate
goal, they must cooperate to achieve a degree of success or avoid disaster.

Structural Approaches: A number of options exist for managers who wish to reduce
conflict via structural change. One technique is to transfer conflict-prone individuals to other

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units. Of course, this apparently simple approach cannot always be used, since some
employees are nearly indispensable to their unit's performance.

Styles of Conflict Management: Managers differ in their ways of dealing with conflict. Ken
Thomas has suggested that there are five major styles of conflict management that managers
can adopt: forcing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding, and accommodating.

Forcing: In addition to defining the five basic styles of conflict management, Thomas has
suggested a two-dimensional framework for comparing them. According to this framework,
the forcing style attempts to overwhelm an opponent with formal authority, threats, or the use
of power.
Collaborating: The collaborating style represents a combination of assertiveness and
cooperativeness. Collaborating involves an attempt to satisfy the concerns of both sides
through honest discussion.

Accommodating: An accommodating style combines unassertiveness and cooperativeness.

At its simplest level, this style may merely involve giving in to another's wishes.

Avoiding: The combination of unassertiveness and uncooperativeness leads to an avoiding

style, in which a person implies that he or she will either improve a difficult situation or
attempt to appear neutral.

Compromising: The fifth style, compromising, involves intermediate amounts of

assertiveness and cooperativeness and strives for partial satisfaction of both parties desires by
seeking a middle ground. To succeed at compromising, both parties must be willing to give
up something.

Communication systems should be improved. Any improvement will be beneficial

to the company as this will result to excellence.

Collective bargaining could be arranged where each side recognises the right of the other to
be present on equal terms.

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Training and development of staff and management is an essential instrument for the
development of interpersonal skills.

Re-designing of tasks and new job descriptions could be introduced to reduce role conflicts
and inter-dependence.

The Reward systems must be re-organised so that they are clear and consistent in their
relationship to performance.

Participative leadership style where managers are pleasant and co-operative and
acknowledge the feelings of others should be introduced to reduce conflicts.

Stimulating Conflicts

While the optimal level may sometimes be zero, in most cases a modest level of conflict
actually encourages involvement and innovation. This indicates that some situations may in
fact benefit from the creation of conflict. According to Robbins, some signs that a manager
needs to stimulate conflict include an unusually low rate of employee turnover, a shortage of
new ideas, strong resistance to change, and the belief that cooperativeness {the principle trait
of a "yes-man") is more important than personal competence.

Among the specific techniques that Robbins offers for inducing conflict are:

1. Appointing managers who are open to change

2. Encouraging competition
3. Restructuring the work unit

Advantages or Impact of Conflicts

I. It indicates that things are wrong and they need to he corrected.

2. Competition between groups or individuals is created and therefore provides
motivation, which leads to improved morale.

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3. It may help to release tensions and clear the air which can improve morale.
4. It may provide the necessary challenge that leads to a necessary change, i.e.
acts as a catalyst.
5 Promote a fresh approach.
6. It may stimulate new ideas and creativity in the effort to resolve conflicts arising.

Negative Impacts or Disadvantages of Conflict

1. Performance targets are not met due to frustration of organisational goals.

2. Groups and individuals will not perform effectively.
3. Costs and delays rise as information and resources are withheld.
4. Lack of commitment and involvement may result, leading to alienation.
5. Stress levels rise amongst affected individuals leading to consequences such as
turnover and absenteeism.
6. Inter-personal or inter-group hostility lead to arguments, non co-operation.
aggression and bloody-mindedness.

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UNIT 11 COMMUNICATIONS WITHIN ORGANISATION

A MODEL OF THE COMMUNICATION PROCESS

Introduction
True or accurate communication is often difficult to achieve because it requires a complex
sequence of steps: idea generation, encoding, transmitting via various channels, receiving,
decoding, understanding, and response.

Receiving the message involves attending to and actually perceiving a written, spoken, or
otherwise transmitted message. Decoding then follows reception, which involves deciphering
the message. The receiver's personality, prior experience, and intellect may intervene at this
stage. Understanding results from the decoding process. However, understanding is often
imperfect. To the extent that the decoded message matches the encoded message, we can say
that understanding has been achieved.

Types of Communication

In organisations, there are several common forms of interpersonal communication. By far, the
most frequently used form is the spoken word, since it is usually the quickest. In addition,
oral communication is likely to be quite accurate because messages can be clarified through
ongoing dialogue. Written communication is also important within organisations. A third
form of interpersonal communication, nonverbal communication, consists of unspoken cues
that a communicator sends in conjunction with a spoken or written message.

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Communication Networks

The formal structure of relationships in an organisation can affect various aspects of the
communication process. Research on the impact of structure on communication has focused
on how different kinds of network, or patterns of relationships, influence communication.

The centralised networks are characterised by their members' differing abilities to obtain and
pass on information.

In contrast, in a decentralised network, each member has an equal opportunity to participate

in the communication process.

Horizontal Communication

Horizontal Communication consists of messages sent because employees who occupy the
same level within an organisation. Examples include communication between members of
different departments or between coworkers in a single department.

Communication Roles

The specific functions a person serves in an organisation's communication network may

comprise his or her communication role. Rogers and Rogers have identified four roles that
organisational members may play: gatekeeper, liaison, isolate, and cosmopolite.

Gatekeepers

A gatekeeper is an individual who passes information to others or controls messages.

Common examples of gatekeepers are secretaries and assistants to upper-level managers. A
gatekeeper who has the ability to control the substance and/or the timing of the information
that is given to a decision maker can actually influence the final decision.

Liaisons

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An isolate is someone who has very little or no contact with other members of the
organisation. Certain jobs, such as night guard and messenger, are characterised by a lack of
sustained contact with others in an organisation.

Cosmopolites

A cosmopolite is a person whose communication network frequently extends into the

organisation's external environment. By definition, cosmopolites have a greater interest in
national, rather than local, affairs and tend to have stronger professional affiliations.

Nonverbal Communication

Through nonverbal communication, people use facial expressions, gestures, manner of dress,
and the larger social context to convey silent messages. In popular terms, this type of
communication is sometimes referred to as "body language".

Different Dimensions of Nonverbal Communication

Despite these limitations, it is possible to attribute limited meaning to certain general patterns
of behaviour in many situations. According to Albert Mehrabian, nonverbal communication
can be understood in terms of several fairly basic dimensions.

Immediacy: Nonverbal signals may be interpreted in terms of their immediacy. Generally,

people approach other people and objects that they like and desire, and withdraw from those
that they evaluate negatively.

Power: A second dimension that enters into the interpretation of nonverbal communication is
power. Generally, the relative status of individuals can be inferred from how they relate to
each other nonverbally. A person of higher status can assume a relaxed posture in the
presence of others, but a person of lower status is expected to display a more tense body
posture when superiors are present.
Proxemics

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In his notion of proxemics, Edward Hall, an anthropologist, contends that physical space
serves an important purpose in communication. People tend to stand at a predictable distance
from each other in accordance with the specific roles they occupy.

Spatial Arrangements

The arrangement of furniture, such as desks and chairs, affects the frequency and nature of
interpersonal communication. Osmond has suggested that the areas that drive people away
from each other should be termed socio-fugal, while those that bring people together should
be termed socio-petal.

Time

Although this form of nonverbal communication is more subtle in nature, status can be
conveyed by the use of time. The way in which a request is phrased ("As soon as possible..."
or "At your convenience...") implies how urgent the request is and how it should be
approached.

Individual Barriers to Effective Communication

Differences in Status
Generally, employees are more responsive to, and even solicitous of, communication from
people of equal or higher status. Moreover, managers report that they tend to find it more
valuable and personally satisfying to communicate with superiors than with subordinates.
Given this bias, upward communication is often understandably less effective and less
likely to elicit change.

The Credibility of the Source

For communication to be effective, its source should be credible. And a source who combines
power and attractiveness with credibility is likely to be an especially effective communicator.

Perceptual Biases

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When people are confronted with information that they find unsettling or distasteful, they are
also likely to ignore it.

Organizational Barriers To Effective Communication

Information Overload
When an abundance of information is directed to a single position within an organisation,
decoding and interpreting the messages can become overwhelming. The primary result of
such information overload is diminished effectiveness.

Time Pressures
For communication to be effective, it must arrive at an appropriate time, as well as be
accurate and complete.
Organizational Climate
The larger social system within an organisation can be a barrier to effective communication.
If the climate is one of openness and trust, then incomplete or controversial communications
are more likely to be interpreted favourably.

Informal Communication
Since employees are generally free to exchange information with one another as part of their
jobs, little can or should be done to directly control or eliminate such informal
communication. While informal networks may serve useful functions by cutting red tape and
leading to greater loyalty through positive social relations, they may also give birth to
pathways called grapevines. While organisational theorists generally regard grapevines as
inevitable outgrowths of organisational structure, most managers believe they have a negative
impact on organisational functioning.

Master strategies for improving communications in organisations

1. Use appropriate language

2. Practice empathic communication
3. Encourage feedback
4. Develop a climate of trust
6. Use appropriate media

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7. Encourage effective listening

UNIT 12 THEORIES IN MANAGEMENT

INTRODUCTION

CLASSIFICATION OF MANAGEMENT THEORIES

During the history of management a number of more or less separate schools of management
thought have emerged, and each sees management from its own viewpoint. Thus there are
many ways of classifying management theories. Koontz’s has classified the management
theories into the following six groups:

i) The management process school

ii) The empirical school

iii) The human behavioural school

iv) The social systems school

v) The decision theory school

vi) The mathematical school.

Adding one more style or approach of his own Evans discusses eleven basic styles cited by
Herbert Hicks in his hooks “the management of organizations” (1967). Again leaving the
early perspectives, Evans and others (1979) classify management theories into three broad
groups.

i) Classical management theory

ii) Neoclassical management theory

iii) Modern management theory

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Under each group a few schools of thought are identified. These three groups of schools of
management thought, are currently in vogue and found adequate for the purpose.

Scientific Management

Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856-1915) is considered to be the father of scientific

management. Henry Gantt, Frank and Lillian Gilberth and Harrington Emerson supported
Taylor in his efforts. All these disciples of Taylor became famous in their own right.
Together with Taylor they revolutionized management thinking. Scientific management is the
name given to the principles and practices that grew out of the work of Frederick Taylor and
his followers and that are characterized by concern for efficiency and systematization in
management. Four basic parts of a series of ideas developed by Taylor are as follows:

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT SCHOOL

Frederick Winslow Taylor became interested in finding ways of improving the productivity
of workers. He studied the work of individuals to identify how they perform their tasks with a
view to finding the best way to perform such tasks. He analysed each aspect, eliminated what
was unnecessary and went on to develop the exact sequence of activities. He published his
book The Principles of Scientific Management in 1911. In this book, Taylor described how
scientific method could be used to define the “one best way” for a job to be done. The
school’s approach has been acclaimed as being useful for determining the most efficient way
to do things.

i) Each person’s job should be broken down into elements and a scientific way to perform
each clement should be determined.

ii) Workers should be scientifically selected and trained to do the work in the designed and
trained manner.

iii) There should be good cooperation between management and workers so that tasks are
performed in the designed manner.

iv) There should he a division of labour between managers and workers. Managers should
take over the work of supervising and setting up instructions and designing the work, and the

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workers should be free to perform the work himself. Thus, the scientific method provides a
logical framework for the analysis of problems. It basically consists of defining the problem,
gathering data, analyzing the data, developing alternatives, and selecting the best alternative.
Taylor believed that following the scientific method would provide a way to determine the
most efficient way to perform work. Instead of abdicating responsibility for establishing
standards, the management would scientifically study all facets of an operation and carefully
set a logical and rational standard. Instead of guessing or relying solely on trial and error, the
management should go through the time consuming process of logical study and scientific
research to develop answers to business problems. Taylor believed sincerely that scientific
management practices would benefit both the employee and the employer through the
creation of larger surplus and hence the organization would receive more income. He
believed that management and labour had a common interest in increasing productivity.
Taylor did a lot of work on improving management of production operations. He
demonstrated in the classic case of the pig iron experiment at the Bethlehem Steel Company,
how both output per worker and the daily pay of worker could be increased by employing
scientific method.

The Scientific Management School led by F. W. Taylor investigated the reasons for
widespread production inefficiency and discovered that:

1. Production and pay were poor

2. Inefficiency and waste were prevalent
3. Most companies had tremendous unused potential.

Taylor advocated:
a) Vertical job specialization
b) Horizontal job specialization

Job specialization is the result of division of labour in which each job includes a narrow
subset of the tasks required to complete the product or services. Job specialization tries to
increase work efficiency as each employee performs fewer tasks.

The main elements of Scientific Management approach

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 • Analyzed work using scientific method to determine the “one best way” to complete
production tasks.
• Emphasized study of tasks, selection and training of workers and co-operation
between workers and managers.
• Introduce the piece-rate system which equated worker rewards and performance.
• Workers were viewed as part of a machine.
• Excluded senior management tasks.
• All work processes should be broken down into specialized tasks.
• Monetary incentives as a motivator
• Adoption of work measurement and work study

Taylor’s contributions to the development of management thought

He is the founding father of scientific management within the classical school of management
thought.
Taylor considered that contemporary management practice was unsystematic and lacked
professionalism.
• He considered that all work processes should be systematically analyzed and broken
down into specialized task.
• He believed one best method could be determined to complete each task.
• Scientific management systematized the analysis of work processes.
• He introduced the techniques of work studies and organization and methods in order
to determine vest methods.
• He transformed management attitudes towards the achievement of optimal efficiency
and effectiveness.
• He introduced the system of piecework as the means of providing incentives to
workers to perform at prescribed standard.

Limitation to Taylor’s work

The scientific management school is criticized on the following grounds. He perceived
workers as equivalent to machines. There by reducing the workers role to that of rigid
adherence to methods and procedures over which they had no discretion. It led to
fragmentation of work on account of its emphasis on specialization. He relied on “stick and
carrot” approach. He saw the planning and control of work place activities as exclusively in

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the hands of management rather than involving the participation of employees. Every job
was measured, timed and rated scientifically thus precluding realistic bargaining over wage
rates. It led to the creation of boring repetitive jobs and tight management control. It led to
alienation of employees from their management.

No man is entirely an ‘economic man’ and man’s behaviour is dictated not only by financial
needs, but by other needs like social needs, security needs and esteem needs. Hence, it may
not always be true that economic incentives are strong enough to motivate workers.
Secondly, there is no such thing as ‘one best way’ of doing a job so far as the component
motions are concerned and hence time and motion study may not be entirely scientific. Two
studies done by two different persons may time the same job entirely differently. Thirdly,
separation of planning and doing a job and the greater specialization inherent in the system
tend to reduce the need for skill and produce greater monotony of work. Lastly, advances in
methods and better tools amid machines eliminated some workers, causing resentment from
them.

Administrative Management

While pioneers of the scientific management tried to determine the best way to perform a job,
those in the administrative management explored the possibilities of an ideal way to put all
jobs together and operate an organization. Thus the emphasis of administrative or general
management theory is on finding ‘the best way’ to run an organization. This school of
thought is also called administrative or traditional principles of management. Henry Fayol
(184 1-1925), a French industrialist, is the chief architect and the father of the administrative
management theory. Other prominent exponents include Chester I Barnard amid
ColnelLyndallUrwick( a British management expert ).

Limitation of Administrative Management

Like the scientific management school, the administrative management school is also
criticized on some grounds. Many of the principles of this school including those of Fayol are
contradictory and have dilemmas. These principles are no better than proverbs, which give
opposite messages. For example, the principle of unity of command contradicts the principle
of specialization or division of labour and the principle of limited span of control, contradicts
that the number of organizational levels should be kept at a minimum. Further the principle of

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specialization is internally inconsistent; for purpose, process, and place are competing modes
of specialization and to secure the advantages of any one mode, the organizer must sacrifice
the advantages of the other three modes. All modes cannot be followed simultaneously while
pursuing specialization.

Secondly, these principles are based on a few case studies and they are not empirically tested.

Thirdly, these principles are stated as unconditional statements and valid under all
circumstances, which is not practicable. More and more conditional principles of
management are needed.

Fourthly these principles result in the formation of mechanistic organization structures, which
are insensitive to employees’ social and psychological needs. Such structures inhibit the
employees’ self-actualization and accentuate their dependence on superiors.

This school does not consider sociology, biology, psychology, economies, etc. as relevant
and included within the purview. Further, these principles are based on the assumption that
organizations are closed systems. According to this school of thought employees tend to
develop an orientation towards their own departments rather than towards time whole
organization.

Lastly, the rigid structures created by these principles do not work well under unstable
conditions.

Fayol’s Unified Concept

As the managing director of a mining company, Fayol developed a unified concept of

management and broad administrative principles applicable to general and higher managerial
levels. He used the word ‘administration’ for what we call management. Fayol focused on
managerial levels and the organization as a whole. His perspective extended beyond the shop
level and the physical production processes and was of macro in nature. In his French book
‘Industrial and General Management’, He writes that all activities of business enterprises
could he divided into six groups: technical, commercial, financial, accounting, security and
administrative (or managerial). He focused on the managerial activity and propounded that
fundamental functions of any manager consists of planning, organizing, commanding,
coordinating and controlling. He emphasized that the process of management is the same at
any level of an organization and is common to all types of organizations. He also presented

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14 principles of management as general guidelines for management practice. They dealt with
division of work, authority and responsibility, discipline, unity of command, unity of
direction, subordination of individual interest to general interest, remuneration, centralization,
scalar chain, order, equity stability of tenure of personnel, initiative amid esprit de corps.

Henri Fayol
Henri Fayol was an early 20th century French Mining Engineer and a practicing manager. He
classified the activities of organizations into technical, financial, security, accounting and
management groups. He provided the most enduring definition of management, “to manage
is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, coordinate and control”. He identified the
five functions of management as planning, organizing, commanding, coordinating and
controlling.

He developed 14 universal principles of organization; many of these are still accepted today:
· Division of labour
· Authority
· Span of control
· Unity of command
· Subordination of individual interest to the general interest
· Remuneration
· Centralisation
· Hierarchy or scalar chain (clear line of authorities)
· Order
· Equity
· Stability and tenure of personnel
· Initiative
· Esprit de corps =comradeship/togetherness

The scientific management school concentrated too much on work processes and tools whilst
neglecting management task. Fayol in his work emphasized the perspective of management
within the organization and emphasized that management was a profession and should be
thought both in educational institutions and on job.

Fayol’s contributions to the development of management thought.

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He shifted the management focus to the structural nature of organization. He defined the
importance of hierarchy or scalar chain and role of authority by management secures
compliance to its action. He developed management principles that could be passed on to
and refined by others e.g. unity of command, unity of direction and span of control.

Limitations to Fayol’s work

He assumed that universal principles applied to all original situations. He only recognized the
formal organization and concentrated on the structure of the organization. He shows
management as essentially paternalistic. His approach was insensitive to the needs of people
as individual and groups.
Bureaucratic Organization

As organizations became larger and more complex, the authoritarian-paternalistic pattern

gave way to increased functional specialization with many layers of middle and lower
management for coordinating organizational effort. The result was a bureaucratic approach to
organizational structure. With the intentions of eliminating managerial inconsistencies and as
a reaction to managerial abuses of power, Max Weber propounded a set of principles to
provide grounds for organizing group efforts. The characteristics of bureaucratic organization
are division of labour by functional specialization. We defined hierarchy of authority, a set of
rules covering the rights and duties of employees, a system of procedures or dealing with
work situations, impersonal relations between people and promotion and selection of
employees based on technical competence, Often, public service with a large number of
offices and employees like postal services are cited as examples of bureaucratic
organizations. The strength of such a bureaucratic organization exists in its system of
workable set of rules, policies and a hierarchy of authority.

The advantages of bureaucracy are many folds. Apart from consistent employee behaviour, it
eliminates overlapping or conflicting jobs or duties, and the behaviour of the system is
predictable. In turn, consistency and precise job definitions help to avoid wasteful actions and
improve efficiency. Furthermore, bureaucracy has the advantages of basing its mode of hiring
and promotion on merit, developing expertise in employees and assuring continuity in the

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organization. In other words, bureaucracy emphasizes the position rather than person and
organization continues even when individuals leave.

Despite the above advantages, bureaucratic organization has some significant negative and
side effects. Too much of red tapes and paper work not only lead to unpleasant experiences
but also to inefficient operations. Since employees are treated impersonally and they are
expected to rely on rules and policies, they are unwilling to exercise individual judgment and
avoid risks.

Consequently their growth, creativity, development and even initiative suffer considerably.

Machine like treatment makes employees unconcerned about the organization and exhibit
indifference regarding the organization and job performance. Bureaucracy expects
conformity in behaviour rather than performance.

Criticism of Classical Management Theory

Apart from the limitations and disadvantages of schools of classical theory discussed so far
under each school, there are some general criticisms on schools of classical theory. The
notion of rational economic person is often strongly criticized. The assumption that people
are motivated primarily by economic reward might have been appropriate around 1900 A.D.,
and for a few people today. This assumption is not correct under the new circumstances
where aspirations and the educational level of people have changed. Further, organizations
have grown more complex and hence require more creativity and judgment from employees.
Secondly the classical theory assumes that all organizations can be managed according to one
set of principles and the same may not be valid. In other words, all pervasiveness of
principles of management is also questioned. With changes in objectives, approaches,
structures and environment, organizations may have to have some changes in principles.

The principles propounded by the classical theory are not vigorously scientific and thus did
not stand the test of time. They did not add up to the consistent and complete body of theory.
They reflected the observers’ empirical observations and their logical deductions, rather than
a precise theory built upon truly scientific research and evidence. However, the principles,
which were plausible and highly relevant to practitioners, have been later developed into
guidelines for managing business enterprises (McFarland, 1974, p17). The traditionalists
believed that management theories can be reduced from observing and analyzing what
managers do, and the empirical findings have been distilled to arrive at certain principles.

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Hence, they are criticized for carrying on the practices of the past and perpetuating outmoded
practices and mediocricity. Yet, this is the leading school of thought and time most prevalent
kind of management found in practice.

HUMAN RELATIONS APPROACH

This school was developed during the 1930s. it aimed at understanding how psychological
and social processes interact with the work situation to influence performance. Human
Relations Schools was the first major approach to emphases informal work relationship and
work satisfaction.

The Human Relations School is highly diversified approach. The mane that is usually
associated to the school is Elton Mayo. He led the Human Relations School against the
classical school approach in the 1930s. He first started his experiment at Western Electric
Company in Chicago. They were to investigate the influence of the physical working
conditions on workers’ productivity and efficiency.

This research project known as the Hawthorne Studies, provided some of the most interesting
and controversial resource in the history of management. The Hawthorne studies were a
series of experiments conducted from 1927 to 1932. During the first stage of the project (the
illumination experiments) various working condition, particularly the lighting in the factory
were altered to determine the effect of this changes between the factory lighting and
production levels.

The researchers believed that productivity may be affected more by psychological and social
needs/factors than by physical objective influence. After series of interviews with the
employees, the researchers under Mayo eventually concluded that the informal work group
influenced productivity and employee behaviour.

They argued that manager should stress primarily employee welfare, motivation and
communication. They believed that social needs had precedence over economic needs.
Therefore management must gain the cooperation of the group and promote job satisfaction
and group norms consistent with the goals of the organization.

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Limitation of Human Relation School

Human relations school has several limitations as well. It is considered to be a swing in the
opposite direction of classical theory. In other words, they saw only human variables as
critical and ignored other variables. Every organization is made up of a number of diverse
social groups with incompatible values and interests. These groups might cooperate in some
spheres and compete and clash in others. It is practically impossible to satisfy everybody and
turn the organization into a big happy family.

This approach over-emphasizes the importance of symbolic rewards which may not be
appreciated by recipient’s ‘significant others’ and underplays the role of material rewards.

Furthermore, the assumption about formation of informal groups in unrealistic and not very
common. Informal groups can only make the worker’s day more pleasant and not his
repetitive, monotonous and uncreative task. Workers do not come to the organization to seek
affection and affiliation. Techniques of human relations school try to play a trick on workers
to create a false sense of happiness and are not really concerned with their real well being.
There is a difference between allowing workers to participate in making decisions and letting
workers think they are participating. On this sense, this approach is also production-oriented
and not employee oriented. The unqualified application of these techniques in all situations is
not possible. For example where secrecy of decision is required and when decisions have to
be made quickly on emergent basis, this approach may not work. This approach makes as
unrealistic demand on the supervisor and expects him to give up his desire for power. The
assumption that the satisfied workers are more productive and improved working conditions
and human relations lead to increased output may, not always be true. Above all, human
behaviour is not the total field of concern of the manager.

Human relations movement accepted scientific management’s central goal of efficiency, but
focused on individuals and on small-group processes rather than large organizations. It
stressed communication, leadership and interpersonal relations, particularly between
employees and their bosses. Like scientific management efforts, research in human relations
focused on the lower levels of organization rather than on the middle and upper groups and
hence lacked comprehensive scope. Behaviour scientists became interested in companies as
research sites, but they tended to use their findings to build their own disciplines, or to
establish a science of human relations rather than a science of management. Thus the human

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relations movement accepted many of the assumptions of the scientific management thinkers,
and it did not achieve a major breakthrough in management theory.

The Hawthorne Studies

During the same time period that scientific management was popular, another largely
separate school of thought emerged, the human relations approach. The human relations
approach, which partially grew out of the field of psychology, emphasized the importance of
motivation and attitudes in explaining worker behavior.
The Hawthorne Studies were begun in 1927 and spanned 12 years. The Hawthorne
experiments were important because they demonstrated that in addition to the job itself
certain factors can influence workers behavior.

In essence, the Hawthorne studies investigated the relationship between the level of lighting
in the workplace and worker productivity. It concluded that as lighting conditions were made
worse productivity would improve.

Elton Mayo, who led the school, pointed out that management concern for the workers’ well-
being and sympathetic supervision improved their performance.
Classical School of Management

1. Strengths

i) Provided the first coherent attempt to understand the nature, purpose and structure
of large-scale organizations.

ii) Established the principals of organization that still governs the way many
organizations operate today.

iii) Embraced scientific management, which systematized work through analysis,

standardization and specialization.

iv) Emphasized scientific selection and training combined with piecework incentives.

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 v) Provided insight into the grouping and coordination of tasks (emphasized clear
lines of authority, i.e. scalar chain), span of control and clearly defined roles that
can be seen in many organizations today.

vi) Provided enduring definition of management, i.e. to manage is to plan, to

organize, to coordinate and to control.

vii) The formal structure of organizations was exposed (by Max Weber) as being well
suited to the delivery of standardized products and services, i.e. Bureaucracy.
Based on specialization, hierarchy of authority, a system of rules and procedures,
impersonality. Some degree of bureaucracy is essential for effective management.

2. Weaknesses

i) Viewed workers as mechanistic cogs/obstacles in a management driven

production.

ii) Very narrow perspective on money as the only motivator and limited recognition
of other human needs.

iii) Failed to recognize the complexity and difficulty of managing the human factor of
production.

SYSTEMS THEORY OF ORGANIZATION

The major proponent of this theory is Kast & Rosenzweig & Trist & Bamyeth. The theory
considers an organization not only as a system in itself but as part of other systems. Just as
parts of an organization linked together, so is the organization itself linked to other
organization like a series cogs in a wheel.

Elements of the organizational system

The main subsystems in an organizational system are:
a) Technical Subsystem

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 b) Psycho-social subsystem
c) Structural subsystem

Technical Subsystem
This employs technology to assist in carrying out its tasks, e.g. computer, fax, telephones, air-
conditioner etc.

Psychosocial subsystem
This emphasizes people and the informal goals of people, values and aspirations made of
behaviour, as this will reflect in their performance on duty.

Structural subsystem
This employs technologies and people in order to get work done i.e. to process inputs into
outputs in addition Kats & Rosenzweig proposes to further elements.

Goals and values subsystems: It emphasizes the formal goals & values of the organization
itself.

The managerial subsystem: It emphasizes the mechanisms of co-ordination and control

beyond the formal lines of the structural subsystem.

Levels within the organization

The systems theorists identifies three levels of operation within the organization:
a) Technical level –concerns with gathering the actual task done
b) Organizational level – coordinates and integrate the operation of the technical
level
c) Institutional level – sees to the development of the organization in relation of its
environment.

CONTINGENCY APPROACH

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Following World War II, a new perspective on organisational behavior began to develop.
Called the contingency approach, it acknowledged the difficulty of offering simple general
principles to explain or predict behavior in organisational settings.

Organisational Behavior researchers who subscribe to the contingency approach believe that
employee behavior is too complex to be explained by only a few simple and straightforward
principles. Instead, they seek to identify the factors that are jointly necessary for a given
principle to hold. Contingency researches recognize the interdependency of personal and
situational factors in the determination of employee behavior.

In summary, the approach opines that there is no single best way to manage. Rather, it
requires managers to be flexible and to adapt the management style to the situation at hand.

Contingency Theory does not aim to identify any particular approach to management rather it
points out that there is no best form of organization and that one needs to consider the impact
of the situation in which the organization finds itself, the form of organization and
management which will be more suitable or should be conditioned by the demands placed on
it. In other words, it denies anniversary principles of management by stating that a variety of
factors both internal and external to the firm, may affect the organization’s performance.
Thus, there is no best way to manage and organize as circumstances vary.

Situational characteristics are called contingencies. Understanding contingencies helps a

manager to know which sets of circumstances dictate which management actions.
Organizational Humanism

This school of thought is an extension of behavioural schools of neoclassical theory and

hence has much in common with behavioural schools. Some of the researchers like Chris
Argyris,

Douglas McGregor and Abraham Maslow mentioned under behavioural schools are the
propounders of organizational humanism or the modern behavioural school. The underlying
philosophy of this school is that individuals need to use all of their capacities and creative
skills at work as well as at home. This ‘self-actualizing view’ is the basis of this school.
According to this view, motives fall into categories that can be arranged according to ‘their
importance and employees seek to mature (self-actualize) on the job and are capable of being

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so. Employees are primarily self-motivated and self-controlled and react negatively to
externally imposed controls.

If allowed to become self-actualized, employees will integrate the goals with those of the
organization. Self-actualization refers to reaching one’s potential i.e., ultimate use of personal
skills.

Exponents of this theory felt that rational design of organizations leads to highly specialized
and routine jobs in which employees cannot use all their creative and motivated potential.
Hence, unnecessary rules, rigidly designed jobs and inflexible supervision should be avoided
and in consistent with human nature. Employees should have greater freedom and satisfaction
at work.

Self-actualized employees are highly motivated and produce organizational benefits that
cannot he achieved in the bureaucratic organization. The best role for a manager is to
challenge employees, develop their decision-making skills, and allow them to seek
responsibility.

Humanist approach suggests to rely on the worker’s internal motivation (i.e., desire to grow)
as against external pressures (social acceptance and organizational play) suggested in
classical and neoclassical theories. Organizational humanism focuses on individual needs and
the satisfaction of these needs at work.

Organizational humanism is criticized on the ground that it is difficult to believe that every
employee seeks self-actualization at work. Organizational humanists say that there are many
ways in which employees can entertain themselves at work and make their jobs interesting.

Management Science

Management Science should not be confused with scientific management of classic theory.

However, the management science approach also known as quantitative approach is evolved
from the early application of some of the scientific management techniques of classical
theorists.

Because of complexities of organizations discussed earlier, today’s managers are required to

have more and better information in order to make effective decisions. The management
science approach proposes the use of quantitative technique to aid decision making. Despite

106
voluminous data to be analysed and sophisticated computations to be done, a wide variety of
quantitative tools have been developed and high-speed computers deployed in the analysis of
information.

This approach gained momentum during the Second World War when interdisciplinary
groups of scientists called Operations Research Teams were engaged to seek solutions to
many complex problems of war. These teams constructed mathematical models to simulate
real life problems and by changing the values of variables in the model, analysed the effect of
changes and presented a rational basis for decision makers. Tools such as linear
programming, queuing theory, simulation models, CPM, PERT, inventory-control and quality
control tools were extensively used in this approach. Thus the focus of management science
or quantitative approach is on making objective and rational decisions. Objective rationality
implied an ability and willingness to follow a reasoned, unemotional, orderly and scientific
approach in relating means with ends and in visualizing the totality of the decision
environment. It is an attempt to rationalize and quantify the managerial process.

This approach facilitated disciplined thinking, achieving precision and perfection by

expressing relationships among variables and facts in quantitative terms. While this approach
has found wide applications in planning and control activities, not all managerial processes
can be rationalized and quantified. The area such as organizing, staffing and leading which
are more human than technical in nature, found this approach not so beneficial and this is the
major limitation of these tools.

Lastly, it can be seen that the most dramatic developments in management theory and
practice have occurred since 1900. The modern management theory has provided few key
concepts like looking at organizations as open systems, having contingency basis for
managerial actions, considering a variety of individual needs in designing organizations and
use of a wide variety of quantitative tools to aid managerial decisions.

PROBLEMS AND CONFLICTS IN MANAGEMENT THEORIES:

It has already been observed that there are contradictory and conflicting arguments in
management theories and hence they are no more than proverbs. The problem is how a
practitioner must choose his approach. Alternatively, is there any way to synthesis a unified
management theory from among the diffused theories or the jungle of approaches. As
discussed in the beginning of this unit, revisionists are aiming for a high-level,

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comprehensive, integrated theory that would bring order to the theory jungle. Their theory
and methods are colliding at certain points with those of the earlier scientific management
(classical theory) and human-relations (neo-classical theory) movements. It also appears that
unification of different schools of thought, of the theories in management is unlikely and each
will maintain its viewpoint. The reasons for such a conclusion lays in the problems, of
semantics (everyone saying the same thing but using different terminology), differences in
definitions of management and the tunnel vision of each school to see its own point of view.

As far as practitioners are concerned, there is no rational basis to choose a style or approach.
Each approach depends upon a special knowledge of concepts from different fields of study.
Probably each individual may have to assess himself and his environment and make a choice
of one of more approaches that suit him. Evans cites the example of the technical processing
work of libraries as best suited to the school of challenge-response and says that the ‘most
successful managers select elements from various schools that fit their personalities’. As a
matter of fact, practicing managers are basically unaware of, or less concerned about
management’s division into schools. They give different emphasis to problems in different
situations, draw together what they know about management and what is most appropriate. In
other words, the schools of thoughts in management are transcending into an electric stage as
far as modern managers are concerned.

Another basic problem of the management theory is to provide adequate explanations and
predictions in subject matter that is subjected to rapid and extensive change. Management
theories have to be dynamic and embrace a number of upcoming subjects and concepts.

Yet another problem inherent in the applied science nature of management is that of
separating the managerial implications from non-managerial implications when inputs are
taken from the fields like organization theory, decision theory, personality theory, game
theory, information theory, communication theory, learning theory, group theory and
motivation theory. The problem is to demonstrate and support conclusions applicable to
management theory.

The recent trend is to play greater attention to comparative management theory, which
emphasizes cross-cultural ‘study as well as variations within a given culture i.e., across the
boundaries between nations or cultural groupings of nations, as well as in different
organizational or administrative contexts like schools, hospitals, libraries, etc., within a given
culture.

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Research Questions

Choose only ONE

Assignment 1

Question 1.

Management is a discipline, practice and process which involve people and other human
resources in order to achieve organisational goals.

• Identify and discuss the four managerial functions. (10 Marks)

• Highlights the challenges with which the managers of today are facing.
(10 marks)
{20 Marks}

Or

Question 2.

• Evaluate the three levels of leadership in an organisation.

(10 marks)

• Show the responsibilities associated with each of these 3 levels.

(10marks) {20
marks}

Assignment 2:

Question 1

• Stipulate and give reasons for individual resistance to an organisational change.

( 10 marks )

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 • Identify and discuss the means through which an organisational change can be
addressed.
( 10 marks)
{20 arks}

Or

Question 2

Explain the term ‘contingency approach to management’ and discuss its importance.
(20 marks)

Assignment 3:

Question 1

Discuss the reasons why understanding the ‘System Approach’ could help managers to
improve the performance of their organisations. Give example in support of your answer.

(20 marks)

Or

Question 2

Discuss the view that bureaucracy has no place in business in the 21 st Century. Give examples
in support of your answer. (20 marks)

Due Date:

Assignment 4

Test:

Due Date:

Assignment Format:

• Use APA as per IUM requirements

• Introduction, body and conclusion

• 12 font, New Roman Times

110
 • 3-5 pages

• Use 3-5 References

• Typed Assignment

• Due date to be honoured

Recommended Text Books:

Robbins S.P and Judge, T. A (2007). Organisational Behavoir 12 ed. Person Education Inc.
New Jersey.

Jones G. R, George J.M & Hill C.W.L. (2000). Contemporary Management

Bateman T S & Snell S A. (2002). Management: Competing in the New Era.

. 5th Edition
McShane S.L & Von Glinow M.A. (2000). Organizational Behaviour.

Revision Questions

Question 1

(a) Identify problems you might encounter at different stages in managing change in an
organisation.
Answer-
• Responding to Globalization
• Managing workforce diversity
• Improving Quality and Productivity
• Responding to labour shortage
• Improving Customer Service and People Skills
• Empowering people

(b) How would you seek to overcome resistance to change?

111
 Answer-

Question 2

(a) Outline the strengths and weaknesses of the Classical School of Management.
Classical School of Management

1. Strengths

i) Provided the first coherent attempt to understand the nature, purpose and structure
of large-scale organizations.

ii) Established the principals of organization that still governs the way many
organizations operate today.

iii) Embraced scientific management, which systematized work through analysis,

standardization and specialization.

iv) Emphasized scientific selection and training combined with piecework incentives.

v) Provided insight into the grouping and coordination of tasks (emphasized clear
lines of authority, i.e. scalar chain), span of control and clearly defined roles that
can be seen in many organizations today.

vi) Provided enduring definition of management, i.e. to manage is to plan, to

organize, to coordinate and to control.

vii) The formal structure of organizations was exposed (by Max Weber) as being well
suited to the delivery of standardized products and services, i.e. Bureaucracy.
Based on specialization, hierarchy of authority, a system of rules and procedures,
impersonality. Some degree of bureaucracy is essential for effective management.

2. Weaknesses

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 i) Viewed workers as mechanistic cogs/obstacles in a management driven
production.

ii) Very narrow perspective on money as the only motivator and limited recognition
of other human needs.

iii) Failed to recognize the complexity and difficulty of managing the human factor of
production.

(b) Briefly describe the four principles F W Taylor came up with.

• Analyzed work using scientific method to determine the “one best way” to complete
production tasks.
• Emphasized study of tasks, selection and training of workers and co-operation
between workers and managers.
• Introduce the piece-rate system which equated worker rewards and performance.
• Workers were viewed as part of a machine.
• Excluded senior management tasks.
• All work processes should be broken down into specialized tasks.
• Monetary incentives as a motivator
• Adoption of work measurement and work study

Question 3

(a) Discuss the nature of organisational culture

Answer- Specifically, there are six key elements that managers need to

address when they design an organizational structure:

• Work specialization - the degree to which tasks in the organization are subdivided
into separate jobs. Division of labor and the early auto assembly plants in the US are
examples of this.

• Departmentalization - the basis by which jobs are grouped together. The most
common ways of doing this is by function (e.g., manufacturing, marketing) type of
product, geography or territory (e.g. east coast office, west coast office)

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 • Chain of command - the unbroken line of authority that extends from the top of the
organization to the lowest echelon and clarifies who reports to whom.

• ·Span of control - the number of subordinates a manager can efficiently and

effectively direct.

• Centralization/Decentralization - the degree to which decision making is

concentrated at a single point in the organization. Decentralization is when decision
discretion is pushed down to lower-level employees.

· Formalization - the degree to which jobs within the organization are standardized.
(b) Briefly explain the basic elements of organisational structure.

Strategy:

– Innovation, cost minimization, and imitation.

Organization Size

– An organization’s size significantly affects its structure.

– The relationship isn’t linear, rather size affects structure at a decreasing rate.

Technology

– How an organization transfers its inputs into outputs.

– Every organization has at least one technology for converting financial, human, and
physical resources into products or services.

– The common theme that differentiates technologies is their degree of routineness.

Environment

- institutions or forces outside the organization that potentially affect the organization’s
performance.

Organizational Designs and Employee Behavior

Question 4

(a) What is meant by conflict in an organisation?

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Answer-Conflict can spring from a variety of sources. Robbins suggests that these sources
can be grouped into three general categories: communication, structural and personal
behaviour factors.

(b) Describe five merits of conflict in organisations.

Answer-
1. Money - the ratio of profits to wages might lead to a conflict between workers and
managers.
2. Job - rates of pay are different for each job and sometimes one group
claims a job possibly to safeguard their future security, or loss of
earnings, if the job is given to others.
3. Goals - managers are concerned with efficiency and workers with
security.
4. Environmental factors - downward fluctuations in the market for a
product are a
threat to workers security.
5. Nature of work itself - the socio-technical system organizes men in a
particular way which often leads to conflicts.
(c) Suggest two methods that management might use to reduce the
causes of negative conflict.
• Superordinate Goals
• Structural Approaches and others include
• Styles of Conflict Management
• Forcing
• Collaborating
• Accommodating
• Avoiding
• Compromising
• Communication systems
• Collective bargaining
• Training and development

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Question 5

(a) What is leadership?

Answer- Leadership is a process through which a person tries to get organisational members
to do something, which the person desires. In other words, it is the process of directing the
behaviour of others towards the accomplishment of organisational objectives. It is the role of
the leader to obtain the commitment of individuals in achieving these goals.

(b) List eight qualities of a good leader:

Answer-
• honesty
• entegrity
• openness
• Directive leadership involves giving specific guidance to subordinates and asking
them to follow standard rules and regulations.
• Supportive leadership includes being friendly to subordinates and sensitive to their
needs.
• Participative leadership involves sharing information with subordinates and
consulting with them before making decisions.
• Achievement-oriented leadership entails setting challenging goals and emphasizing
excellence while simultaneously showing confidence that subordinates will perform
well.

Question 6
Answer-
(a) Identify and explain five indicators of de-motivation or frustration
induced behaviour within an organization.
1. Regressive behaviour - not co-operating, reverting to childish or primitive
behaviour.
2. High rate of absenteeism, arriving late, leaving early, avoiding
responsibility.
3. Aggressive behaviour on behalf of the frustrated individual, e.g. abusive
language, malicious gossip might be directed towards a supervisor.
4. No efforts to achieve organisational goals and objectives.

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5. Persisting in fixated behaviour that has no adaptive value in the situation -
e.g. inability to accept new ideas.
6. Displaced aggression directed not at the source of frustration, which might
not be clear and identifiable but as a scapegoat, (subordinate/staff or
inanimate object).

(b) Describe five causes of de-motivation.

Answer- Causes of De-Motivation include:
1. Poor supervision or inadequate working conditions may cause de-motivation (Herzberg's
2 factors theory).
2. De-motivation will occur where expectancy is low (expectancy theories of
motivation).
3. Perceptions of inequity - ratio between broadly defined inputs (skills) and
outputs (pay) do not compare with a preferred benchmark. Individuals
will seek negative adjustment if this persists.
4. Failure to satisfy basic needs (Alderfer's Erg theory).
5. Conflict between individual goals and organisation goals. Lotham and
Locke developed goals setting theory by developing management by
objectives and motivation theory.

Question 7
How are OB concepts addressed in management functions, roles, and skills?
Answer – One common thread runs through the functions, roles, and skills of managers:
the need to develop people skills if they are going to be effective and successful.
Managers get things done through other people. Managers do their work in an
organization.
• Management functions involve managing the organization—planning and controlling
and managing people within the organization—organizing and leading.
• Management roles are the “parts” managers play within an organization and involve
their interaction with people.
• Management skills, as identified by Robert Katz, boil down to three essential
management skills: technical, human, and conceptual. These use OB to manage
processes and people and to problem solve.

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Question 8
Define organizational behavior. Relate it to management.
Answer – Organizational behavior (abbreviated OB) is a field of study that investigates
the impact that individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior within organizations
for the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organization’s
effectiveness. As managers accomplish their work through others, OB provides the tools
for guiding the productivity of others, predicting human behavior at work and the
perspectives needed to manage individuals from diverse backgrounds.

Question 9
What are the three levels of analysis in our OB model? Are they related? If so, how?
Answer-
• Individual
• Groups
• Structure
Question 10
What is an organization? Is the family unit an organization? Explain.
Answer – An organization is a consciously coordinated social unit, composed of two or
more people, which functions on a relatively continuous basis to achieve a common goal
or set of goals. The family is a type of organization because it has all the characteristics of
an organization. The one variation is that the “goals” of a family may not be explicit, and
therefore students might argue that it is not an organization per se.

11. Identify and contrast the three general management roles.

Answer – In the late 1960s, Henry Mintzberg discovered three general management roles
that had sub-roles. The ten roles can be grouped as being primarily concerned with
interpersonal relationships, the transfer of information, and decision making.
· Interpersonal—ceremonial and symbolic
· Figurehead—duties are ceremonial and symbolic in nature
· Leadership—hire, train, motivate, and discipline employees
· Liaison—contact outsiders who provide the manager with information. These may be
individuals or groups inside or outside the organization.
· Information—involve the collection and dissemination of information
· Monitor—collect information from organizations and institutions outside their own

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 · Disseminator—a conduit to transmit information to organizational members
· Spokesperson—represent the organization to outsiders
· Decisional—focus on making choices
· Entrepreneur—managers initiate and oversee new projects that will improve their
organization’s performance
· Disturbance handlers—take corrective action in response to unforeseen problems
· Resource allocators—are responsible for allocating human, physical, and monetary
resources
· Negotiator—discuss issues and bargain with other units to gain advantages for their
own unit

Question 12
What are effectiveness and efficiency, and how are they related to organizational
behavior?
Answer-
Question 13
Identify and contrast the three general management roles.
Answer-
• Interpersonal roles
• Informational roles
• Decisional roles
Question 14
What is a “contingency approach” to OB?
Answer – The contingency approach refers to situational factors that are variables which
moderate the relationship between the independent and dependent variables. There are
four key dependent variables (productivity, absenteeism, turnover, and job satisfaction)
and a large number of independent variables (for example, motivation, leadership, work
processes), organized by level of analysis, that research indicates have varying effects.
Because of the large number of independent variables, the study of OB is complex and
requires a systematic approach within organizations as we seek to predict the behavior of
people at work.

Question 16

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 Why do you think the subject of OB might be criticized as being “only common sense,”
when one would rarely hear such a criticism of a course in physics or statistics?

Question 17

"Specifically, there are six key elements that managers need to address when they design an
organizational structure". Discuss this statement fully.

Question 18
"Henri Fayol was an early 20th century French Mining Engineer and a practicing manager. He
classified the activities of organizations into technical, financial, security, accounting and
management groups". Discuss this statement fully.

19. Contrast psychology and sociology’s contribution to OB.

Answer – OB is a field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, group, and
structure have on behavior within organizations. Both psychology and sociology are
concerned with behavior.
Psychology is the science of behavior that studies individual behavior and sociology
studies people in relation to their fellow human beings. Psychological study in the field
of OB has contributed knowledge on a number of topics including: learning, perception,
personality, emotions, training, leadership, motivation, job satisfaction, decision making,
etc.
Sociological study has contributed knowledge on topics such as: group dynamics, teams,
organizational culture, organizational theory and structure, communications, power and
conflict.

20. “Behavior is generally predictable, so there is no need to formally study OB.” Why is
that statement wrong?
Answer – Such a casual or commonsense approach to reading others can often lead to
erroneous predictions. OB improves managers’ predictive ability by replacing intuitive
opinions with a more systematic approach. Behavior generally is predictable if we know
how the person perceived the situation and what is important to him or her. While

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people’s behavior may not appear to be rational to an outsider, there is reason to believe it
usually is intended to be rational and it is seen as rational by them. There are certain
fundamental consistencies underlying the behavior of all individuals that can be identified
and then modified to reflect individual differences. These fundamental consistencies
allow predictability. When we use the phrase systematic study, we mean looking at
relationships, attempting to attribute causes and effects, and basing our conclusions on
scientific evidence—that is, on data gathered under controlled conditions and measured
and interpreted in a reasonably rigorous manner.
21. What are the three levels of analysis in our OB model? Are they related? If so, how?
Answer – Individual, group, organization. The three basic levels are analogous to
building blocks—each level is constructed upon the previous level. Group concepts grow
out of the foundation laid in the individual section; we overlay structural constraints on
the individual and group in order to arrive at organizational behavior

22. If job satisfaction is not a behavior, why is it considered an important dependent

variable?
Answer – Job satisfaction is the difference between the amount of rewards workers
receive and the amount they believe they should receive. Unlike the other dependent
variables, job satisfaction represents an attitude rather than a behavior. It became a
primary dependent variable for two reasons: 1) demonstrated relationship to performance
factors and 2) the value preferences held by many OB researchers. Managers have
believed for years that satisfied employees are more productive. Much evidence questions
that assumed causal relationship. However, it can be argued that advanced societies
should be concerned with the quality of life. Ethically, organizations have a responsibility
to provide employees with jobs that are challenging and intrinsically rewarding.

23. What are effectiveness and efficiency, and how are they related to organizational
behavior?
Answer – An organization is productive if it achieves its goals (effective) and does so by
transferring inputs to outputs at the lowest cost (efficiency). As such, productivity implies
a concern for both effectiveness and efficiency. Hospital example—effective when it
successfully meets the needs of its clientele. It is efficient when it can do so at a low cost.
Business firm example—effective when it attains its sales or market share goals, but its
productivity also depends on achieving those goals efficiently. Achieving productivity

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 through effectiveness and efficiency involves all three levels of an organization, the
individual, the group, and the organizational system. OB provides the tools, insights, and
ability to predict outcomes needed to balance these two elements.

24. Contrast the research comparing effective managers with successful managers.
What are the implications from the research for practicing managers?
Answer – Successful managers—networking made the largest relative contribution to
success. Human resource management activities made the least relative contribution.
Effective managers—Communication made the largest relative contribution; networking
the least. Successful managers do not give the same emphasis to each of those activities
as do effective managers. Their emphases are almost the opposite. This finding challenges
the historical assumption that promotions are based on performance, vividly illustrating
the importance that social and political skills play in getting ahead in organizations. One
common thread runs through the functions, roles, skills, and activities approaches to
management: managers need to develop their people skills if they are going to be
effective and successful.

25. Why do you think the subject of OB might be criticized as being “only common
sense,” when one would rarely hear such a criticism of a course in physics or statistics?
Answer – Each of us is a student of behavior by nature. Unfortunately, our casual or
commonsense approach to reading others can often lead to erroneous predictions.
However, we can improve our predictive ability by replacing our intuitive opinions with a
more systematic approach. The systematic approach used in this book will uncover
important facts and relationships and will provide a base from which more accurate
predictions of behavior can be made. Behavior generally is predictable if we know how
the person perceived the situation and what is important to him or her. While people’s
behavior may not appear to be rational to an outsider, there is reason to believe it usually
is intended to be rational and it is seen as rational by them. Systematic study replaces
intuition, or those “gut feelings” about “why I do what I do” and “what makes others
tick.”

Question 26
Critically discuss the main elements of Scientific Management approach.

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Answer-
The Scientific Management School led by F. W. Taylor investigated the reasons for
widespread production inefficiency and discovered that:

1. Production and pay were poor

2. Inefficiency and waste were prevalent
3. Most companies had tremendous unused potential.

Taylor advocated:
a) Vertical job specialization
b) Horizontal job specialization

Job specialization is the result of division of labour in which each job includes a narrow
subset of the tasks required to complete the product or services. Job specialization tries to
increase work efficiency as each employee performs fewer tasks.

The main elements of Scientific Management approach inlude:

• Analyzed work using scientific method to determine the “one best way” to complete
production tasks.
• Emphasized study of tasks, selection and training of workers and co-operation
between workers and managers.
• Introduce the piece-rate system which equated worker rewards and performance.
• Workers were viewed as part of a machine.
• Excluded senior management tasks.
• All work processes should be broken down into specialized tasks.
• Monetary incentives as a motivator
• Adoption of work measurement and work study

Taylor’s contributions to the development of management thought. He is the founding father

of scientific management within the classical school of management thought. Taylor
considered that contemporary management practice was unsystematic and lacked
professionalism.

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 • He considered that all work processes should be systematically analyzed and broken
down into specialized task.
• He believed one best method could be determined to complete each task.
• Scientific management systematized the analysis of work processes.
• He introduced the techniques of work studies and organization and methods in order
to determine vest methods.
• He transformed management attitudes towards the achievement of optimal efficiency
and effectiveness.
• He introduced the system of piecework as the means of providing incentives to
workers to perform at prescribed standard.

Limitation to Taylor’s work

The scientific management school is criticized on the following grounds. He perceived
workers as equivalent to machines. There by reducing the workers role to that of rigid
adherence to methods and procedures over which they had no discretion. It led to
fragmentation of work on account of its emphasis on specialization. He relied on “stick and
carrot” approach. He saw the planning and control of work place activities as exclusively in
the hands of management rather than involving the participation of employees. Every job
was measured, timed and rated scientifically thus precluding realistic bargaining over wage
rates. It led to the creation of boring repetitive jobs and tight management control. It led to
alienation of employees from their management.

Question 27

Make a comparison of the major Leadership Models.

Answer-
The major models of leadership have many similarities and differences. The similarities
include a general focus on leader behaviours as being primarily oriented toward either task
accomplishment or social supportiveness.

Model Leader Situational Outcomes/

Behaviours Variables Criteria

Ohio State/ Initiating structure None Satisfaction

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Blake-Mouton Consideration Performance
Grievances
Turnover

Fiedler's Task oriented Leader-member Performance

Contingency (low LPC) relations
Model Relationship Task structure
Oriented {high LPC) Position power

Path-Goal Directive Task structure Satisfaction

Theory Supportive Subordinate Motivation
Participative characteristics Performance
Achievement
Oriented

Hersey-Blanchard Concern for people Subordinate Effectiveness

Concern for task maturity

Vroon-Yetton Autocratic Decision quality Quality of

Participative Decision decision
Acceptance Acceptance of
decision by
Subordinate

Vertical dyad Differential Subordinate Satisfaction

Linkage treatment of competence Performance
Subordinates Subordinate Turnover
loyalty

28 Critically discuss the major contributions of Henri Fayol to Management practice.

Answer-
Henri Fayol was an early 20th century French Mining Engineer and a practicing manager. He
classified the activities of organizations into technical, financial, security, accounting and

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management groups. He provided the most enduring definition of management, “to manage
is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, coordinate and control”. He identified the
five functions of management as planning, organizing, commanding, coordinating and
controlling. He developed 14 universal principles of organization; many of these are still
accepted today:
• Division of labour
• Authority
• Span of control
• Unity of command
• Subordination of individual interest to the general interest
• Remuneration
• Centralisation
• Hierarchy or scalar chain (clear line of authorities)
• Order
• Equity
• Stability and tenure of personnel
• Initiative
• Esprit de corps =comradeship/togetherness

He shifted the management focus to the structural nature of organization. He defined the
importance of hierarchy or scalar chain and role of authority by management secures
compliance to its action. He developed management principles that could be passed on to
and refined by others e.g. unity of command, unity of direction and span of control. He shows
management as essentially paternalistic. His approach was insensitive to the needs of people
as individual and groups.

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