OB Block 1 PDF Lecture Notes

Lecture Notes – Block 1 Week 1 – Personality Personality The field of OB tackles issues at three levels: individual, group and organizational. These all affect organizational behaviour in the workplace. ➔ The individual level consists of: - Perception - Emotions - Decision m...

Lecture Notes – Block 1 Week 1 – Personality Personality The field of OB tackles issues at three levels: individual, group and organizational. These all affect organizational behaviour in the workplace. ➔ The individual level consists of: - Perception - Emotions - Decision making - Job attitudes - Motivation ➔ The group level consists of: - Leadership - Group dynamics - Groups vs teams ➔ The organizational level consists of: - Change - Culture - Structure - Power & conflict Personality can be defined as: “The sum total of ways in which an individual reacts to and interacts with others”. It is said that personality is a result from both heredity (genes) and an individuals environment. It is known to be problematic to measure. To do so, self-reports exist. Some examples are the Myers Briggs ‘MBTI’ test, and the big five. 3 Some other personality traits exist in OB as well. One of these is known as the dark triad. The dark triad consists of the traits Machiavellianism (ends justify all means), narcissism (it’s all about me), and psychopathy (lack of concern for others). Values Values can be described to an individual to what to him is right, good, desirable, preferable. Values are stable and enduring. These vary among groups and influence our perception. The value system consist of 2 parts: - Content: (what do we find important?) - Intensity: (how important do we find these?) We distinguish values further into both instrumental values, and terminal values. - Instrumental values: These ask how you will accomplish your goals. - Terminal values: These ask what you would like to accomplish. Instrumental values are crucial to terminal values. Hofstede’s dimensions: a cross-cultural perspective on values. The 5 dimensions of Hofstede explain differences in national culture and, therefore, also differences in national values. The 5 dimensions are: - Power distance: Inequalities of power and wealth - Individualism / Collectivism: Act as individual or rather as member of a group - Masculinity / Femininity: Separate or same roles for men and women - Uncertainty avoidance: Acceptance or avoidance of ambiguity - Long-term / short-term orientation 4 Week 2 – Job Attitudes & Motivation Variables A conceptual model consist of 4 types of variables: - Independent variables - Dependent variables - Mediating variables - Moderating variables Attitude Attitude can be defined as: “Evaluative (i.e. favourable or unfavourable) statements about objects, people, events etc” and “Attitude is a psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of favour or disfavour”. Attitudes consist of 3 parts: 1.) Cognition: What do you see, hear, perceive, know? 2.) Affect: How do you feel about this? 3.) Behaviour: How do you act? Job satisfaction comes from the following factors: - Content of the job - Social context - Pay (generally a weak factor) - Personality - Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) There is also a list of potential consequences of job satisfaction, both positive and negative. 5 Motivation Motivation is the process that accounts for an individual’s direction. Intensity and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal. Motivation can be explained through Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Here, once a lower need is satisfied a higher need will be pursued. McGregor established a theory that splits people into either theory X, or theory Y. ➔ Theory X: People are lazy. People inherently dislike work and responsibility, and people need to be coerced, monitored and controlled. ➔ Theory Y: People like to work. People seek responsibility, and people don’t need to be coerced, monitored, and controlled Cognitive evaluation theory People like to self-determine, to feel they have control over their actions. Extrinsic rewards and deadlines diminish motivation to the extent they are perceived as coercive. Cognitive evaluation theory, therefore, does not make pay dependent on performance. Intrinsic motivation can be calculated as follows: Goal setting theory For goals to motivate, they must meet the following requirements: - Specific (and measurable vs vague and non-measurable) - Difficult (yet realistic) - Feedback Equity theory and justice Equity theory entails the following formula: Input can be anything: Working hours, specialist knowledge, training and education etc. 6 Output can be anything as well: Pay, production, promotion possibilities, recognition etc. When your own output/input is lower than other’s output/input you are motivated to find a way to raise your own results. Some definitions - Distributive organizational justice: Perceived fairness of distribution of resources. - Procedural organizational justice: Perceived fairness of the distribution process. - Interactional justice: Am I treated fairly and respectfully? - Job rotation: More tasks at the same level - Job enrichment: more responsibility, more autonomy. Motivation through pay 7 Week 3 – Moods and Emotions, Perception and Decision Making Emotions vs Moods Emotions and moods differ from each other in several aspects (see table below) Emotions Moods - Intense - Less intense - Caused by a specific event - Cause is either general or unknown - Lasts from a short span of time - Last for a longer span of time - Specific facial expressions - Less specifically expressed Several factors are known to influence moods and emotions: - Personality (can have both a positive, as a negative effect) - Weather - Stress - Social activities - Sleep - Physical exercise - Age (fewer negative emotions as someone gets older) - Gender - Time of day, day of the week Emotional labour entails expression of organizationally desired emotions. This is especially the case in service jobs. Emotional labour can lead to emotional dissonance: a conflict between felt (actual) emotions and displayed (faked) emotions. Ultimately, this can lead to a burnout. Emotions and mood matter in OB because positive moods and emotions can lead to better decisions making, more creativity, self -efficacy, more credibility and overall better performance. Cause Emotions and moods are caused by both internal, as for external factors. This can return to three factors: 1.) Consistency: Does the person act the same in similar situations over time? 2.) Consensus: Does everyone facing the same situation act the same way? 3.) Distinctiveness: Does the person act the same in different situations? The fundamental attribution error is an error in which people view good results/outcomes as their own effort, yet they blame poor results/outcomes of external factors, while doing the opposite for others. Other people’s good results are blamed on external factors while bad results are blamed on the individuals. 8 Several shortcuts in judging people exist: - Selective perception: You (don’t) see what you (don’t) want to see. - Halo effect: General impression based on a single characteristic. - Contrast effects: Persons are often evaluated relative to others - Stereotyping: A person is categorized in a group based on one characteristic Decision making Several methods of decision making exist based on information available: - Rationality: You have complete information and identify all relevant options. Here you select the option with the highest utility. - Bounded rationality: You are limited, but still possess sufficient information. Managers typically then go for a “good enough” solution. - Intuition: Decision making based on experience and learning. In decision making, certain biases and errors exist: - Overconfidence bias: “These measures will certainly increase profits by 10%...” - Confirmation bias: Confirmatory information embraced, disconfirmatory information ignored. - Escalation of commitment: Past investments “justify” current action 9 Week 4 – Groups and teams Groups and teams ➔ A group is any number of people who (1) interact with one another; (2) are psychologically aware of one another; and (3) perceive themselves to be a group. ➔ A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. Out of these definitions, it seems that a group can exist without being a team, but a team cannot exist without being a group. Groups exist for three reasons: security & protection, affiliation & status, and power. Stages of group development A group goes through 5 separate stages in its lifetime: 1.) Forming 2.) Storming 3.) Norming (the creation of performance norms, appearance norms, social arrangement norms, and development of identification with the group. This leads to group conformity) 4.) Performing 5.) Adjourning The punctuated-equilibrium model argues that there are periods of inertia in groups. The midpoint works as an alarm clock that ends this inertia. Finally, the last meeting is a burst of energy to finalize and work towards completion. Group processes Groups distinguish between a list of processes: - Roles (A set of expected behaviour patterns attributed to someone occupying a given position in a social unit) - Norms (Acceptable standards of behaviour shared by their members that express what they ought and ought not to do under certain circumstances) - Conformity - Deviant behaviour (voluntarily violation of norms by team members. This decreases commitment) 10  - Status (one’s position in a group. This brings both identity and differentiation within a group) - Cohesiveness (how much individuals “click”. This differs in size and the amount of social loafing) - Diversity - Group decision making Teams We distinguish between 4 types of teams: ➔ Problem-solving teams ➔ Self-managed work teams ➔ Cross-functional teams ➔ Virtual teams Effective teams are created through contectual factors, composition, and process variables. ➔ Contextual factors: these contain adequate resources, leadership and struct, climate and trust, and performance evaluation. ➔ Composition: The characteristics of each member of the team and the size of the team in itself ➔ Process variables: These are variables such as the specific purpose, goals, mental models, levels of conflict, and the amount of social loafing. Team players are created through selection, training, and rewarding. Diversity We distinguish between: ➔ Surface-level diversity (easily perceived characteristics such as gender, race, ethnicity, age, or disability) ➔ Deep-level diversity (what you cannot see e.g. characteristics, such as personality and values) Diversity comes in the following forms: age, gender, race and ethnicity, disability, tenure, religion, and abilities. 11 Week 5 – leadership Leaders vs managers Leaders and managers differ in several aspects. These aspects are displayed in the table below. An effective manager enhances the quantity and quality of performance, and also works to improve employee satisfaction and commitment. A successful manager enhances the speed of moving up the ranks, i.e. getting promoted to better paid and higher status jobs. Behavioural theories of leadership People who are task orientated typically initiate structure, while people who are employee oriented typically work on consideration. Charismatic leadership In this type of leadership, leaders have a vision and are able to articulate this throughout the given team. Leaders are sensitive to the needs of their followers. 12 Transformational & transactional leadership Transformational leaders are leaders who inspire followers to transcend their own self-interests and who are capable of having a profound and extraordinary effect on followers. Transactional leaders are leaders who guide or motivate their followers in the direction of established goals by clarifying role and task requirements. 13