Introduction to Organisational Behaviour

Management, Organisation & Communication

Faculty of International Business & CommunicationD. Jutten

What is Organisational Behaviour?

The field of OB is the study of people at work.

• OB studies the influence which…- Individuals, - Groups and- Organisations

…have on behaviour within organisations

Why do we need to study it?

• Managers have all sorts of people problems:• Bosses with poor communication skills• Employees’ lack of motivation• Conflict between team members• Employee resistance because of reorganisation

Understanding of human behaviour plays an important role in determining a manager’seffectiveness .

What is the Goal of studying OB?

• Learn to Understand, Predict & Change human behaviour concerning employment-related issues like:• Jobs• Work• Absenteeism• Employment turnover• Productivity• Human performance• Management

Focus of OB• Motivation

• Leader behaviour and power

• Interpersonal communication

• Group structure and processes

• Perceptions and attitudes

• Personality, emotions and values

• Change processes

• Conflict and negotiations

• Work design

Contributing disciplines

• Psychology: measure, explain and change individual behaviour

• Social psychology: focuses on people’s influences on one another

• Sociology: study of people in relation to their social environment

• Anthropology: study of societies for the purpose of learning about human beings and their activities

Why is it difficult to predict someone’s behaviour?

• People are complex and diverse

• People often act very differently in the same situation

• We behave differently in different situationsex: church/party

We need to take contingency variables (or situational conditions) into account

Challenges and opportunities for OB

• Globalisation

• Workforce Diversity: Organisations are heterogeneous • gender• age• race• ethnicity• sexual orientation• disability• religion

Managing Workforce Diversity

• increasing creativity • improvement of

decision making• different

perspective on problems• improving quality

and productivity• improving customer

services

• improving people skills• stimulating

innovation and change• improving ethical

behaviour• creating a positive

work environment

PERSONALITY TRAITS AND WORK VALUESOrganizational Behaviour: Chapter 2

What is personality?

• The growth and development of someone’s whole psychological system

• Definition by Gordon Allport: “the dynamic organisation within the individual of those psychological systems that determine his unique adjustments to his environment”

• The sum total of ways in which an individual reacts to and interact with others

Personality determinants

• Heredity or environment?• Research shows heredity is of more

importance• Physical stature• Facial attractiveness • Gender• Temperament• Muscle composition and reflexes• Energy level • Biological rhythms

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)

16 personality types:• Extraverted versus introverted• Sensing versus intuitive• Thinking versus feeling• Judging versus perceiving

Big Five Model video

• Openness to experience• Conscientiousness • Extraversion• Agreeableness• Emotional stability ( or Neuroticism)

• Acronym: OCEAN

Assignment: Do the personality test on: learnMyself.com and hand in the overal result of the five dimensions next week (click on green button “start advanced”)

Other personality traits relevant to OB

• Core self-evaluation

• Self-Monitoring

• Type A Personality

• Type B Personality

• Proactive Personality

Values

• Represent basic convictions that “a specific mode of conduct or end-state of existence is personally or socially preferable to an opposite or converse mode of conduct or end-state of existence.”

• What is right or wrong; good or bad?

Values

Two factors:

• Content is something important?

• Intensity how important?

Value system:

• The hierarchy of values

• Freedom, pleasure, respect, honesty, obedience, equality

Terminal vs Instrumental Values

• Terminal desirable end states goals to achieve

• Instrumental preferable modes of behaviour or the means of achieving the terminal values

• E.g: a comfortable (prosperous) life vs ambitious behaviour (hardworking, aspiring)

Generational Values

• Veterans

• Boomers

• Xers

• Nexters

• Hardworking, conservative

• Succes, ambition, dislike of authority

• Work/life balance, team oriented

• Confident, self-relient but team oriented

Linking an individual’s personality and values to the

workplace• Person-job fit

• Person-job fit theory (by John Holland)

• satisfaction is highest and turnover is lowest when personality and occupation are in agreement

• Person-organisation fit

• with organisational changes it is more important that employees’ personalities fit the overall organisation’s culture than the specific job

Hofstede Dimensions

Hofstede’s Framework for Assessing Cultures• Power distance

• Individualism vs collectivism

• Masculinity vs femininity

• Uncertainty avoidance

• Long-term vs short-term orientation

Criticism on Hofstede

• Based on single company

• Study is 30 yrs old and world has changed• Fall of soviet union • Transformation CEEC’s • End of apartheid in South Africa• Spread of Islam• Rise of China as global power

GLOBE

• 9 dimensions which resemble Hofstede• Added were:• Human orientation• Performance orientation

Thank you for your attention!

For next week read chapters 3 & 4.