DEFINITION OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

According to Griffin and Moorhead, "The study of human behavior in organizational settings, the interface between human behavior and the organizational context and the organization itself."         

 

The above definition has three parts

·         The Individual Behavior

·         The Organization and

·         The interface between these two

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Each individual brings to an organization a unique set of beliefs, values, attitudes and other personal characteristics and these characteristics of all individuals must interact with each other in order to create organizational settings.

According to Stephen P. Robbins, “Organizational behavior is a field of study that investigates the impact of individuals, groups and structures have on behavior within organizations for the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organization's effectiveness.”

 

Organizational behavior (OB) studies the behavioral patterns of different levels of people deployed in the organizations. It is clinical assessment of behavior of people in the organizations. Almost in every type of organization such as, business, manufacturing, service, etc. there is an interaction of people. One of the important aspects of the interaction is the behavior. Their behavior affects the performance of others. How they behave in formal organization in given circumstances is the main focus of organizational behavior. In an organization, people join their works under particular structures so that they achieve the organizational objectives in a planned way. But it may not be possible without favorable pattern of other employees of the organization. Organizational behavior gives such knowledge to the learners so that they can learn different dimensions of behaviors of all employees in the organization.

 

CONTRIBUTING FIELDS TO ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

Organizational Behavior is a synthesis of many other fields of study and is built upon contributions from a number of behavioral disciplines:

1. Psychology

Psychology is the science that seeks to measure, explain and sometimes change the behavior of humans and other animals. Psychologist concern themselves with studying and attempting to understand individual behavior Particularly with the problems of fatigue, boredom and other factors relevant to working conditions that could impede efficient work performance.

2. Sociology

Sociology studies people in relation to their fellow human beings. Specifically, Sociologists have made their greatest contributions to Organizational behavior through their study of group behavior in Organizations ‑ particularly formal and complex organizations.

 3. Social psychology

Social psychology is an area within psychology, blending concepts from both psychology and sociology. Social psychologist makes significant contributions in the areas of measuring, understanding and changing attitudes, communication patterns and group decision making process.

 4. Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of societies to learn about human being and their activities, Anthropologists work on cultures and environment. Much of our current understanding of organizational culture, organizational environments and differences among national cultures is the result of the work of Anthropologists.

 5. Political science

Political science studies the behavior of individuals and groups within a political environment. Specific topics of concern here include structuring of conflict, allocation of power and how people manipulate power for individual self interest.

 

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GOALS OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

 

There are four basic goals of Organizational Behavior:

 

1.     To Describe: Organizational Behavior describes systematically how people of the organization behave under a variety of conditions in the Organization.

2.    To Understand: Organizational Behavior helps to determine and understand the reason why people in the organization behave as they do. Managers would be highly frustrated if they could only talk about behaviors of their employees, but not understand the reasons behind those actions.

3. To Predict: Organizational Behavior helps to predict the future behavior of the employees in the organization. This would allowed them to take preventive actions.

4.    To Control: Organizational Behavior helps to control the behavior of the people of the Organization for the purpose of their effective and efficient performance towards the accomplishment of goals.

 

ELEMENTS/FORCES OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

 

There are four key forces / elements of Organizational behavior:

1. People: People of the Organization make up an internal social system in the organization. These people consist of individuals and groups. As individuals and groups, people have different values and beliefs which have impact on their action and behavior in the organization.

2. Structure: Structure is the formal or official relationships between superiors and subordinates and between departments and sections and between the works and activities. There are managers and employees, accountants and assemblers.

3. Technology: Technology provides the resources with which people works and affects the tasks that they perform effectively and efficiently. The technology used has a significant influence on working relationships.

4. Environment: Every organization must be operated within both internal external environments. The attitude, behavioral patterns and action of the people of the organization are greatly influenced by these environments.

 

 

APPROACHES TO ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

 

There are three approaches to Organizational Behavior. They are:

 

1. The Human Resources (supportive) approach

The human resource approach is concerned with the growth and development of people toward higher levels of competency, creativity and fulfillment, because people are the central resource in any organization and society. The human resources approach is supportive. It helps employees become better, more responsible people and then it tries to create a climate in which they may contribute to the limits of their improved abilities. It assumes that expanded capabilities and opportunities for people will lead directly to improvements in operating effectiveness. Essentially, the human resources approach means that better people achieve better results.

 2. The contingency approach

The contingency approach to organizational behavior means that different situations require different behavior practices for effectiveness. Situations are much more complex than first perceived and the different variables may require different behavioral approaches. No longer is there one best way. Each situation must be analyzed carefully to determine the significant variables that exist in order to establish the kinds of practices that will be more effective. The strength of the contingency approach is that it encourages analysis of each situation prior to action while at the same time discouraging habitual practice based on universal assumptions about people.

 3. The system approach

The system approach implies that there are many variables in the organization and that each affects all the others in a complex relationship. An event that appears to affect one individual or one department actually may have significant influences elsewhere in the organization. Consequently, managers, in taking actions, must look beyond the immediate situation in order to determine the effects on the larger system. Thus, the system approach compels managers to take a holistic view of the subject.