MEANING OF ORGANIZATION CULTURE

A system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organization.
There seems to be agreement organization culture refers to a system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organization. This system of shared meaning is, on closer examination, a set of key characteristics that the organization values. The search suggests that there are seven characteristics that, aggregate, capture the essence of an organization’s culture.

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CHARACTERISTICS OF ORGANIZATION CULTURE:

The characteristics of organizatioanal culture are as follow:

1. Innovation and risk taking: The degree to which employees are encourage to be innovative and take risk.
2. Attention to detail: The degree to which the employees are expected exhibit precision, analysis, and attention detail.
3. Out come orientation: The degree to which management focuses on results or outcomes rather than on the techniques and processes used to achieve those outcomes
4. People orientation: the degree to which management decisions take into consideration the effect of out- comes on people within the organization.
5. Team orientation: The degree to which work activities are organized around team rather than individuals.
6. Aggressiveness: The degree to which people are aggressive and competitive rather than easygoing.
7. Stability: The degree to which organizational activities emphasize maintaining the status quo in contrast to growth.

Each of these characteristics exists on a continuum from low to high appraising the organization on these seven characteristics that gives a composite picture the organization’s culture.

TYPES OF ORGANIZATION CULTURE

Organization culture represents a common perception held by the organization’s members. We should expect, therefore, that individuals with different backgrounds or at different levels in the organization will tend to describe the organization’s culture in similar terms.

1. Dominant culture: Expresses the core values that are shared by a majority of the organization members. A dominant culture expresses the core values that are shared by a majority of the organization members. When we talk about an organization’s culture, we are referring to its dominant culture.
2. Subcultures: Mini cultures within an organization, typically defined by department designations and geographical separation. Subculture tends to develop in large organization to reflect common problems, situations, or experience that member’s face. These subcultures are likely to be defined by department designations and geographical separation.
3. Strong versus weak culture: It has become increasingly become popular to differentiate between strong and weak cultures. The argument here is that strong cultures have a greater impact on employee behavior and are more directly related to reduce turnover. The organization’s core values are both intensely held and widely shared. The more members who accept the core values and the greater their commitment to those values is, the stronger the culture is.
4. Organizational culture versus national culture: National differences that is, national cultures must be taken into account if accurate predictions are to be made about organizational behavior in different countries. The research indicates that national culture has a greater impact on employees than does their organization’s culture.

FUNCTIONS OF ORGANIZATION CULTURES

We have explicitly argued that a strong culture should be associated with reduced turnover. The functions that cultures perform and assess whether culture can be a liability for an organization. Culture performs a number of functions within an organization.
First, it has a boundary defining role, that is, it creates distinctions between one organization to another organization.
Second, it conveys a sense of identity for organization members.
Third, culture facilitates the generation of commitment to something larger that one’s individual self interest.
Fourth, it enhance the stability of the social system. Culture is the social glue that helps hold the organization together by providing appropriate standards for what employees should say and do.
Finally, culture serves as a sense making and control mechanism that is of particular interest to us.

HOW EMPLOYEES LEARN CULTURE

Culture is transmitted to employees in a number of forms, the most potent being stories, rituals, material symbols, and language.

1. Stories: During the days when Henry ford II was chairman of the Ford Motor Co. one would have been hard pressed to find a manager who had not heard the story about Mr. ford reminding his executives, when they got too arrogant, that “it’s my name that’s on the building.” The message was clear: Henry Ford II ran the company.
2. Rituals: Rituals are repetitive sequences of activities that express and reinforce the key values of the organization – what goals are most important, which people are important, and which people are expendable. repetitive sequences of activities that express and reinforce the key values of the organization, which goals are most important, which people are important, and which are expendable.
3. Material symbols: The headquarters of Alcoa doesn’t look like your typical head office operation. There are few individual offices, even for senior executives. It is essentially made up of cubicles, common areas, and meeting rooms. This informal corporate headquarters conveys to employees that Alcoa values openness, equality, creativity, and flexibility. Some corporations provide their top executives with chauffeur driven limousines and, when they travel by air, unlimited use of the corporate jet. Others may not get to ride in limousines or private jets but they might still get a car and air transportation paid for by the company.
4. Language: Many organizations and units within organizations use language as a way to identify members of a culture or subculture. By learning this language, members attest to their acceptance of the culture and, in so doing, help to preserve it. Organizations, over time, often develop unique terms to describe equipment, offices, key personnel, suppliers, customers, or products that relate to its business.

CREATING AN ETHICAL ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE

The content and strength of a culture influences an organization’s ethical climate and the ethical behavior of its members. A strong organizational culture will exert more influence on employees than a weak one. If the culture is strong and supports high ethical standards, it should have a very powerful and positive influence on employee behavior. What can management do to create a more ethical culture? We suggest a combination of the following practices:

1. Be a visible model: Employees will look to top management behavior as a benchmark for defining appropriate behavior. When senior management is seen as taking the ethical high road, it provides a positive message for all employees.
2. Communicate ethical expectations: Ethical ambiguities can be minimized by creating and disseminating an organizational code of ethics. It should state the organization’s primary values and the ethical rules that employees are expected to follow.
3. Provide ethical training: Set up seminars, workshops, and similar ethical training programs. Use these training sessions to reinforce the organization’s standards of conduct; to clarify what practices are not permissible; and to address possible ethical dilemmas.
4. Visibly reward ethical acts and punish unethical ones: Performance appraisals of managers should include a point by point evaluation of how his or her decisions measure up against the organization’s code of ethics.
5. Provide protective mechanisms: The organization needs to provide formal mechanisms so that employees can discuss ethical dilemmas and report unethical behavior without fear of reprimand. This might include creation of ethical counselors, ombudsmen, or ethical officers.

CREATING A CUSTOMER RESPONSIVE CULTURE

We can suggest a number of actions that management can take if it wants to make its culture more customer responsive. These actions are designed to create employees with the competence, ability, and willingness to solve customer problems as they arise.

1. Selection: The place to start in building a customer responsive culture is hiring service orientation. Studies show that friendliness, enthusiasm, and attentiveness in service employees positively affect customers’ perceptions of services quality.
2. Training and socialization: Organizations that are trying to become more customer responsive don’t always have the option of hiring all new employees more customer focused. In such cases, the emphasis will be on training rather than hiring. This describes the dilemma that senior executives at companies such as General Motors, Shell and J.P.
3. Empowerment: Consistent with low formalization is empowering employees with the discretion to make day to day decisions about job related activities.
4. Leadership: Leaders convey the organization’s culture through both what they say and what they do. Effective leaders in customer responsive cultures deliver by conveying a customer focused vision and demonstrating by their continual behavior that they are committed to customers.
5. Performance evaluation: There is an impressive amount of evidence demonstrating that behavior based performance evaluations are consistent with improved customer service. Behavior based evaluations appraise employees on the basis of how they behave or act on criteria such as effort, commitment, team work, friendliness, and the ability to solve customer problems rather than on the measurable outcomes they achieve.
6. Reward systems: Finally, if management wants employees to give good service, it has to reward good service. It needs to provide ongoing recognition to employees who have demonstrated extraordinary effort to please customers and who have been singled out by customers for going the extra mile. And it needs to make pay and promotions contingent on outstanding customer service.

MEANING OF POWER & POLITICS

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BASES OR SOURCES OF POWER

 The bases or sources of power focus on the interpersonal relationship between manager and the subordinates. The bases or sources of power can be divided into two general groups – formal and personal.

1. Coercive power: This source of power depends on fear. The person with coercive power has the ability to inflict (impose) punishment or aversive consequences on the other person or to make threats that the other person believes will result in punishment or undesirable outcomes.

2. Reward power: This source of power depends on the person's having the ability and resources to reward others. The opposite of coercive power is reward power.

3. Legitimate power: The power a person receives as a result of his or her position in the formal hierarchy of an organization is known as legitimate power.

4. Information power: Power that comes from access to and control over information is information power. People in an organization who have data or knowledge that others need can make those others dependent on them.

1. Expert power: It is more of a personal power rather than organizational power and is the ability to control another person's behavior through the possession of knowledge and expertise that the other person needs and does not possess himself.

2. Referent power: The last category of influence that French and Raven identified was referent power. Its base is identification with a person who has desirable resources or personal traits. Referent power explains why celebrities are paid millions of dollars to endorse products in commercials.

3. Charismatic power: Charismatic power is really an extension of referent power stemming from an individual’s personality and interpersonal style. People with charismatic qualities, although not in formal leadership positions, are able to exert influence over others because of the strength of their heroic qualities.

POWER TACTICS

   Power tactics is to learn how employees translate their power bases into specific actions. Recent research indicates that there are standardized ways by which power holders attempt to get what they want. The findings identified seven tactical dimensions or strategies:

1. Reason: Use of facts and data to make a logical or rational presentation of ideas.

2. Friendliness: Use of flattery, creation of goodwill, acting humble, and being friendly prior to making a request.

3. Coalition: Getting the support of other people in the organization to back up the request.

4. Bargaining: Use of negotiation through the exchange of benefits or favors.

5. Assertiveness: Use of a direct and forceful approach such as demanding compliance with requests, repeating reminders, ordering individuals to do what is asked, and pointing out that rules require compliance.

6. Higher authority: Getting the support of higher levels in the organization to back up requests.

7. Sanction: Use of organizationally derived rewards and punishments.

MEANING OF POLITICAL BEHAVIOR

  Political behavior in organizations is defined as those activities that are not required as part of one's formal role in the organization but that influence, or attempt to influence, the distribution of advantages and disadvantages within the organization.

THE REALITY OF POLITICS

Resources in organizations are also limited, which often turns potential conflict to real conflict. If resources were abundant, then all the various constituencies within the organization could satisfy their goals. But because they are limited, not everyone’s interests can be provided for. Furthermore, whether true or not, gains by one individual or group are often perceived as being at the expense of others within the organization. These forces create a competition among members for the organization’s limited resources.

Maybe the most important factor leading to politics within organizations is the realization that most of the ‘facts’ that are used to allocate the limited resources are open to interpretation.

Therefore, to answer the earlier question of whether it is possible for an organization to be politics-free, we can say ‘yes,’ if all members of the organization hold the same goals and interests, if organizational resources are not scarce, and if performance outcomes are completely clear and objective. But that doesn’t describe the organizational world that most of us live in.

FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO POLITICAL BEHAVIOR

Recent research and observation have identified a number of factors that appear to encourage political behavior. Some are individual factors and some are organizational factors.

• High self-monitors

• Internal locus of control

• High match personality

• Organizational investment

• Perceived job alternatives

• Expectation of success, etc.

• Reallocation of resources

• Promotion opportunities

• Low trust

• Role ambiguity

• Unclear performance evaluation system

• Zero-sum reward practices

• Democratic decision-making

• High performance pressures

• Self-serving senior managers, etc.

DEFENSIVE BEHAVIORS / HOW DO PEOPLE RESPOND TO ORGANIZATIONAL POLITICS

###When politics is seen as a threat and consistently responded to with defensiveness, negative outcomes are almost sure to surface eventually. When people perceive politics as a threat rather than as an opportunity, they often respond with defensive behavior. The defensive behavior may be of three types:

A) Avoiding Action:

1. Overconforming: Strictly interpreting own responsibility by saying things like, “The rules clearly state…” or “This is the way we have always done it.”

2. Buck passing: Transferring responsibility for the execution of a task or decision to someone else.

3. Playing dumb: Avoiding an unwanted task by falsely pleading ignorance or inability.

4. Stretching: Prolonging a task so that one appears to be occupied—for example, turning a two-week task into a four-month job.

5. Stalling: Appearing to be more or less supportive publicly while doing little or nothing privately.

B) Avoiding Blame:

1. Buffing: This is a nice way to refer to “covering your rear.” It describes the practice of rigorously documenting activity to project an image of competence and thoroughness.

2. Playing safe: Evading situations that may reflect unfavorably. It includes taking on only projects with a high probability of success, having risky decisions approved by superiors, qualifying expressions of judgment, and taking neutral positions in conflicts.

3. Justifying: Developing explanations that lessen one’s responsibility for a negative outcome and/or apologizing to demonstrate remorse.

4. Scapegoating: Placing the blame for a negative outcome on external factors that are not entirely blameworthy.

5. Misrepresenting: Manipulation of information by distortion, embellishment, deception, selective presentation, or obfuscation.

C) Avoiding Change:

1. Prevention: Trying to prevent a threatening change from occurring.

2. Self-protection: Acting in ways to protect one’s self-interest during change by guarding information or other resources.

IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT (IM)

Impression management (IM) is a subject that only quite recently has gained the attention of OB researchers. All intended to make them more attractive to others as being perceived positively by others should have benefits for people in organizations. So the process by which individuals attempt to control the impression others form of them is called impression management.

IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT (IM) TECHNIQUES

Techniques used in impression management are:

1. Conformity: Agreeing with someone else's opinion in order to gain his or her approval.

2. Excuses: Explanations of a predicament-creating event aimed at minimizing the apparent severity of the predicament (unfortunate position).

3. Apologies: Admitting responsibility for an undesirable event and simultaneously seeking to get a pardon for the action.

4. Acclaiming: Explanation of favorable events to maximize the desirable implications for oneself.

5. Flattery: Complimenting others about their virtues in an effort to make one appear perceptive and likable.

6. Favors: Doing something nice for someone to gain that person's approval.

7. Association: Enhancing or protecting one's image by managing information about people and things with which one is associated.

WHY TEAM POPULAR

In the modern business concept, teams have experienced substantial popularity to run their business smoothly and efficiently. The popularity of teams is as follows:

a) As organizations have restructured themselves to compete more effectively and efficiently, they have turned to teams as a better way to use employee talents. b) Management has found that teams are more flexible and responsive to changing events than traditional departments or other forms of permanent groupings. c) Teams have the capability to quickly assemble, deploy, refocus, and disband. d) Teams facilitate employee participation in operating decisions. e) Teams can develop new skills and become more involved in their jobs. So, they are an effective means for management to democratize their organizations and increase employee motivation.

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DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TEAMS AND GROUPS

Groups and teams are not the same things. Here we will try to clarify the differences between a work group and a work team.

A work group is a group that interacts primarily to share information and to make decisions to help each member perform within his or her area of responsibility. Work groups have no need or opportunity to engage in collective work that requires joint effort. There is no positive synergy that would create an overall level of performance that is greater than the sum of the inputs.

A work team generates positive synergy through coordinated effort. Their individual efforts result in a level of performance that is greater than the sum of those individual inputs.

The comparison of work groups and work teams can be summarized as under:

TYPES OF TEAMS

The four most common types of teams are likely to be found in an organization. They are:

1. Problem-solving teams: In problem-solving teams, members share ideas or offer suggestions on how work processes and methods can be improved, although they rarely have the authority to unilaterally implement any of their suggested actions. These are typically the same department who meet for a few hours each week to discuss ways of improving quality, efficiency, and the work environment.

2. Self-managed work teams: Self-managed work teams are groups of employees who perform highly related or interdependent jobs and take on many of the job responsibilities of their former supervisors. Typically, these include planning and scheduling of work, assigning tasks to members, collective control over the pace of work, making operating decisions, taking action on problems, and working with suppliers and customers.

3. Cross-functional teams: These are made up of employees from about the same hierarchical level but from different work areas who come together to accomplish a task. A task force is essentially a cross-functional team. Similarly, committees composed of members from across departmental lines are another example of cross-functional teams. Cross-functional teams are an effective means for allowing people from diverse areas within an organization to exchange information, develop new ideas, solve problems, and coordinate complex projects.

4. Virtual teams: The previous types of teams do their work face-to-face. Virtual teams use computer technology to tie together physically dispersed members to achieve a common goal. They allow people to collaborate online – using communication links like wide-area networks, video conferencing, or e-mail – whether they’re only a room away or continents apart.

CREATING EFFECTIVE TEAMS

The key components making up effective teams can be subsumed into four general categories. These are:

1. Context: The four contextual factors that appear to be most significantly related to team performance are:

a) Adequate resources: Teams are part of a larger organizational system. All work teams rely on resources outside the group to sustain them. A scarcity of resources directly reduces the ability of a team to perform its job effectively. Teams need timely information, proper equipment, adequate staffing, encouragement, and administrative assistance.

b) Leadership and structure: Team members must agree on who is to do what and ensure that all members contribute equally to sharing the workload. Agreeing on the specifics of work and how they fit together to integrate individual skills requires team leadership and structure.

c) Climate of trust: Interpersonal trust among team members facilitates cooperation, reduces the need to monitor each other’s behavior, and bonds members around the belief that others on the team won’t take advantage of them. Team members are more likely to take risks and expose vulnerabilities when they believe they can trust others on their team.

d) Performance evaluation and reward system: Individually oriented evaluation and reward systems must be modified to reflect team performance. In addition to evaluating and rewarding employees for their individual contributions, management should consider group-based appraisals, gain-sharing, profit-sharing, small-group incentives, and other system modifications that will reinforce team effort and commitment.

2. Composition: This category includes variables that relate to how teams should be staffed. These variables are:

a) Abilities of members: To perform effectively, a team requires three different types of skills. These are technical expertise, problem-solving and decision-making skills, and interpersonal skills.

b) Personality: Teams that rate higher in mean levels of extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and emotional stability tend to receive higher managerial ratings for team performance. A single team member who lacks a minimum level of, say, agreeableness, can negatively affect the whole team’s performance.

c) Allocating roles: Managers tend to understand the individual strengths that each person can bring to a team, select members with their strengths in mind, and allocate work assignments that fit with members’ preferred styles.

d) Diversity: When a team is diverse in terms of personality, gender, age, education, functional specialization, and experience, there is an increased probability that the team will possess the needed characteristics to complete the task effectively.

e) Size of teams: A minimum of four or five and a maximum of ten may be necessary to develop diversity of views and skills. Managers seem to seriously underestimate how coordination problems can geometrically increase as team members are added.

f) Member flexibility: Teams made up of flexible individuals have members who can complete each other’s tasks. This is an obvious plus to a team because it greatly improves its adaptability and makes it less reliant on any single member.

g) Member preferences: Not every employee is a team player. High-performing teams are likely to be composed of people who prefer working as part of a group.

3. Work design: Effective teams need to work together and take collective responsibility to complete significant tasks. The work design category includes the following:

a) Authority: Team authority means the freedom and autonomy of the members of the team.

b) Skill variety: Team members must have the opportunity to use their different talents and skills.

c) Task identity: Team members must have the ability to complete a whole and identifiable task or product.

d) Task significance: When working on a task or project, the team members must have a substantial impact on others.

4. Process: The final category related to team effectiveness is process variables. These include the following:

a) Common purpose: Effective teams have a common and meaningful purpose that provides direction, momentum, and commitment for members. This purpose is a vision. It’s broader than specific goals.

b) Specific goals: Successful teams translate their common purpose into specific, measurable, and realistic performance goals. Team goals should be challenging.

c) Team efficacy: Effective teams have confidence in themselves. They believe they can succeed. We call this team efficacy.

d) Conflict levels: Conflict in a team isn’t necessarily bad. Conflict can actually improve team effectiveness, although not all types of conflict. Effective teams will be characterized by an appropriate level of conflict.

e) Social loafing: Individuals can hide inside a group. They can engage in social loafing and coast on the group’s effort because their individual contributions cannot be identified. Effective teams undermine this tendency by holding themselves accountable at both the individual and team levels.

TURNING INDIVIDUALS INTO TEAM PLAYERS

The following summarizes the primary options managers have for trying to turn individuals into team players:

1. Selection: Some people already possess the interpersonal skills to be effective team players. When hiring team members, in addition to the technical skills required for filling the job, care should be taken to ensure that candidates can fulfill their team roles as well as the technical requirements.

2. Training: A large proportion of people raised on the importance of individual accomplishments can be trained to become team players. Training specialists conduct exercises that allow employees to experience the satisfaction that teamwork can provide. They typically offer workshops to help employees improve their problem-solving, communication, negotiation, conflict-management, and coaching skills.

3. Rewards: Promotion, pay raises, and other forms of recognition should be given to individuals for how effective they are as collaborative team members. Examples of behavior that should be rewarded include training new colleagues, sharing information with teammates, helping to resolve team conflicts, and mastering new skills that the team needs but in which it is deficient. Lastly, team members should be given the intrinsic rewards that employees can receive from teamwork. It is exciting and satisfying to be an integral part of a successful team.

 DEFINING AND CLASSIFYING GROUPS

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Groups can be either formal or informal.

1. Formal Group: Formal groups are defined by the organization's structure, with designated work assignments establishing tasks. In formal groups, the behavior that one should engage in are stipulated by & directed toward organizational goals. a) Command group: A command group is determined by the organization chart. It is composed of the subordinates who report directly to a given manager. b) Task group: Task groups represent those working together to complete a job task.

2. Informal Group: Informal groups are alliances that are neither formally structured nor organizationally determined. These groups are natural formations in the work environment that appear in response to the need for social contact. Example: (Lunch together)

a) Interest group: It is consist of those who are working together to attain a specific objective with which each is concerned. b) Friendship Group: Groups often develop because the individual members have one or more common characteristics. These formations are known as friendship group.

WHY DO PEOPLE JOIN IN GROUPS

The reasons why people join in a group are as follows:

1. Security: By joining a group, individuals can reduce the insecurity of standing alone. People feel stronger, have fewer self doubts and are more resistant to threats when they are part of a group.

2. Status: Inclusion in a group that is viewed as important by others provides recognition and status for its members.

3. Self esteem: Groups can provide people with feelings of self worth (importance, value). That is membership can give increased feelings of worth to the group members themselves.

4. Affiliation: Groups can fulfill social needs, people enjoy the regular interactions that come with group membership which are their primary source for fulfilling their needs for affiliation.

5. Power: What can not be achieved individually often become possible through group action. There is power in numbers.

6. Goal achievement: There are times when it takes more than one person to accomplish a particular task. In such instances, mgt will rely on the use of a formal group.

STAGES OF GROUP DEVELOPMENT

Groups passed through a standard sequence of five stages. These stages are:

1. Forming: Forming is characterized by a great deal of uncertainty about the group purpose, structure & leadership. This stage is complete when members have begun to think of themselves as part of a group.

2. Storming: The storming stage is one of intra-group conflict. There is conflict over who will control the group. When this stage is complete, there will be a relatively clear hierarchy of leadership within the group.

3. Norming: The third stage is one in which close relationships develop & the group demonstrates cohesiveness. There is now a strong sense of group identity & camaraderie (intimacy). Norming stage is complete when the group structure solidifies and the group has assimilated a common set of expectation of what define correct member behavior.

4. Performing: The fourth stage is performing. The structure at this point is fully functional and accepted. Group energy has moved from getting to know and understand each other to performing the task at hand.

5. Adjourning: In this stage, the group prepares for its disbandment. High task performance is no longer the group's top priority. Instead, attention is directed toward wrapping up activities. Responses of group members vary in this stage. Some are upbeat, basking in the group’s accomplishments. Others may be depressed over the loss of camaraderie and friendship gained during the work group’s life.

GROUP STRUCTURE

Groups have a structure that shapes the behavior of the members and makes it possible to explain and predict a proportion of individual behavior within the group as well as the performance of the group itself. They include roles, norms, status, group size and the degree of group cohesiveness.

A) Roles: Roles mean a set of expected behavior patterns attributed to someone occupying a given position in a social unit.

1. Role identity: There are certain attitudes and actual behaviors consistence with a role, and they create the role identity. People have the ability to shift role rapidly when they recognize that the situation and its demands clearly require major changes.

2. Role perception: The view of how an individual supposed to act in a given situation is a role perception. Based on an interpretation of how we believe we are supposed to behave, we engage in certain types of behavior.

3. Role expectations: Role expectations are defined as how others believe ones should act in a given situation. How one behaves is determined to a large extent by the role defined in the context in which ones are acting.

4. Role conflict: When an individual is confronted by divergent role expectations, the result is role conflict. It exists when an individual finds that compliance with one role requirement may make it more difficult to comply with another.

B) Norms: Norms are acceptable standards of behavior that are shared by the group’s member. Norms tells member what they ought and ought not to do under certain circumstances.

1. The Hawthorne studies: The Hawthorne studies, later conducted by Harvard professor Elton Mayo, concluded that a worker’s behavior and sentiments were closely related, that group influences were significant in affecting individual behavior, that group standard were highly effective in establishing individual worker output, and that money was less a factor in determining worker output than were group standards, sentiments, and security.

2. Common classes of norms: A group norms are likely an individual’s fingerprints – each is unique. There are some common classes of norms that appear in most work group. These are – performance norms, appearance norms, social arrangement norms, and allocation of resource norms.

3. Conformity: As a member of a group, one desire acceptance by the group. Because of one’s desire for acceptance, one is susceptible to conforming to the group’s norms. There are considerable evidence that groups can place strong pressures on individual member to change their attitudes and behaviors to conform to the group standard. It is actually adjusting one’s behavior to align with the norms of the group.

4. Deviant workplace behavior: Antisocial actions by organizational members that intentionally violate established norms and that result in negative consequences for the organization, its members or both.

C) Status: Status is socially defined position or rank given to groups or group members by others – permeates every society.

1. Status and norms: Status has been shown to have some interesting effects on the power of norms and pressures to conform. For instance, high-status members of group often are given more freedom to deviate from norms that are other group members. High-status people are also better able to resist conformity pressures than their lower status peers.

2. Status and group interaction: Interaction among members of group is influenced by status. We find, for instance, that high status people tend to be more assertive. They speak out more often, criticize more, state more commands, and interrupt more often.

3. Status inequity: It is important to group members to believe that the status hierarchy is equitable. When inequity is perceived, it creates disequilibrium, which results a various types of corrective behavior.

4. Status and culture: The importance of status does vary between cultures. The French, for example, are highly status conscious. Also, countries differ on the criteria that create status.

D) Size: The size of the group affects the group’s overall group behavior. The evidence indicates that the smaller groups are faster at completing tasks than are large ones. However if the group is enlarged in problem solving, large group consistently get better marks than their smaller counterparts. Social loafing is one of the most important findings related to the size of the group. Social loafing is the tendency for individual to expand les effort when working collectively than when working individually. E) Cohesiveness: Groups differ in their cohesiveness, that is, the degree to which member are attracted to each other and are motivated to stay in the group. Some work groups are cohesive because the member has spent a great deal of time together, or the group’s small size facilitates high interaction, or the group has experienced external threats that have brought members close together.

GROUP DECISION MAKING

Two heads are better than one. This belief has expanded to the point that, today, many decisions in organizations are made by groups, teams, or committees.

A) Group versus the individual: Decision making by groups or individual depends on a number of factors. These are:

1. Strengths of group decision making: Groups generate more complete information and knowledge. They offer increased diversity of views. So groups generate higher quality decisions. Finally, groups lead to increased acceptance of solution.

2. Weaknesses of group decision making: Group decisions have some drawbacks. They are time consuming. There are conformity pressures in groups. Group decision can be dominated by one or a few members. Finally group decisions suffer from ambiguous responsibility.

3. Effectiveness and Efficiency: Whether groups are more effective than individuals depends on the criteria being used for defining effectiveness. If decision is defined in terms of speed, individual are superior. If creativity is important, groups tend to be more effective than individuals. But effectiveness cannot be considered without also assessing efficiency. In terms of efficiency, groups almost always stack up a poor second to the individual decision maker. In deciding whether the groups, then, consideration should be given to assessing whether increases in effectiveness are more than enough to offset the losses in efficiency.

B) Groupthink and groupshift: Two byproducts of group decision making are groupthink and groupshift.

1. Groupthink: Groupthink is the phenomenon in which the norm for consensus overrides the realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action. Groupthink is a disease that attack many groups and can dramatically hinder their performance.

2. Groupshift: It indicates that in discussing a given set of alternatives and arriving at a solution, group members tend to exaggerate the initial positions that they hold. It leads to a significant shift in the positions of members towards a more extreme position in the direction in which they are already leaning (partiality) before the discussion.

 MEANING OF PERCEPTION

Perception can be defined as the process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory impressions to give meaning to their environment. People's behavior is based on their perception of reality, not reality itself.

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In other words, perception is the process by which people select, organize, interpret, retrieve, and respond to information from their surroundings. It is each person’s interpretation of reality. Because perceptions differ greatly among individuals, the same workplace events, problems, and challenges will naturally be perceived differently within an organization.

FACTORS INFLUENCING PERCEPTION

A number of factors operate to shape and sometimes distort perception. These are:

1. The Perceiver
   Interpretation of a target is heavily influenced by the perceiver's personal characteristics such as attitudes, motives, interests, past experiences, and expectations.

2. The Target
   Characteristics of the observed target can affect perception. For example, loud individuals in a group are more likely to be noticed than quiet ones. Perception is also influenced by the target’s relationship to its background and the tendency to group similar or close things together.

3. The Situation
   Environmental elements affect perception. Factors such as time, location, light, and heat can shape how a situation is perceived.

ATTRIBUTION THEORY

Perceptions of people differ from those of inanimate objects because we make inferences about their actions. Attribution theory explains how we judge people differently based on the meanings we attribute to their behavior. The theory distinguishes between:

• Internally caused behavior: Under the individual’s personal control.
• Externally caused behavior: Resulting from outside factors.

Key factors in attribution:

• Distinctiveness: Does the person behave differently in various situations?
• Consensus: Do others behave the same way in similar situations?
• Consistency: Does the person act the same way over time?

FREQUENTLY USED SHORTCUTS IN JUDGING OTHERS

1. Selective Perception
   People interpret what they see based on their interests, background, and attitudes. This helps in “speed-reading” others but risks inaccuracy.

2. Halo Effect
   A single characteristic such as intelligence or appearance creates a general impression of the individual.

3. Contrast Effect
   Evaluations are influenced by comparisons with others recently encountered.

4. Projection
   Attributing one’s own characteristics to others can distort judgments.

5. Stereotyping
   Judging someone based on the perceived characteristics of the group they belong to, such as gender or age, regardless of accuracy.

THE LINK BETWEEN PERCEPTION AND INDIVIDUAL DECISION MAKING

Decision-making is influenced by perception. Individuals interpret and evaluate information, decide alternatives, and analyze strengths and weaknesses. Distortions in perception can bias the decision-making process.

HOW DECISIONS ARE ACTUALLY MADE IN ORGANIZATIONS

Bounded Rationality

Humans simplify complex problems into models that capture the essence but not the complexity of the problem. They seek satisfactory solutions rather than optimal ones. Decision-makers rely on familiar and obvious choices, limiting the scope of their evaluation.

Common Biases and Errors

1. Overconfidence Bias: Overestimating one’s abilities.
2. Anchoring Bias: Fixating on initial information.
3. Confirmation Bias: Seeking information that confirms past choices.
4. Availability Bias: Basing judgments on easily available information.
5. Representative Bias: Matching occurrences to preexisting categories.
6. Escalation of Commitment: Sticking to a decision despite evidence it’s wrong.
7. Randomness Error: Overestimating control over random events.
8. Hindsight Bias: Believing an outcome was predictable after it occurs.

WHAT ABOUT ETHICS IN DECISION MAKING?

Three Ethical Decision Criteria

1. Utilitarianism: Maximizing the greatest good for the greatest number.
2. Rights: Protecting basic individual rights.
3. Justice: Impartial enforcement of rules to ensure equal distribution of benefits and costs.

Ethics and National Culture

Ethical standards vary globally. Multinational organizations must establish ethical principles adapted to cultural norms while maintaining high standards.

THE RATIONAL DECISION-MAKING PROCESS/MODEL

1. Define the Problem: Identify the discrepancy between the current and desired state.
2. Identify the Decision Criteria: Determine what is relevant for the decision.
3. Allocate Weights to the Criteria: Prioritize the criteria.
4. Develop the Alternatives: Generate possible solutions without appraising them.
5. Evaluate the Alternatives: Critically analyze and rate each option.
6. Select the Best Alternative: Choose the option with the highest score based on the evaluation.

MEANING OF PERSONALITY

Personality means a dynamic concept describing the growth and development of a person’s whole physical system. According to Gordon Allport, personality is the dynamic organization within the individual of those psychophysical systems that determine his unique adjustment to his environment. Finally, personality can be defined as the sum total of ways in which an individual reacts to and interacts with others. It is most often described in terms of measurable traits that a person exhibits.

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PERSONALITY DETERMINANTS

An early debate in personality research centered on whether an individual’s personality was the result of heredity or environment. Today, we recognize a third factor – the situation. Thus, an adult’s personality is now generally considered to be made up of both heredity and environmental factors moderated by situational conditions.

1. Heredity: Heredity refers to factors determined at conception. Physical structure, facial attractiveness, gender, temperament, muscle composition, reflexes, energy level, and biological rhythms are characteristics generally considered to be either completely or substantially influenced by who the parents are. Studies of young children lend strong support to the power of heredity. Evidence demonstrates that traits such as shyness, fear, and aggression can be traced to inherited genetic characteristics.

2. Environment: Environmental factors exert significant pressure on personality formation, including the culture in which one is raised, early conditioning, and the norms among family, friends, and social groups. These factors play a substantial role in shaping personality. For example, culture establishes norms, attitudes, and values passed from one generation to the next, creating consistencies over time.

3. Situation: The situation influences the effects of heredity and environment on personality. An individual’s personality, although generally stable and consistent, can change in different situations. The various demands of different situations call forth different aspects of personality. Thus, personality patterns should not be viewed in isolation.

THE BIG FIVE MODEL

The Big-Five model represents the five basic dimensions underlying all others and encompassing most significant variations in human personality:

1. Extroversion: Captures one’s comfort level with relationships. Extroverts tend to be gregarious, assertive, and sociable, while introverts are reserved, timid, and quiet.

2. Agreeableness: Refers to an individual’s propensity to defer to others. Highly agreeable people are cooperative, warm, and trusting, while those scoring low are cold, disagreeable, and antagonistic.

3. Conscientiousness: Measures reliability. Highly conscientious individuals are responsible, organized, dependable, and persistent, while low scorers are easily distracted, disorganized, and unreliable.

4. Emotional Stability: Taps a person’s ability to withstand stress. Emotionally stable people are calm, self-confident, and secure, while those with high negative scores are nervous, anxious, depressed, and insecure.

5. Openness to Experience: Addresses one’s range of interest and fascination with novelty. Open individuals are creative, curious, and artistically sensitive, while conventional individuals find comfort in familiarity.

MAJOR PERSONALITY ATTRIBUTES INFLUENCING OB

Specific personality attributes have been found to be powerful predictors of behavior in organizations:

1. Locus of Control: Refers to an individual’s perception of control over their fate. Internals believe they control their destinies, while externals see their lives as controlled by external forces like luck or chance.

2. Machiavellianism: High Machiavellians are pragmatic, emotionally distant, and believe the ends justify the means. They thrive in situations with minimal rules and face-to-face interactions.

3. Self-Esteem: Refers to the degree to which individuals like or dislike themselves. High self-esteem is directly related to expectations for success and confidence in abilities.

4. Self-Monitoring: Indicates an individual’s ability to adjust behavior to external, situational factors. High self-monitors adapt well, showing behavioral flexibility, while low self-monitors display consistent behavior across situations.

5. Risk-Taking: Refers to differences in willingness to take chances. High risk-takers make rapid decisions with less information, while low risk-takers are more cautious.

6. Type A Personality: Characterized by competitiveness, impatience, and a constant struggle to achieve more in less time. Traits include rapid movement, multitasking, and obsession with numbers.

7. Proactive Personality: Proactives identify opportunities, show initiative, and persist until meaningful change occurs. They are often seen as leaders and change agents within organizations.

MEANING OF EMOTIONS

Emotions are reactions to an object, not traits. They are objective-specific and closely intertwined with affect and moods. Emotions are intense feelings directed at someone or something and can transform into moods when the contextual object is lost. For example, becoming angry at a colleague criticizes your work demonstrates an emotion directed at a specific object.

FELT VS. DISPLAYED EMOTIONS

1. Felt Emotions: An individual’s actual emotions.

2. Displayed Emotions: Organizationally required emotions considered appropriate in a given job. These are learned behaviors often masking true feelings, particularly in customer-facing roles where emotional labor is high.

EMOTION DIMENSIONS

1. Variety: Emotions include anger, happiness, fear, envy, and more. Positive emotions express favorable evaluations, while negative emotions express unfavorable evaluations.

2. Intensity: People respond differently to identical stimuli, influenced by personality or job requirements. For instance, intense happiness may manifest as ecstasy, while intense sadness as deep depression.

3. Frequency and Distribution: High-frequency or long-duration emotional labor demands more exertion from employees. Success in meeting emotional demands depends on intensity, frequency, and duration of effort required.

Comprehensive Analysis and Insights

This content represents an extensive overview of essential human resource management concepts, ranging from career development to workplace safety. Here’s a refined, unique analysis with added insights for a more polished understanding:

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Career Anchors and Reality Shocks

• Career Anchors: Personal values or priorities that are fundamental to career decisions, such as autonomy, stability, or innovation. These act as guiding principles, influencing how individuals shape their professional paths.
• Reality Shocks: A critical phase often encountered during career initiation. It occurs when the expectations of a fulfilling and dynamic job meet the reality of routine or less engaging tasks. This underscores the importance of realistic job previews during recruitment.

Insight: To mitigate reality shocks, organizations should integrate onboarding programs that set realistic expectations and foster gradual engagement.

Compensation Framework and Legal Foundations

• Compensation: Represents the cornerstone of employee motivation, encompassing direct financial pay and indirect benefits. Effective pay systems align employee contributions with organizational goals while adhering to legal standards.

Key Legislation:

1. Davis-Bacon Act (1931): Enforces wage standards for federal contractors to ensure fair compensation.
2. Fair Labor Standards Act (1938): Introduced protections such as minimum wages and overtime pay, shaping modern labor standards.
3. Equal Pay Act (1963): Eliminates gender-based wage disparities, advocating equal pay for equal roles.

Analysis: Laws ensure equity and protect worker rights. However, organizations must regularly audit compliance to avoid legal risks and maintain a competitive employer brand.

Job Evaluation and Compensation Structures

• Job Evaluation: Determines the relative worth of roles through methods such as ranking, classification, and the point system. This forms the foundation for pay grades and wage structures.
• Compensable Factors: These include measurable attributes like skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions, ensuring that pay reflects job complexity.
• Pay Grades & Wage Curves: Establish salary ranges based on job difficulty, aligning internal equity with market competitiveness.

Insight: Regular benchmarking against market rates ensures organizations remain attractive to top talent, while internal equity sustains employee morale.

Incentives and Performance-Based Pay

• Short-Term Incentives:

  • Spot Bonuses: Rewards for extraordinary but unquantifiable achievements.
  • Piecework and Team Incentives: Tied to individual or group productivity, motivating employees to exceed performance benchmarks.

• Long-Term Incentives:

  • Stock Options: Allow employees to share in the company’s financial growth.
  • Profit-Sharing Plans: Foster a sense of ownership and alignment with organizational success.

Analysis: Effective incentive programs balance short-term achievements with long-term engagement, promoting both immediate productivity and sustained loyalty.

Employee Benefits and Services

• Health and Retirement Plans:

  • HMO and PPOs: Affordable healthcare models tailored to diverse employee needs.
  • Pension Schemes (Defined Benefit vs. Defined Contribution): Provide financial security post-retirement, with varying employer obligations.

• Work-Life Balance Initiatives:

  • Flexible benefits programs allow employees to customize their perks, such as paid leave or wellness programs, fostering satisfaction and retention.

Insight: Offering tailored benefits demonstrates organizational empathy, addressing diverse employee priorities and enhancing overall engagement.

Labor Relations and Union Dynamics

• Union Security: Models like union shops and agency shops balance worker representation with employer flexibility.

• Key Acts:

  • Wagner Act (1935): Strengthened collective bargaining rights.
  • Taft-Hartley Act (1947): Addressed union and employer fairness.

• Dispute Resolution:

  • Mediation & Arbitration: Provide structured methods for resolving conflicts, maintaining workplace harmony.

Analysis: Strong labor relations are built on mutual trust. Organizations that foster open communication and fair practices often avoid the adversarial challenges of union disputes.

Fair Treatment, Discipline, and Workforce Management

• Fair Treatment Programs:

  • Speak-Up Programs: Encourage employees to voice concerns safely.
  • Open-Door Policies: Offer direct access to higher management, fostering transparency.

• Workforce Adjustments:

  • Alternatives to layoffs, such as voluntary pay reductions or time off, help organizations balance cost-cutting with employee retention.

Insight: Maintaining a reputation for fairness during challenging times strengthens employee loyalty and preserves organizational culture.

Workplace Safety and Health Management

• Occupational Safety and Health Act (1970): Created OSHA to enforce safety standards, reducing workplace accidents.
• Burnout Management: Recognizing and addressing employee exhaustion through realistic goal-setting and wellness programs enhances productivity and morale.

Analysis: Prioritizing safety not only complies with regulations but also cultivates a culture of care, boosting employee confidence and trust.

Final Thoughts:

This synthesis integrates key HR principles with actionable insights, emphasizing strategic alignment between employee satisfaction and organizational success. By prioritizing equity, incentives, safety, and communication, organizations can achieve sustainable growth while fostering an engaged and motivated workforce.

GLOSSARY: HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT AND RELATED CONCEPTS

• Management Process: The five fundamental functions of management: planning, organizing, staffing, leading, and controlling.
• Human Resources Management (HRM): Policies and practices designed to handle the "people" aspects of management, including recruitment, training, performance appraisal, and rewards.
• Authority: The official rights to make decisions, assign tasks, and issue orders.
• Line Manager: A manager responsible for directing subordinates' work and achieving organizational goals.
• Staff Manager: A manager who supports and advises line managers.
• Implied Authority: Influence a personnel manager holds through their access to senior leadership, affecting decisions on matters like testing and compliance.
• Functional Control: Authority exercised by an HR manager in coordinating personnel activities.
• Staff (Service) Function: HR's role in supporting and advising line management.
• Globalization: The expansion of business operations, including sales and production, to international markets.

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2. Equal Opportunity and the Law

• Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act: Prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC): Enforces laws against workplace discrimination.
• Affirmative Action: Measures aimed at addressing the lingering effects of past discrimination.
• Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP): Oversees federal contractors' compliance with equal opportunity regulations.
• Equal Pay Act of 1963: Mandates equal pay for equal work regardless of gender.
• Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973: Requires affirmative action for disabled individuals among federal contractors.
• Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA): Prohibits discrimination based on pregnancy or related medical conditions.
• Sexual Harassment: Unwelcome conduct based on sex that disrupts work or creates a hostile work environment.
• Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson: Landmark Supreme Court case establishing that hostile work environments qualify as sexual harassment.

3. Job Analysis

• Job Analysis: Identifying the responsibilities, duties, and skills needed for a specific job.
• Job Description: Document outlining the duties, responsibilities, and working conditions of a job.
• Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ): Tool for collecting quantitative job data.
• Functional Job Analysis: A job classification method that includes reasoning, judgment, and communication requirements.

4. Personnel Planning and Recruiting

• Trend Analysis: Reviewing historical employment patterns to forecast future needs.
• Ratio Analysis: Using data ratios to predict staffing requirements.
• Scatter Plot: A graphical representation to find relationships between variables like sales and staffing.
• Job Posting: Advertising job openings internally or externally.

5. Employee Testing and Selection

• Test Validity: The extent to which a test measures what it claims to measure.
• Reliability: Consistency of test results over time.
• Work Sampling Technique: Evaluating job candidates through real or simulated job tasks.

6. Interviewing Candidates

• Structured Interview: A standardized format with a set list of questions.
• Stress Interview: Intentionally stressful situations to assess candidates' reactions.
• Panel Interview: Multiple interviewers evaluate a candidate.

7. Orienting and Training Employees

• Employee Orientation: Introducing new hires to company policies, culture, and expectations.
• On-the-Job Training (OJT): Practical, hands-on training while performing actual job duties.
• Programmed Learning: A systematic training method involving immediate feedback.

8. Developing Managers

• Management Development: Programs aimed at enhancing managerial knowledge and skills.
• Succession Planning: Preparing for future leadership transitions by identifying and training potential leaders.
• Behavior Modeling: Demonstrating effective management techniques followed by practice and feedback.

9. Managing Quality and Productivity

• Flextime: A flexible work schedule allowing employees to set their start and end times.
• Job Sharing: Two employees share one full-time position.
• Quality Circle: Groups of employees meeting to solve work-related problems collaboratively.

10. Appraising Performance

• Graphic Rating Scale: Evaluates employees on specific traits using a defined scale.
• Critical Incident Method: Focuses on recording significant examples of good or poor performance.
• Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale (BARS): Combines qualitative incidents with a quantitative rating scale.

11. Managing Careers

• Career Cycle: Phases of career progression, from growth to decline.
• Exploration Stage: Period where individuals assess career options based on their skills and interests.
• Occupational Orientation: Personal tendencies guiding career choices, based on John Holland's theory.

It seems you've shared a comprehensive list of terms and explanations related to career development, compensation, labor relations, and employee safety. Here's a well-structured summary based on the topics you've provided:

Career Anchors & Reality Shocks

• Career Anchors: Non-negotiable values or concerns that guide career decisions.
• Reality Shocks: Disillusionment faced by new employees when job expectations clash with reality.

Employee Compensation & Pay Plans

• Employee Compensation: Includes all forms of pay and rewards arising from employment.

• Key Acts:

  • Davis-Bacon Act (1931): Sets wage rates for federal contractors.
  • Fair Labor Standards Act (1938): Regulates wages, hours, and child labor.
  • Equal Pay Act (1963): Mandates equal pay for equal work regardless of gender.

• Job Evaluation & Pay Grades:

  • Methods: Ranking, classification, point method, and factor comparison.
  • Compensable Factors: Include skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.
  • Pay Grades & Wage Curve: Structure salaries based on job difficulty and market rates.

Performance-Based Pay & Incentives

• Types of Incentives:

  • Spot Bonuses: Immediate rewards for unmeasured achievements.
  • Piecework: Pay tied to units produced.
  • Team Incentives: Bonuses for exceeding group productivity goals.

• Long-Term Incentives:

  • Stock Options: Rights to purchase company shares at a fixed price.
  • Profit-Sharing Plans: Employees share company profits.

Benefits & Employee Services

• Health & Retirement Plans:

  • HMO & PPOs: Prepaid and discounted health care services.
  • Social Security & ERISA: Ensure retirement benefits and pension rights.

• Leave & Compensation:

  • Sick Leave, Severance Pay: Income during illness or job termination.
  • Flexible Benefits Programs: Tailored benefit plans for employees.

Labor Relations & Collective Bargaining

• Union Security Types: Closed shop, union shop, agency shop, and open shop.

• Key Acts:

  • Wagner Act (1935): Supports collective bargaining.
  • Taft-Hartley Act (1947): Outlines union and employer rights.

• Bargaining & Strikes:

  • Good Faith Bargaining: Honest negotiation efforts.
  • Mediation & Arbitration: Third-party conflict resolution methods.

Employee Discipline & Fair Treatment

• Dismissal & Alternatives:

  • Wrongful Discharge: Unlawful termination.
  • Layoffs & Downsizing: Workforce reductions with or without re-employment guarantees.

• Employee Advocacy Programs:

  • Speak-Up Programs & Open-Door Policies: Ensure employees can voice concerns.

Safety & Health in the Workplace

• Occupational Safety and Health Act (1970): Ensures safe working conditions.
• Key Terms:
  • Unsafe Acts/Conditions: Behavior or environments causing accidents.
  • Burnout: Exhaustion from unrealistic work expectations.