Introduction to Organisational Behaviour
Introduction to Organisational Behaviour OB – investigates the impacts that individuals, groups and structure have on behaviour within organisations to improve the effectiveness of the organisation • PEOPLE are the biggest issue in an organisation • Understanding human behaviour in the workplace • Applying psychological and social concepts to organisations • Body of knowledge about people skills and managing those people • Study of what people think, feel and do in organisations and the effect of this • It is multileveled and multi disciplinary We all study behaviour all the time: • Observe, sense, listen, ask and read • Learn from experiences of others • Make generalisations to predict and explain the behaviour of others • OB attempts to replace intuition with a systematic study that looks at cause and effect relationships within the organisation
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Different levels that have effects on the individuals behaviour Inherently multi-‐level, can’t be explored in isolation Behavior is not random-‐ OB identifies fundamental consistencies underlying the behaviour of all individuals and modifies it to reflect individual differences o It is a systematic approach which creates a base from which to make accurate predictions of behaviour and its effects OB must reflect situational/contingency situations – you act differently at a party than at church Contingency variables – situational factors and variables that moderate the relationship between 2 variables o We can say x leads to y, but only under condition z
1. Individual level • People enter a job not as a blank canvas but with their own individual characteristics which impacts how they will act in and influence the organisations • Attitudes, personality and values • Needs and motivations • Moods, emotions and abilities à EQ and IQ 2. Group Level • Football team – as individuals they are amazing, but the dynamics of the team caused them to fail miserably • Groups are their own separate identity and entity • Conflict and negotiation • Communication • Interpersonal effectiveness – mindfulness, compassion etc. 3. Organisational level • Work design to enhance performance and experience • Organisational culture and change • Managing diversity • Still concerned with the people aspect of the org level Why study OB? • Organisational behaviour affects the bottom line o Better understanding of how people work in an organisation can improve efficiency o EG: Westfarmers – own Coles, Bunnings etc. – focus on employee performance and wellbeing § Culture of Bunnings vital, bottom up, employees and staff encouraged to offer ideas and feedback, empowering § So successful, able to purchase BBC (similar brand – competitor) o Masters (Woolworths brand) is now going bankrupt – key factor is culture, top down, very rigid and bureaucratic o Bunnings generates roughly 30% for Westfarmers
• OB is for everyone Evidence Based Management • EBM • Basing managerial decisions on the best available scientific evidence • Argues managers should become more scientific and make decisions much like doctors – based on facts and the latest available evidence Multi-‐disciplinary contributions
Individual Attributes, Personality and Values Psychoanalytical approach (Freud) • Id – primal desires and basic nature • Ego – reason and self control – conscious, rational self trying to balance the two • Superego – quest for perfection, strict morality • Severely limited approach o Most theories not tested or even testable Behaviourism
Stimulus à response à reward à repetition of response • Conditioning – Skinner – positive and negative reinforcement • Human behaviour is determined by the external effects • Stimulus is a factor in the environment which elicits a response (reaction) – the reward either encourages the behaviour to repeat, if it is an undesirable outcome then the behaviour will cease and extinction occurs • Limitations o Does not take into account the complexity of human reaction/thought process – negative feedback does not necessarily create an extinction of the action o Does not take into account the effect of internal factors – people are not merely reactive Social-‐Cognitive Theory • Interaction between Personal factors, Environmental factors and the behaviour
Personality – relatively stable set of characteristics representing internal properties of an individual reflected in behavioural tendencies across a wide variety of situations • Patterns of reactions – in general, major events influence o Depends on strength of trait à more extreme ends of the continuum will be more persistent o Depends on situation whether weak or strong – strong = more social constraints, harder to be yourself, weaker contexts allow more freedom of behaviour
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General trends across populations à trend to becoming more conscientious as you age, openness to experience stabilises
Mischel & Shoda-‐ Personality-‐situation interaction • Featuers (a-‐i) influences internally, interact based on existing internal factors (strength of traits) and the external factors (situation strong or weak) à this leads to behaviour
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Different levels that have effects on the individuals behaviour Inherently multi-‐level, can’t be explored in isolation Behavior is not random-‐ OB identifies fundamental consistencies underlying the behaviour of all individuals and modifies it to reflect individual differences o It is a systematic approach which creates a base from which to make accurate predictions of behaviour and its effects OB must reflect situational/contingency situations – you act differently at a party than at church Contingency variables – situational factors and variables that moderate the relationship between 2 variables o We can say x leads to y, but only under condition z
1. Individual level • People enter a job not as a blank canvas but with their own individual characteristics which impacts how they will act in and influence the organisations • Attitudes, personality and values • Needs and motivations • Moods, emotions and abilities à EQ and IQ 2. Group Level • Football team – as individuals they are amazing, but the dynamics of the team caused them to fail miserably • Groups are their own separate identity and entity • Conflict and negotiation • Communication • Interpersonal effectiveness – mindfulness, compassion etc. 3. Organisational level • Work design to enhance performance and experience • Organisational culture and change • Managing diversity • Still concerned with the people aspect of the org level Why study OB? • Organisational behaviour affects the bottom line o Better understanding of how people work in an organisation can improve efficiency o EG: Westfarmers – own Coles, Bunnings etc. – focus on employee performance and wellbeing § Culture of Bunnings vital, bottom up, employees and staff encouraged to offer ideas and feedback, empowering § So successful, able to purchase BBC (similar brand – competitor) o Masters (Woolworths brand) is now going bankrupt – key factor is culture, top down, very rigid and bureaucratic o Bunnings generates roughly 30% for Westfarmers
• OB is for everyone Evidence Based Management • EBM • Basing managerial decisions on the best available scientific evidence • Argues managers should become more scientific and make decisions much like doctors – based on facts and the latest available evidence Multi-‐disciplinary contributions
Individual Attributes, Personality and Values Psychoanalytical approach (Freud) • Id – primal desires and basic nature • Ego – reason and self control – conscious, rational self trying to balance the two • Superego – quest for perfection, strict morality • Severely limited approach o Most theories not tested or even testable Behaviourism
Stimulus à response à reward à repetition of response • Conditioning – Skinner – positive and negative reinforcement • Human behaviour is determined by the external effects • Stimulus is a factor in the environment which elicits a response (reaction) – the reward either encourages the behaviour to repeat, if it is an undesirable outcome then the behaviour will cease and extinction occurs • Limitations o Does not take into account the complexity of human reaction/thought process – negative feedback does not necessarily create an extinction of the action o Does not take into account the effect of internal factors – people are not merely reactive Social-‐Cognitive Theory • Interaction between Personal factors, Environmental factors and the behaviour
Personality – relatively stable set of characteristics representing internal properties of an individual reflected in behavioural tendencies across a wide variety of situations • Patterns of reactions – in general, major events influence o Depends on strength of trait à more extreme ends of the continuum will be more persistent o Depends on situation whether weak or strong – strong = more social constraints, harder to be yourself, weaker contexts allow more freedom of behaviour
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General trends across populations à trend to becoming more conscientious as you age, openness to experience stabilises
Mischel & Shoda-‐ Personality-‐situation interaction • Featuers (a-‐i) influences internally, interact based on existing internal factors (strength of traits) and the external factors (situation strong or weak) à this leads to behaviour
