Unit - 1
Fundamentals of OB
DEFINITION
Organizational Behaviour is concerned with the understanding, prediction and control of human behaviour in organizations. It focuses on the individuals, the groups and the organization and also on their interactional relationships. It is the study and application of knowledge about how people act with organizations. It is a human tool for human benefit. It applies broadly to the behaviour of people in all types of organizations.
Wherever organizations are, there is a need to understand organizational behaviour. According to Fred Luthans, “Organizational behaviour is directly concerned with the understanding, production and control of human behaviour in organizations.”
SCOPE OF OB
“OB is a field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups, and structure have on behaviour
within organizations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge towards improving an organization’s effectiveness”.
The scope of OB involves three levels of behaviour in organizations: individuals, groups and structure.
1. Individual Behaviour
(i) Personality
(ii) Perception
(iii) Values and Attitudes
(iv) Learning
(v) Motivation
2. Group Behaviour
(i) Work groups and group dynamics
(ii) Dynamics of conflict
(iii) Communication
(iv) Leadership
(v) Morale
3. Organization: Structure, Process and Application
(i) Organizational Climate
(ii) Organizational Culture
(iii) Organizational Change
(iv) Organizational Effectiveness
(v) Organizational Development
IMPORTANCE OF ORGANIZATION BEHAVIOR (OB)
1. It builds better relationship by achieving, people, organizational, and social objectives.
2. It covers a wide array of human resource like Behavior, training and development, change management,
leadership, teams etc.
3. It brings coordination which is the essence of management.
4. It improves goodwill of the organization.
5. It helps to achieve objectives quickly.
6. It makes optimum utilization of resources.
7. It facilitates motivation.
8. It leads to higher efficiency.
9. It improves relations in the organization.
10. It is multidisciplinary in the sense that applies different techniques, methods, and theories to evaluate the
performances.
OB highlights on its several aspects like:
a. Way of thinking—requires clearly identifying the level of analysis (individual, group, organizational).
b. Multi-disciplinary—draws principles, theories, and models from psychology, sociology and cultural anthropology.
c. Humanistic orientation—assumes that individual feelings, attitudes, perceptions, goals, etc., are important to the organization.
d. Performance-oriented—focusing on whether and why individual/group/organization performance is high, moderate, or low.
e. External environment—substantially impacts organizational behavior.
f. Scientific method—plays a critical role in OB research.
g. Applications oriented—concerned with providing useful/applicable answers to management problems.
Individuals:
-Each person is substantially different from all others in terms of their personalities, needs, demographic factors and past experiences and/or because they are placed in different physical settings, time periods or social surroundings. This diversity needs to be recognized and viewed as a valuable asset to organizations.
Individual performance forms the basis of organizational performance. The four key influences on individual’s behavior and motivation are:
a. Individual characteristics—e.g., personality, attitudes, perceptions, values.
b. Individual motivation—interacts with ability to work to determine individual performance.
c. Rewards/punishment—use of behavior modification techniques to enhance performance and control misbehavior.
d. Stress.
The historical growth/ evolution of the subject organizational growth
The four important approaches to the study of organizational behavior, i.e.,
(1) Human Resource Approach,
(2) Contingency Approach,
(3) Productivity Approach,
(4) System Approach.
1. Human Resources Approach: - This approach recognizes that human resources in an organization are the central force. Their development will contribute to the success of the organization. Human resources approach provides for the changes in the managerial role. It requires that the managers, instead of controlling the employees, should provide active support to them by treating them as part of the group.
2. Contingency Approach: - The approach stresses that there is no single way to manage effectively under all circumstances. The methods of behaviours which work effectively in one situation may fail in another. The organizational structure and the processes of management are governed by the external environment and several aspects of the internal environment. Effective management processes will vary in different situations depending on the individuals and groups in the organization, the nature of the job and technology, the environment facing the organization and its structure.
3. Productivity Approach: - Productivity means the numerical value of the ratio of output to input. Higher the value of this ratio, greater is the efficiency and effectiveness of the management. The traditional concept of productivity was concerned with economic inputs and output only. But nowadays human and social inputs and outputs are equally important. Productivity, a significant part of organizational behaviour decisions, is recognized and discussed extensively. These decisions relate to human, social and economic issues. For example, if better organizational behaviour can reduce worker’s turnover or the number of absentees, a human output or benefit occurs.
4. System Approach: - The systems approach is of the view that an organization is a powerful system with several subsystems which are highly and closely interconnected. Any action taken to solve the problems in one subsystem will have its effect on the other subsystems as well; since all the parts of the organization are closely connected. Thus, this approach gives the managers a way of looking at the organization as a whole, whole group, and the whole social system. Systems approach has become an integral part of modern organizational theory. Organizations are termed as complex systems comprising of interrelated and interlocking systems.
The public and government have been included keeping in view the relationship between organization and external environment. The other subsystems are integral part of overall organizations.
The theoretical framework of OB is discussed below in details:
COGNITIVE FRAMEWORK
Cognitive approach emphasizes the positive and freewill aspects of human behavior and uses concepts such as expectancy, demand, and intention. Cognition can be simply defined as the act of knowing an item of information. In cognitive framework, cognitions precede behavior and constitute input into the person’s thinking, perception, problem solving, and information processing.
The work of Edward Tolman can be used to represent the cognitive theoretical approach. According to Tolman, learning consists of the expectancy that a particular event will lead to a particular consequence. This cognitive concept of expectancy implies that organism is thinking about, or is conscious or aware of the goal and result of a behavior exhibited by it. It means that a person desires a goal and also knows the behavior that will lead to achievement of the goals.
Pioneer behaviorists Ivan Pavlov and Jon B. Watson stressed the importance of studying observable behaviors instead of the elusive mind. They advocated that behavior could be best understood in terms of stimulus and response (S-R). They examined the impact of stimulus and felt that learning occurred when the S-R connection was made. Modern behaviorism, that marks its beginning with B.F. Skinner, advocates that behavior in response to a stimulus is contingent on environmental consequences. Thus, it is important to note that behaviortistic approach is based on observable behavior and environmental variables (which are also observable).
Social learning theory takes the position that behavior can best be explained in terms of a continuous reciprocal interaction among cognitive, behavioral, and environmental determinants. The person and the environmental situation do not function as independent units but, in conjunction with behavior itself, reciprocally interact to determine behavior. It means that cognitive variables and environmental variables are relevant, but the experiences generated by previous behavior also partly determine what a person becomes and can do, which, in turn, affects subsequently behavior. A person’s cognition or understanding changes according to the experience of consequences of past behavior.
Bandura developed social learning theory into the more comprehensive social cognitive theory (SCT). Stajkovic and Luthans have translated this SCT into the theoretical framework for organizational behavior. Social cognitive theory recognizes the importance of behaviorism’s contingent environmental consequences, but also includes cognitive processes of self regulation. The social part acknowledges the social origins of much of human thought and action (what individual learns from society), whereas the cognitive portion recognizes the influential contribution of thought processes to human motivation, attitudes, and action. In social cognitive theoretical framework, organizational participants are at the same time both products and producers of their personality, respective environments, and behaviors. Bandura identified five basic human capabilities as a part of SCT.
1. Symbolizing: People process visual experiences into cognitive models. They help in future action.
2. Forethought: Employees plan their actions.
3. Observational: Employees learn by observing the performance of the referent group (peers, supervisors and high performers) and the consequences of their actions.
4. Self-regulatory: Employees self-regulate their actions by setting internal standards (aspired level of performance).
5. Self-reflective: Employees reflect back on their actions (how did I do?) and perceptually determine how they believe then can successfully accomplish the task in the future given the context (probability of success between 0 to 100% is estimated)
Behavioral bias: It further causes dependence, dis-contentment, indiscipline, and irresponsibility.
Law of diminishing returns: It says that beyond a certain point, there is a decline in output even after each additional good or positive factor.
Unethical practices and manipulation of people: Knowledge of motivation and communication acquired can be used to exploit subordinates in an organization by the manipulative managers.
References:
1. Understanding Organizational Behaviour, Parek, Oxford
2. Organizational Behaviour, Robbins, Judge, Sanghi, Pearson.
3. Organizational Behaviour, K. Awathappa, HPH.
4. Organizational Behaviour, VSP Rao, Excel
5. Introduction to Organizational Behaviour, Moorhead, Griffin, Cengage.
6. Organizational Behaviour, Hitt, Miller, Colella, Wiley
