Summery organization and people
Chapter 1
Organizational behaviour (OB) is a study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups
and structure have on behaviour. This knowledge can be applied to improve organizational
effectiveness. Organisations are social entities that are goal- oriented, linked to their
environment and employing deliberately (opzettelijk) designed and coordinated activities
and approaches to achieve their objectives.
The core topics from OB are:
- Motivation
- Leader behaviour and power
- Interpersonal communication
- Group structure and processes
- Attitude development and perception
- Change processes
- Conflict and negotiation
- Work design
Several managerial activities:
- Traditional management: decision making, planning and controlling
- Communication: exchanging routine information and processing paperwork
Helps with effectiveness
- HRM: motivation, disciplining, managing conflict staffing and training
- Networking: socializing, politicking and interacting with outsiders
Helps with getting successful
Behaviour is not random but can be predicted. Systematic study is looking at relationships,
attempting to predict causes and effects and drawing conclusions based on scientific
evidence. Evidence-based management (EBM) is using systematic studies including scientific
evidence to make managerial decisions. A 3th option of managing is intuition, deciding this
on the fly and with your gut feeling without any studies. This can be dangerous and bring a
lot of risk because you don’t have enough information.
Data is the foundation of EBM. Big data is the extensive use of statistical calculations and
analysis.
Current usage predicting events, calculate risks involved, prevent catastrophes
New trends data-driven management and decision making, big data can help OB
Limitations issues of privacy and appropriate application
OB is an applied behavioural science built by a number of behavioural disciplines:
- Psychology: measures, explains (and changes) the behaviour of
humans and animals
- Social psychology: focusses on the influence of people on one
another, an important subject is change. (psychology + sociology)
- Sociology: people in relation to their social environment or culture
- Anthropology: human beings and their activities
,Because of contingency variables, situational factors that reduce the relationship between
two or more variables. Behaviour of people cannot be studied in isolation. Interrelationships
with different variables need to be studied, such as:
- The nature and purpose of the organisation
- The human element and behaviour of people
- Business strategy, organisational processes and the execution of work
- The process of management as an integrating and co- ordinating activity
- Social responsibilities and business ethics
- The external environment of which the organisation is part
- The need for organisation success and survival
Challenges and opportunities for OB:
Continuing globalization organizations are no longer constrained by national borders
- Working with people from different cultures: you have to understand the culture and
adapt your management style to fit the differences
- Adapting to differing cultural and regulatory norms: effective managers need to know
cultural norms and laws in the counties they work in.
Workforce demographics the workforce has always adapted to variations in the economy,
longevity, birth rates, socioeconomic conditions and other changers that have a big impact.
Workforce diversity the concept that organizations are becoming more heterogeneous in
terms of gender, age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and other characteristics.
Social media
Employee Well-Being at work endangered by never getting away from the virtual
workplace and family responsibilities
Positive work environment positive organizational scholarship (POS) is a research that
concerns how organizations develop human strengths, foster vitality and resilience and
unlock potential.
Ethical behaviour ethical dilemmas and ethical choices are situations in which individuals
are required to define right and wrong conduct
A model is an abstraction of reality, a simplified representation of some real-world
phenomenon. This is the OB model
Inputs the variables that lead to processes, they will stage what will occur later.
Processes actions that engage in as a result of inputs and that lead to certain outcomes
Outcomes key factors that are affected by some other variables
, Chapter 2
Attitudes (houding) are evaluative statements about objects,
people or events. To fully understand attitudes, we must
consider their fundamental properties or components.
Attitudes have three components:
- Cognitive component: opinion or belief
- Affective component: emotion or feeling
- Behavioural component: intention to behave in a
certain way toward someone or something
According to some research’s attitudes follow behaviour. Cases of attitude following
behavior illustrates the effects of cognitive dissonance, contradictions (tegenstrijdigheden)
individuals might perceive between their attitudes and their behavior. Any inconsistency
between those two is uncomfortable, and individuals will therefore attempt to reduce it. The
desire to reduce dissonance depends on three factors:
- Importance of the elements creating dissonance
- Influence we believe we have over those elements
- Rewards of dissonance
The most powerful moderators of the attitude relationship are:
- Importance Important attitudes reflect our fundamental values and show a strong
relationship with our behaviour
- Correspondence to behaviour Specific attitudes tend to predict specific behaviour;
general attitudes can predict general behaviours
- Accessibility Attitudes that our memories can easily access are more likely to
predict behaviour
- Social pressures Social pressures to behave in a certain way lead to differences
between attitudes and behaviour
- Direct personal experience something you know, results in a stronger attitude-
behaviour relationship
Major Job Attitudes:
- Job Satisfaction: a positive feeling about one’s job resulting from an evaluation of tis
characteristics
- Job Involvement: the degree to which a person identifies with a job, actively
participates in it and considers performance important to their self-worth
- Psychological Empowerment: employees’ beliefs in the degree to which they affect
their work environment, their competencies, the meaningfulness etc.
- Organisational Commitment: the degree an employee identifies with a particular
organization and its goals and wishes to maintain membership in the organization
- Perceived Organisational Support (POS): the degree to which employees believe an
organization values their contribution and cares about their well-being
POS is important in countries where the power distance, the extent to which a
society accepts that power in organizations is distributed unequally, is lower
- Employee Engagement: an individual’s involvement, satisfaction, passion and
enthusiasm for the work he does
Chapter 1
Organizational behaviour (OB) is a study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups
and structure have on behaviour. This knowledge can be applied to improve organizational
effectiveness. Organisations are social entities that are goal- oriented, linked to their
environment and employing deliberately (opzettelijk) designed and coordinated activities
and approaches to achieve their objectives.
The core topics from OB are:
- Motivation
- Leader behaviour and power
- Interpersonal communication
- Group structure and processes
- Attitude development and perception
- Change processes
- Conflict and negotiation
- Work design
Several managerial activities:
- Traditional management: decision making, planning and controlling
- Communication: exchanging routine information and processing paperwork
Helps with effectiveness
- HRM: motivation, disciplining, managing conflict staffing and training
- Networking: socializing, politicking and interacting with outsiders
Helps with getting successful
Behaviour is not random but can be predicted. Systematic study is looking at relationships,
attempting to predict causes and effects and drawing conclusions based on scientific
evidence. Evidence-based management (EBM) is using systematic studies including scientific
evidence to make managerial decisions. A 3th option of managing is intuition, deciding this
on the fly and with your gut feeling without any studies. This can be dangerous and bring a
lot of risk because you don’t have enough information.
Data is the foundation of EBM. Big data is the extensive use of statistical calculations and
analysis.
Current usage predicting events, calculate risks involved, prevent catastrophes
New trends data-driven management and decision making, big data can help OB
Limitations issues of privacy and appropriate application
OB is an applied behavioural science built by a number of behavioural disciplines:
- Psychology: measures, explains (and changes) the behaviour of
humans and animals
- Social psychology: focusses on the influence of people on one
another, an important subject is change. (psychology + sociology)
- Sociology: people in relation to their social environment or culture
- Anthropology: human beings and their activities
,Because of contingency variables, situational factors that reduce the relationship between
two or more variables. Behaviour of people cannot be studied in isolation. Interrelationships
with different variables need to be studied, such as:
- The nature and purpose of the organisation
- The human element and behaviour of people
- Business strategy, organisational processes and the execution of work
- The process of management as an integrating and co- ordinating activity
- Social responsibilities and business ethics
- The external environment of which the organisation is part
- The need for organisation success and survival
Challenges and opportunities for OB:
Continuing globalization organizations are no longer constrained by national borders
- Working with people from different cultures: you have to understand the culture and
adapt your management style to fit the differences
- Adapting to differing cultural and regulatory norms: effective managers need to know
cultural norms and laws in the counties they work in.
Workforce demographics the workforce has always adapted to variations in the economy,
longevity, birth rates, socioeconomic conditions and other changers that have a big impact.
Workforce diversity the concept that organizations are becoming more heterogeneous in
terms of gender, age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and other characteristics.
Social media
Employee Well-Being at work endangered by never getting away from the virtual
workplace and family responsibilities
Positive work environment positive organizational scholarship (POS) is a research that
concerns how organizations develop human strengths, foster vitality and resilience and
unlock potential.
Ethical behaviour ethical dilemmas and ethical choices are situations in which individuals
are required to define right and wrong conduct
A model is an abstraction of reality, a simplified representation of some real-world
phenomenon. This is the OB model
Inputs the variables that lead to processes, they will stage what will occur later.
Processes actions that engage in as a result of inputs and that lead to certain outcomes
Outcomes key factors that are affected by some other variables
, Chapter 2
Attitudes (houding) are evaluative statements about objects,
people or events. To fully understand attitudes, we must
consider their fundamental properties or components.
Attitudes have three components:
- Cognitive component: opinion or belief
- Affective component: emotion or feeling
- Behavioural component: intention to behave in a
certain way toward someone or something
According to some research’s attitudes follow behaviour. Cases of attitude following
behavior illustrates the effects of cognitive dissonance, contradictions (tegenstrijdigheden)
individuals might perceive between their attitudes and their behavior. Any inconsistency
between those two is uncomfortable, and individuals will therefore attempt to reduce it. The
desire to reduce dissonance depends on three factors:
- Importance of the elements creating dissonance
- Influence we believe we have over those elements
- Rewards of dissonance
The most powerful moderators of the attitude relationship are:
- Importance Important attitudes reflect our fundamental values and show a strong
relationship with our behaviour
- Correspondence to behaviour Specific attitudes tend to predict specific behaviour;
general attitudes can predict general behaviours
- Accessibility Attitudes that our memories can easily access are more likely to
predict behaviour
- Social pressures Social pressures to behave in a certain way lead to differences
between attitudes and behaviour
- Direct personal experience something you know, results in a stronger attitude-
behaviour relationship
Major Job Attitudes:
- Job Satisfaction: a positive feeling about one’s job resulting from an evaluation of tis
characteristics
- Job Involvement: the degree to which a person identifies with a job, actively
participates in it and considers performance important to their self-worth
- Psychological Empowerment: employees’ beliefs in the degree to which they affect
their work environment, their competencies, the meaningfulness etc.
- Organisational Commitment: the degree an employee identifies with a particular
organization and its goals and wishes to maintain membership in the organization
- Perceived Organisational Support (POS): the degree to which employees believe an
organization values their contribution and cares about their well-being
POS is important in countries where the power distance, the extent to which a
society accepts that power in organizations is distributed unequally, is lower
- Employee Engagement: an individual’s involvement, satisfaction, passion and
enthusiasm for the work he does
