1

LESSON NO. 1

ORGANISATION BEHAVIOUR

INTRODUCTION

Org. Behaviour (in short called as OB) is concerned with the study of the behaviour and interaction of people in
restricted or organised settings. It involves understanding people and predicting their behaviour, and knowledge
of the means by which their behaviour is influenced and shaped.

Organisations are bodies or entities created for a stated purpose They may consist of one or more people. In the
case of a sole trader or single operator, he needs to build relationships with suppliers, contractors, customers,
clients, and the community. For those that consist of more than one person, internal as well as external
relationships have to be created and maintained. Organisations therefore consist of individuals, groups, and
relationships. Objectives, structures, systems and processes are then created to give direction and order to
activities and interactions. OB is thus of great concern to anyone who organises, creates, orders, directs,
manages, or supervises the activities of others. It is also of concern to those who build relationships between
individuals, groups of people, different parts of organisation between different organisation, for all these
activities are founded on human interactions.

OB is therefore concerned with:-

1. The purposes for which organisations are created
2. The behaviour of individuals, and an understanding of the pressures and influences that cause them to
act and react in particular ways.
3. The qualities that individuals bring to particular situations.
4. The creation of groups i.e., collections of people brought together for given purposes.
5. The background and context within which activities take place.
6. The relationships and interactions with the wider environment with other organisations and groups.
7. The management and ordering of the whole and its parts into productive and effective work relationships.

GOALS OF O.B.

There are 4 primary goals of OB, which are as under:-

1. Describe
2. Understand
3. Predict, AND Behaviour.
4. Control

ELEMENTS OF O.B.
There are 4 key elements of ob, which are as under: -
1. The People
2. The structure
3. The Environment
4. The Technology People

Env. Env.

Structure Technology
Env.

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MEANING OF OB

1. It is the study and application of knowledge about how people act within organisations. IT IS A HUMAN
TOOL FOR HUMAN BENEFIT AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT.
2. It is directly concerned with the understanding, predicting, and controlling of human behaviour.
3. It represents the behavioural approach to management - not the whole of management.
4. It is not to be equated with the industrial psychology. For E.g., organisational structure and management
processes, say, decision making play a direct role in OB, but they are indirectly discussed in industrial
psychology.
5. It is directly concerned with the conceptual and human side of management, but not with the technical side.

DETAILED STUDY OF THE 4 KEY ELEMENTS OF OB

1. PEOPLE

An Organisation is a well-knit social system. People work in organisations. They constitute individuals and
groups. Even in groups, there could be formal as well as informal classifications. People join organisations to
achieve their objectives. They are the LIVING, THINKING, and FEELING beings. Although people have a few
things in common, each person is individualised, just as their palmprints. Heredity, endowment, social
institutions contribute their share toward make up of individuals. Every manager's approach to employee
should be INDIVIDUAL, and NOT STATISTICAL, therefore.

We must employ a whole person, and not his "hands" or "brain" only. Home life cannot be separated from
worklife. PEOPLE FUNCTION AS TOTAL HUMAN BEINGS. The objective of OB is to develop a BETTER
EMPLOYEE, A BETTER CITIZEN, AND A BETTER MAN. The value of person asserts that people are to be
treated differently from other factors. Of production. People should be treated with respect and dignity. The
concept of human dignity rejects the old idea of employees as so many "hands" or economic tools. Organisations
cannot ignore human values.

2. ORGANISATION STRUCTURE

We have learnt that organisations are basically social systems, and come into being on the basis of mutual
interests. From sociology, we learn that all activities are governed by social and psychological laws. Just as
people have psychological needs, they have also social roles and status. In organisations we find two types of
social systems, namely, the formal, and the informal, both of which coexist. It means that an organization's
environment is dynamic, and not static. All parts are interdependent and each part is influenced by other parts.
People need organisations, and organisations need people, is to state the obvious. If there is no sense of
mutuality, there is no reason why at all organisations cannot attain their objectives without the people element
therein, and so is true in reverse.

3. TECHNOLOGY

Technology helps people work with machines, tools, and the like. Thus, they are able to produce more of goods
and services, and offer them to the society. It helps people to do better work, but technology element has both
cost and benefit implications.

4. ENVIRONMENT

All organisations operate within an external environment. An organisation is a larger part of a social system. The
external environment influences the Attitudes of people, affect work conditions, and provide resources.

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OB IS A BEHAVIOURAL SCIENCE

1. Bchavoiural science is considered to be a new science of an ancient subject.

2. Beh, Sc. Is the study of human behaviour.
3. The primary difference between beh.sc, and other social sciences lies in its methodology,
4. A beh.sc. depends upon rigorous scientific methodology in the collection of empirical data on human
behaviour. The other social sciences use indirect documentary practice in building their body of knowledge,
5. Why man behaves the way he does is a very complex process. The problem is so great that many people argue
that there can be no precise science of behaviour. Human beings cannot be effectively controlled

CONTRIBUTING DISCIPLINES TO O.B.

OB is applied beh.sc. and is built upon contributions from a number of behavioural disciplines. They are-
Psychology, Sociology, Social psychology. Anthropology, and Political science. Contributions of psychology
operate at MICRO levels, while other contributions operate at the MACRO level.

1. PSYCHOLOGY

Individual or general psychology has been defined in many ways- It is called the science of soul, the science of
mind, the science of behaviour. All said and done, J.B.WATSON has defined psychology as the positive science
of human behaviour. Behaviour is not mechanical. There is a mind behind it and the behaviour is the expression
of the working of the mind. WOODWORTH has put it aptly - Psychology lost its soul first. Then it lost its mind,
then it lost its consciousness, and now lives with behaviour. Psychology seeks to measure, explain, and
sometimes the behaviour of men. Psychology attempts to study individual behaviour. Psychologists concern
themselves with perception, learning, personality, training, job satisfaction, leadership and motivation.

2. SOCIOLOGY

Sociologists have contributed to the areas of group dynamics, organisation theory and structure, bureaucracy,
power and conflict. Sociology focuses attention on people in relation to fellow human beings.

3. SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

This deals with interpersonal behaviour. In a broad sense, we can say that social behaviour involves one of the
three basic reactions. When an individual meets another individual, there is social interaction. Bach individual
affects the other individual with whom he comes into contact and is in turn affected by them. Secondly, the
individual may be interacting with a group- Then also, behaviour gets affected. Finally, interaction of one group
with the other groups. Social psychology attempts to study the characteristics of all these various social
behaviour. One major area arresting the attention of social psychologists is CHANGE MANAGEMENT, and
particularly how to implement change forcefully without pain.

4. ANTHROPOLOGY

Anthropology is the science of man. Anthropologists study society, particularly the primitive ones to learn about
human beings and their activities. How we behave is a function of culture- Our individual values system will
affect our attitudes and behaviour on the jib . Thus , anthropology teaches how our culture affects organizational
behaviour .

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REMEMBER

O.B. IS NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH MANAGEMENT. OB IS CONCERNED WITH HOW PEOPLE

INDIVIDUALLY AND IN-GROUPS ACT IN ORGANISATIONS. MANAGEMENT IS CONCERNED WITH
THE OPTIMUM ATTAINMENT OF ORGANISATIONAL GOALS> SINCE THOSE GOALS CANNOT BE
ATTAINED WITHOUT HUMAN INPUT, O.B.IS AN IMPORTANT SEGMENT OF MANAGEMENT.

THE CHALLENGES FACING MANAGEMENT

There are several challenges and critical issues facing managements, for which OB offers solutions or atleast
some meaningful insights towards solution. For e.g., more and more women are joining the workforce and
loyalties of employees to the organisations have become a thing of the past, business competition is increasing
across the globe. These are the critical issues being faced by the managers of the present era. Therefore there is a
greater need to understand OB better and more than before. Some issues are discussed in detail:-

1. WORKFORCE DIVERSITY

In today's organisations members of the workforce differ in age, gender, race, ethnicity, and education. When
workers join organisations, they come with their differing expectations, lifestyles and cultural values, and
lifestyle preferences. Therefore the challenge for organisations is to make them, selves accommodating to
diverse groups of people at work place by addressing their different lifestyles, family needs, cultural needs, and
work styles. If diversity is managed properly it can increase creativity and innovation. On the contrary, diversity,
if not managed properly, can result in higher turnover, increased interpersonal conflict and ineffective
communications.

CHANGING DEMOGRAPHIES OF WORKFORCE

Increasing number of womenfolk joining the workforce in industries, more and more of young workers,
increased life expectancy ( resulting in some cases the older workforce still continuing serving industries),
increasing tendency of husband and wife working in same organisations, and in some cases in different
organisations are all changing the demographics of workforce. Such workforce requires to be handled with
circumspection.

CHANGING EMPLOYEE EXPECTATION

Besides the changes in demographics of the workforce, employee expectations and aspirations have changed
from traditional allurement such as job security, good and attractive remuneration, housing facility,
empowerment. Quality of work life etc. Employees expect quality with management. They will emphasis
managing and leading by examples.

EXPANDING GLOBALISATION

Business has crossed the boundaries, and in fact, today it is popularly known as multi national business. This
has made managing men more complex. Globlisation of business process atleast two challenges, namely, fist,
Managers are frequently transferred to other countries different from their own home country, where they come
across several cultural differences among the workforce who have to managed to care and caution., and Second,
even in their own country, managers have to work with superiors, subordinates, and peers, and who were born
and brought up in a different culture.

MOVING TOWARDS TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT

The Challenge before Managers here is, to have to Human Resources Deliver Quality Products and services to
the customers and clients.

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MODELS OF O.B: -

Models are frameworks or possible explanations why do people behave as they do at work. There are so many
models as organisations are very many. Varying results across the organisations are substantially caused by
differences in the models of O.B. Generally, O.B. Models can be divided into 4 categories, namely, 1) The
autocratic model, 2) The custodial, 3) The supportive and 4) The collegial. The following Table shows the
differences among the Models: -

Autocratic Custodial Supportive Collegial

Basis of Model Power Economic Resources Leadership Partnership
Managerial Authority Money Support Team Work
Orientation
Employee Obedience Security and Benefits Job Performance Responsible Behaviour
Orientation
Employee Dependence on Dependence on Participation Self discipline
Psychological Box Organisation
Result
Employee needs Subsistence Security Status and recognition Self Actualisation
met
Performance Minimum Passive Cooperation Awakened drives Moderate Enthusiasm
Result

N.B For managing people, every organisation follows an organisational Behaviour system or framework,
commonly called "model of OB". Four models of OB are the automatic, custodial, suppority, and collegial.
Under autocratic model, managers use their power and authority, where as employee become dependent on
organisations in case of custodial model. Suppority model supports employee and collegial model inculcates
teamwork feeling among employees in the organisation.

EVOLUTION OF O.B.

Although the interest in the welfare of workers is age old, the origin and development of O.B. is traced back to
the beginning of the 19th Century.

The industrial revolution benefited workers in more than one way. It increased wages on the one hand, and
decreased the working hours, on the other. At the same time, two scientists – ROBERT OWEN and ANDREW
URE, pleaded for facilities to be given to the workers. F.W.TAYLOR, inaugurated and revived interest in
human resources at work. He advocated for increase in production by rationalising it.

The significant events like the labour movement, and the great contributions made by the Hawthorne Studies and
Experiments gave a genesis to human relations movement The continued developments in human relation's
approach by 1950s gave birth to O.B.

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LESSON NO. 2

FOUNDATIONS OF INDIVIDUAL BEHAVIOUR

INTRODUCTION

All organisations are composed of individuals. No Organisation exists without individuals. The organisational
performance is largely affected by the way individuals behave at work. That individuals with different
characteristics behave differently in the similar and different situations underlines the need for managers to
understand individuals \human behavior at work., so as to extract the best and maximum contribution from them.

THE INDIVIDUAL AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES '

Individuals differ from each other owing to their varying characteristics that form an individual's individuality.
This is the reason why each individual is considered an island in himself. All individuals are different. This fact
is supported by science. Each one is different from all others just as each of their fingerprints is different. As
regards individual differences at work, the important ones are outlined below:-

1. Depending on different psychological make-ups, people differ in attaching importance to rewards vis - a - vis
kinds of jobs. For e.g., while some people prefer to assume challenging jobs for expressing their abilities;
others may prefer jobs offering job security.
2. People also differ in the type of compensation plan they want Some may prefer to have compensation under
time wage system, while others may like piece wage system as their compensation plan.
3. People differ in the style of leadership they want to work under. While some may like to work under
autocratic leadership style, others may prefer to work under democratic leadership or even laissez-faire
leadership.
4. People also differ in their stamina to bear with job stress. While some prefer to flight, a few may like to work
under extreme stress.
5. People may also differ in their expression to their grievances. Some may be extroverts, while others may turn
out to be introverts.
6. Last, but not the least, people differ in personal characteristics like sex, age, race, education. Perception, and
personality.
7. The individual differences cause differences in individual behavior

HUMAN BEHAVIOUR AND ITS CAUSATION

First, let us understand what the term "behaviour" means. It can be understood as a response to certain stimuli,
which is observable directly or indirectly. Behaviour is observed directly by studying the responses of people at
their work environment. Indirect observation refers to how people describe decision making process and
attitudes verbally.

The human behaviour is caused by certain reasons. Behaviour is the result of interaction between individual
characteristics and the characteristics of the environment in which the behaviour occurs. In other words,
behaviour is a function of both the person and the environment

As stated earlier, each person with a unique combination of characteristics is different from all others. Some of
these characteristics are inherited from birth, and quite a few things are learnt over a period of time. Personal
characteristics remain inside the person whereas environmental ones outside the person these personal and
environmental characteristics serve as the foundations of individual human behaviour.

Now, let us understand how me characteristics of the person and the environment affect behaviour at work.

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PERSONAL BIOGRAPHICAL FACTORS

These include sex age, education, abilities, both mental and physical, and psychological factors Environmental
factors include economic factors, political factors, cultural values, and organisational factors like physical
facilities, organisational structure and design, leadership styles and reward system,

CAUSATION OF HUMAN BEHAVIOUR

The best way to understand human behaviour is to explain it through the system concept, A system consists of
four (4) definite elements, namely, the input, the thruput, the output, and the feedback, Whatever enters in the
system from the environment in the form of information serves as raw materials or input. The thruput is the
evaluation or transformation of input received. Finally, employee's overt behaviour based on the thruput is the
output. Feedback serves the system with alternatives for changes in the sequence or time period of the systems
operations. Even a change in one small factor can bring about relatively large changes in behaviour.

MODELS OF MAN

A study of human behaviour is both rewarding and necessary to managers and managements all over the world.
It is doubtful whether the management can perform its functions successfully without having understanding why
people behave as they do. The fact remains that individual differences among people cause differences in their
behaviour. Based on individual differences among people, individuals are classified into certain models or types.
The following are the important models of man observed in the organisations: -

1. Rational Economic Man

2. Self-Actualising Man
3. Complex Man
4. Social Man
5. Organisation Man.

RATIONAL ECONOMIC MAN

This is the oldest model of man. The basic doctrine of this model is that man strives for earning more money in a
rational manner. Thus- this model assumes that man can be motivated to produce more by providing more
economic incentives as is done in case of piece rate system of reward. But, it is important to mention that man
works following the marginal utility theory. Similarly, the organisation also continues to give employees
incentives till it is receiving matching contribution from them. Beyond that, organisation will not do so, because
it will incur losses.

SELF ACTUALISING MAN

This model is based on the assumption that man is self-motivated and controlled. These assumptions are mostly
based on D.McGREGOR's Theory economic incentives have their limitations in inducing man to work more.
Man works more to satisfy his needs in a hierarchical order as per ABRAHAM MASLOW's Theory. So to say.
man is induced 10 make efforts to reach where he can. Then, the sense of achievement gives him satisfaction.

COMPLEX MAN

The models discussed so far are based on relatively simplistic assumptions of man and his behaviour. These
assumptions say that man behaves according to certain pattern. But, it does not hold true in reality for e.g.,
MASLOW’s Need Hierarchy Theory cannot be uniform or all individuals, but there can be overlapping in needs.
As stated earlier. Behaviour of individuals is caused and individual differences make it unpredictable. Given the

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two persons having the same needs, still they may behave differently because the variable that determine human
behaviour are themselves unpredictable. Thus, human being is quite complex and so is his behaviour. Therefore,
managers need to take clues for their managerial actions realising that no single action can be utilized
successfully in all situations, but depending upon complexities of variables affecting human behaviour.

SOCIAL MAN

This concept is based on the assumption that man being a part of society is influenced and motivated by social
variables, according to this model, man is induced more by his desire to maintain his social relationships and tips
than economic motives. Added to this man's more responsiveness to his •group pressure and sanction- In fact,
the human relation's approach to management beginning from the famous HAWTHORNE STUDIES is also
based on the concept of social man. Therefore, while dealing with individuals in organisations, managers need to
be concerned mainly with people's feelings about their Belongingness to their groups and society.

ORGANBATION MAN

This concept is attributed to WHYTE. In fact, the organisation man is a extension of social man. Organisation
man assumes that man attaches high importance to the loyalty to his organisation and cordial relationship with
his coworkers. Thus, this concept sacrifices individuality for the sake of organisation. The reason being
organisation itself takes care of individual interest. Its implication for management is that management should
design its various functions suitable to satisfy the organisational needs.

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LESSON NO. 3

PERCEPTION

NOTABLE POINTS

1. Perception is a cognitive process of seeing, receiving, selecting, organising, interpreting and giving meaning
to the environment around us.
2. Sensation differs from perception.
3. Sensation and perception are not one and the same. In a simple language, sensation may be described as the
response of a physical sensory organ to a stimulus. Our physical senses i.e., vision, hearing touch, smell, and
taste are continuously bombarded by numerous stimuli that are both inside and outside of our body. The
reactions of our eye to colour ear to sound nose to odour, and so on are examples of our every day sensation.
Sensation activates the functioning of the physical sensory organ itself. Therefore, one can say that sensation
precedes perception, m this way, sensation serves as a raw input to be processed so as to make sense out of
them to perceive the environment or stimuli around us.
4. Perception is much more than sensation. Perception depends upon the sensory raw data, yet it involves the
cognitive process that includes filtering, modifying or even changing these sensation raw data to make sense
out of them. In other words, the perceptual process adds to or and subtracts from the sensory world,

THE PERCEPTUAL PROCESS

It consists of the following stages:-

1. RECEIVING STIMULI

The perception process begins with the reception of stimuli, which will be received from various sources.
Through the sensory organs, we see things, hear sound, nose smells, tongue tastes, and touch things. In this
way, the reception of stimuli is a physiological aspect of the perception process. Stimuli may be external to
us such as sound waves or inside of us such as energy generation by muscles.

2. SELECTION OF STIMULI

People arc bombarded by a number of stimuli everyday. They cannot absorb or assimilate what they observe
or receive them from the environment all at a time. Hence, they select some stimuli for further processing to
attach meaning to them while the rest are screened. Selection of stimuli is not made at random, but
depending on the two types of factors, namely, external factors, and the internal factors. Normally, people
selectively perceive objects or things, which interest them most in a particular situation and avoid those for
which they are ineffective. This is also called as the SELECTIVE PERCEPTION.

3. ORGANISATION OF STIMULI

Having selected the stimuli or data, these need to be organised in some form so as to assign some meaning
to them. Thus, organising the bits of information in to a meaningful whole is called "ORGANISATION".
There are three ways by which the selected data i.e., inputs are organised. They are 1) Grouping, 2)Closure,
and 3) Simplification. Grouping is based on similarity principal. For e.g.. All the workers having similarity
in certain aspects may be perceived to have similar opinion about their supervisor or boss. The tendency to
form a complete meaning from an incomplete one is known as closure.As regards simplification, when
people find themselves overloaded with information they try to simplify it to make it more meaningful and

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4. INTERPRETATION

The data collected and organised remain meaningless for the perceiver till these are assigned meanings.
Assigning meanings to data is called interpretation. Thus, interpretation of data forms one of the most
important elements in the entire perceptual process. Strictly speaking, data collected and organised do not
make any sense without interpretation. Several factors influence interpretation. The most important ones are
halo effect, attribution, stereotyping, personality, situation, person perceived etc.

FACTORS AFFECTING PERCEPTION

Factors that influence perception relate to the perceiver, perceived, and situation. All these factors are of two
kinds -1) Internal or endogenous factors, and 2) External or Exogenous factors. These are discussed in some
detail below.

1. INTERNAL FACTORS

These factors reside in the person concerned. They include a person's needs, desires, personality, and experience.

2. EXTERNAL FACTORS

These factors relate to what is being perceived and the situation. These are size, intensity, frequency, and status
etc.,

IMPROVING PERCEPTION

Perception can be improved b y making various attempts. Following are the important ones that can help
improve one's perception.

1. PERCEIVING ONESELF ACCURATELY

That is to say, one should improve to know more about oneself. Frequent interactions with peers, colleagues,
free, frank and open communication with others and mutual trust are some commonly adopted practices for
perceiving more accurately.

2. IMPROVING ONE'S SELF CONCEPT

When people successfully accomplish what they want, it develops a sense of self-esteem. It also indicates that
correct perception about on self helps perceive others also more accurately.

3. HAVING POSITIVE ATTITUDE

Positive attitude makes one's perception positive or more accurate. Hence, the managers need to overcome
their personal bias, get rid of any negative feelings about others.

4. BE EMPATHET1C

Empathy means to be able to see a situation as it is perceived by other people. In a way, it is like putting your
feet in another's shoes. Looking at a problem from other's point of view enables the person to perceive the
other side of the problem.

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5. AVOIDINGPERCEPTUAL DISTORTION

Some factors like the halo effect, stereotyping, attribution etc distort a person's perception about things or
problems. Therefore, sincere and continuous efforts should be made to guard oneself against such biases.

6. COMMUNICATING OPENLY

Experience suggests that sometimes perception gets distorted due to communication gap and inadequate
communication. In such case, effective communication needs to be developed to ensure that the true and right
message reaches the right place at the right time. This will enable to know the problem in a better perspective,
which in turn will improve a person's perception about the problem.

PERCEPTION AND ITS APPLICATION IN ORGANISATIONS

The perception, in many cases, has important effect on organisations. A few of these are obvious, and the same
is discussed below: -

1. EMPLOYMENT INTERVIEW

Different interviewers try to see different things in the same candidate differently, and thus arrive at different
perceptions. Who one thinks is a good candidate, the candidate can be seen perceived by another interviewer as no
good for the job. Interviewers form early Impressions about the candidate, which ultimately weighs more in the
selection. Therefore, interviewers must be given adequate training in the skills of interviewing.

2. PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

Assessment of an employee's performance very much depends on the perception of the evaluator about the
employee, m practice, superior officers and executives closely tie an employee's future to his performance and
its appraisal. Promotions pay rises, and continuation of job is the most obvious and common outcome of the
employee's performance. Performance Appraisal is both objective and subjective. It becomes objective when
performance can be sufficiently quantified. For e.g., a salesman's performance can be assessed based S on
how many rupees of sales he generated in his territory during a given period of time. However, many
employees jobs are evaluated subjectively. Therefore, these become judgmental. Judgement will become
susceptible to distortion. It might affect the performance appraisal process.

3. PERFORMANCE EXPECTATION

New employees during their selection process acquire a set of expectations booth about the organisation and
about the job. In case there is a big gap between the expectations and realities, there will be problems of
increased alienation of employee, absenteeism, and even turnover.

4. EMPLOYEE EFFORT

Sin many organisations, the level of an employee's performance is given high importance. Hence, an
employee's future in an organisation depends upon his effort made for achieving the organisational goals.
However, assessment of an individual's performance is subjective judgement and thus, susceptible to
perceptual distortions and bias also.

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5. EMPLOYEE LOYALTY

While assessing employees the managers also make another important decision whether the employee are
loyal to the organization. Like effort, assessment of loyalty is also a subjective judgement susceptible to
perceptual distortions and bias. As an example an employee looking for greener pastures outside the
organisation may be labeled as disloyal to the organisation. As a resultant behaviour, the organisation may cut
his future advancement opportunities.

DISTORTION IN PERCEPTION

(Students are required to go through the notes in the APPENDIX)

APPENDIX

Perception is the process that individual use to require and make sense out of information from the
environment. The process is complex and involves three main stages. The first stage is selecting the filtering of
stimuli that encounter so that only certain information receives our attention. For example, suppose that a
manager taking over a new unit has heard a rumor that a particular individual in the unit has a short temper. If
the manager is not careful, this piece of information may cause the manager to pay particular attention to
situations in which the person is impatient or angry.

The second stage of title perceptual process is organizing, the patterning of information from the selection stage.
Slowly pronounce each of the following (bur words:2)

M-A-C-T-A-V-I-S-H

M-A-C-D-O-N-A-L-D

M-A-C-B-E-T-H

M-A-C-H-I-N-E-R-Y

Like many people, you may have pronounced the last word as "MacHinery." This happens because the previous
pattern leads us to expect another word with the same type of pronunciation. This exercise illustrates an
interesting characteristic of perception: the tendency to organize information into the patterns that we expect to
perceive. In the example of the individual rumored to have a short temper, the manager may begin to organize
the selectively perceived behavior into a pattern of incidents in which the individual was angry.

The third stage is interpreting, attaching meaning to the information that we have selected and organized. In our
example, the manager may, over time, begin to interpret (perhaps unfairly) the organized information as
indicating that the person does, indeed, have a short temper.

The perceptions of individuals are affected by a variety of factors such as experiences, needs, personality,
culture, and education. As a result, it is very likely that individuals will differ in their perceptions of the very
same situations and messages. Several common tendencies to distort perceptions are particularly applicable to
managerial communication and interactions. These tendencies are stereotyping, the halo effect, projection, and
perceptual defense. Awareness of these perceptual tendencies can help managers avoid the misunderstandings
that such distortions often create.

STEREOTYPING Stereotyping is the tendency to attribute characteristics to an individual on the basis of an

assessment of the group to which the individual belongs. When a manager engages in stereotyping, two steps occur.

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First, the manager categorizes the individual as belonging to a group whose members are perceived as sharing certain
common characteristics. Second, the manager uses those perceived common characteristics to draw conclusions about
the characteristics of the individual, rather than acquiring information about the person's characteristics more directly.

Stereotyping leads to problems when the generalizations do not apply or do not apply equally to all members of
the group or when people try to generalize about less specifically related characteristics. In such situations,
managers may communicate inappropriate expectations. For example, at American Medical International, Inc., a
publicly owned hospital company based in Beverly Hills, California, the precedent and chief operating officer,
Gene Burleson ran into communication difficulties because of Stereotyping. Burleson was addressing a meeting
of several hundred employees when one asked why the company did not have any women directors or top
executive. Observes reported that Burleson’s response implied that women cannot deal with the stress of the
executive suite. His reply offended many members of the audience and caused the incident to be reported in The
Wall Street journal. Burleson later "admitted he gave a lame and a stupid answer" to the question

HALO EFFECT The halo effect is the tendency to use a general impression based on one or a few
characteristics of an individual to judge other characteristics of that same individual. For example, a manager
may use a general impression based on one thing a worker does, such as compiling a well-done or poorly
prepared report, 10 judge the worker's ability in other areas of work, such as handling customers. To avoid the
halo effect, interviewers and managers need to make special efforts to collect enough data to make reasonable
judgments in all the specific areas that they are trying to evaluate.

PROJECTION Projection is the tendency of an individual to assume that others share his or her thoughts,
feelings, and characteristics. Unfortunately, projection can encourage managers to engage in one-way
communication because they assume that they know how their employees feet on various issues. Engaging in
two-way communication to learn how other individuals really do feel about various issues can help managers
avoid the ill effects of projection.

PERCEPTUAL DEFENSE Perceptual defense is the tendency to block out or distort information that one
finds threatening or that challenges one's beliefs. As a result, managers or workers may not be very receptive to
certain types of information. This may lead to the "shoot the bearer of bad news' syndrome, in which a person
tends to "behead" the bearer of bad news even though the bearer was not the cause of the problem. Thus some
managers get angry at employees who provide information about serious problems thai cannot be ignored, even
though the manager needs to know about them.

Attribution Processes

One aid to understanding how perceptions ultimately influence managerial communication and interpersonal
processes is attribution theory. Attribution theory attempts to explain how individuals make judgments or
attributions about the causes of another's or their own behavior.25 Such judgments often form the basis for
subsequent actions. According to the theory, we make causal judgments that are either dispositional (attributed
to internal causes, such as personality traits or a person's own efforts) or situational (attributed to external causes,
such as equipment or luck). For example, if Jane does not complete a work assignment on time, should we
attribute it to an internal factor like lack of effort or ability, or should we decide some work context or other
external issue is to blame? To make such judgments we consider consensus (the degree to which the behavior is
similar to the way most people act in a given situation), consistency (the degree to which an individual behaves
the same way' in this or a similar situation at other times), and distinctiveness (the degree to which an individual
behaves differently in other situations). Thus if other staff member completed the same assignment on time, Jane
has had trouble completing the same assignment on time in the past, and she has missed deadlines on several
other types of assignments, we would make a probably make a dispositional judgement why the assignment was
late. On the other hand, if others also were late in completing the assignment, Jane normally complete such

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assignments by the deadlines, we are likely to attribute the difficulty to situational factors. The attributions we
make are likely to influence how we handle resolving the late assignment.

In making causal judgments, managers need to be particularly aware of lie fundamental attribution error, the
tendency to underestimate the importance of situational influences and to overestimate the importance of
dispositional influences in explaining behavior. We are particularly likely to make this error when we are
attempting to explain the behavior of others. Moreover, when here are successes and failures involved, we are
likely to succumb to the self serving bias. The self-serving bias is the tendency to perceive oneself as responsible
for successes and others as responsible for failures. b This tendency sets lie stage for serious communication
problems between managers and their subordinates. For instance, a manager may attribute subordinates'
successes to her or his own effective leadership but conclude that failures are due to the subordinates'
shortcomings. Subordinates, on the other hand, tend to see successes as resulting from their own hard work and
ability and to view failures as stemming from bad luck or factors in the work environment, including areas
controlled by their supervisor.

**********************

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 15

LESSON NO. 4

PERSONALITY

Q. 7.1. Define the term personality. Discuss the various determinants of Individual personality.

OR

"Personality is an organized whole without which an individual would have no meaning." comment.

OR

"Personality essentially deals with the variations in thought and behaviour that differentiate one person from
another." Elucidate this statement.

OR
"People are similar yet they are different." comment.

Personality: The term personality has been derived from Latin word 'per sonnare’, which means to speak
through. Personality is traditionally refers to how people influence others through their external appearances
(actions) more precisely. The term personality can be defined as.

Personality is a pattern of stable slates and characteristics of a person that influences his behaviour toward goal
achievement. Each person has a unique ways of protecting these states."

"Personality is a broad amorphous designation relating to fundamental approaches of persons to others and
themselves. To most psychologists the term refers to the study of characteristic traits of an individual,
relationship between these trails and the way in which a person adjusts to other people and situations."

"Personality is the sum total of ways in which an individual reacts and interacts with others. This is most often
described in terms of measurable personality traits that a person exhibits"

"Personality is the dynamic organisation within the individual of those psychological systems that determine his
unique adjustments to his environment.

Academician define personality as.

(a) External appearance and behaviour

(b) The inner awareness of the self as a permanent organising force, and
(c) The particular organisation of measurable traits, both inner and outer.

Determinants of Individual Personality: People are very complex. They have different abilities and interests.
Most failures on job, however, are not attributable to a person's amount of intelligence alone but also to certain
personality characteristics. The personality is influenced by four major factors as:

(a) Cultural factors

(b) Family and social factors

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(c) Situational factors

(d) Biological factors.

(a) Cultural factors: Culture largely determines what a person is and what a person will learn. The culture with
in a person is brought up, is very important determinant of behaviour of a person. Culture is the complex of
these beliefs, values and techniques/or dealing with the environment which are shared among contemporaries
and transmitted by one generation to the next. Culture required both conformity and acceptance from its
members. According to Mussen, each culture expects and trails its members to behave in the ways that are
acceptable to the group. Inspite of the importance of the culture on personality, researchers are unable to
establish linear relationship between these two concepts 'personality and culture'.

(b) Family & Social Factors: Family and social factors are important in shaping personality of an individual.
The impact of these factors on personality can be understood by socialization process and identification process.

Socialization Process: The contribution of family and social group in combination with the culture is known as
socialization. It initially starts with the contact with the mother and later on the others members of the family
(father, brother, sister, co- relatives) & the social group plays influential role in shaping an individual's
personality.

Identification Process: Identification starts when a person begins to identify himself with some other members
of the family. Normally child tries to behave as father or mother. He tries to emulate certain actions of his
parents.

Apart from socialization & identification processes, the personality of an individual is influenced by the home
environment. There is a substantial evidence to indicate that the overall environment at home is created by
parents is critical to personality development.

Family background apart, social class also influences a person's perception, perception of self and others, and
perception of work, authority and money etc.

(c) Situational Factors: The effect of environment is quite strong. Knowledge, skill and language are acquired
and represent important modifications of the behaviour. Learned modification in behaviour are not passed on to
the children, they must be acquired by them through their own personal experience, through interaction with the
environment According to Milgram situation exerts an important press on the individual. It exercises constraints
and may provide push. hi certain circumstances it is not so much the kind of situation in which he is placed, that
determine his actions. He demonstrated that situation may potentially have a very big impact on the behavioral
expression of personality.

(d) Biological Factors: These can be discussed into three broad head:

(i) Physical features

(ii) Brain
(iii) Heredity

(i) Physical Features: Physical stature is the most important factor that contributes to personality. An
individual's external appearance is proved to be having a tremendous effect on his personality. For instance, the
fact that person is short or tall, fat or skinny, handsome or ugly, black or whitish will undoubtedly influence the
person's effect on others and in turn, will affect the self concept.

(ii) Brain: It is another biological factor that influence the personality. Research in this field have given
indication that better understanding of human personality and behaviour might come from the study of the brain.

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(iii) Heredity : Certain characteristics primarily physical in nature are inherited from one's parents, transmitted
by genes in the chromosomes contributed by each parent The heredity plays an important role in one's
personality. The importance of heredity varies from one personality trait to another. For instance, heredity is
generally more important in determining a person's temperament than values and ideas.

Q. 7.2. Can personality be measured ? If yes then discuss the various techniques and tests by which personality
can be measured.

Measurement of Personality : Psychologists have devised a number of tests to measure the various aspects of
personality, these are :

(1) Projective Techniques

(2) Situational Tests
(3) Personality Inventories.

(1)'Projective Techniques: These techniques are based on assumptions that responses to unstructured stimuli
are likely to indicate an individual's underlying motives, attitudes and aspirations. These include ink blots,
incomplete sentences, ambiguous pictures, etc. It is called projective techniques because the individual attributes
his own traits or feelings to other persons or to inanimate objects. They reveal the crucial aspects of personality.
The two widely used projective tests are.

(a) Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

(b) Rorschach Test

(a) Thematic Apperception Test: It assumes that the meaning which an individual sees. in a picture indicates
something of his past experience, feelings, attitudes and motives. Apperceiving relates to perception of a
situation largely in terms of past experience rather than the immediate present Here. the individual is exposed to
ambiguous pictures and requested to make up a story for each. The themes in these stories may involve conflict,
affection, fear, contentment or achievements.

(b) Rorschach Test: It involves ten cards containing ink blots. These ink blots are shown to the individual at a
lime, in a prescribed way, with a request to state whatever he sees in them or whatever comes to their mind in
response to them. It is assumed that individual tends to project the predominating aspects of his personality
through these cards.

For example, One response to the card made by an adolescent girl whose parents were separated was

Fig. A Rorschach type ink-bloc

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 18

"This looks like a person here and another {here and they are carrying something-they are fighting over the same
thing they are both trying to pull it towards themselves."

(2) Situational Tests: Involves to study the individual in daily situations when he is interacting with others,
solving a problem or exploring a new environment. The purpose of this study is to observe the individual in a
context, which is similar to the one for which he is under review. This facilitates the prediction as to how he will
reget in a specific situation.

When it is not possible to arrange the situation, the individuals can be observed in their daily environment
consciously or at certain times in a day. For example, if the objective is to assess their interpersonal skills, the
examiner will observe them when they are working with other persons.

3. Personality Inventories : These inventories are printed forms containing questions, adjectives or statements
about human behaviour. They can be used to evaluate both normal and psychiatric characteristics. The
individual is required to indicate his reactions to different items. The inventories are scored and assessed in
terms of percentiles or statistical norms. Initially, they involve merely single trait such as introversion-
extroversion, subsequently, they have been replaced by multiple trait inventories. Relatively the inventories are
less time consuming and easy to administer however, in certain cases, the individuals can give false impression
about themselves if they desire to do so.

Q. 7.3. Explain the various theories of personality. Which of them is convincing to you and why ?

Theories of Personality: Our time researchers have developed a number of personality theories. Personality
theories can be grouped with five categories.

(a) Trait theory

(b) Freud theory
(c) Adler and Jung theories
(d) Social learning theories
(e) Holistic theories.

(a) Trait Theory : A personality trait can be defined as "an enduring attribute of a person that appears
constantly in a variety of situations."

(i) Individual can be described in terms of construction of traits such as affiliation, achievement, anxiety,
aggression and dependency.
(ii) Trait distinguish one personality from another.
(iii) The traits and the amount of each trait that a person has is assumed to be stable fairly and the differences in
personality and behaviour between two individuals is assumed to be the result of the differences in the
amount of each that each person has.

Thousands of words in English language refer to the characteristics of behaviour of traits. But the fundamental
question is how to reduce them to small number of meaningful nails. One technique is the factor analysis. It is a
complex statistical technique for reducing large number of personality traits into small number of independent
traits. The technique has the advantage of reducing several hundred test responses. Norman provided the
different descriptive objective pairs of words for the same kind to trait (table )

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 19

Trait Dimension Descriptive Objective Pairs

Extroversion Talkative--- Silent
Open--- Secretive
Adventures—Cautions
Agreeableness Good natured--- Irritable
Gentle--- Headstrong
Cooperative--- Negativist
Conscientions ness Tidy--- Careless
Responsible--- Undependable
Preserving --- Quitting
Emotional Stability Calm---Anxious
Poised--- Nervous
Not Hypochodriacal --- Hypochodriacal
Culture Artistically Sensitive ---Artistically insensitive
Refined --- Boorish
Intellectual--- Unreflective

(b) Freud Theory : Freud contributed significantly towards the understanding of human behaviour through his
concept of unconsciousness. According to freud, human mind is composed of three elements (i) the preconscious
(ii) the conscious and (iii) the unconscious. The items in the mind that can be recognized only through freud
association method are preconscious. The conscions element is concerned with thoughts, feelings, beliefs and
desires that we can learn about ourselves through introinspection. The unconscious is basically concerned with
ideas and wishes that can not be learned through introinspection but can be determined from hypnotism, dreams
and Freidian Therapecific Techniques. According to Freud, the conscious is guided by a reasoned reality
principle and the unconscious is guided by the famous hedonist principle of pleasure. Freud developed an
organisation of personality consisting of three structures within the human mine-the id, the ego and the
superego. Their pans of the mind are primarily responsible for originating human actions and reactions and
modifications.

Id: Is the original and the most basic system of human personality. It consists of everything psychologically that
is inherited and present at the time of the birth. At the base of the Freudian theory lies the id that is primitive,
instinctual and governed by the principles of greedy and pleasure. Id represents a storehouse of all instincts,
containing in its dark depths all wishes, desires and unconsciously direct and determine our behaviour. Id is
largely childish, irrational, never satisfied, demanding and destructive of others. Id. is the foundation upon which
all other parts of the personality are erected.

Ego: As an individual learns to separate the unreality from reality in childhood, the ego develops. The ego is the
reality oriented pan in thinking, it is largely practical and works in an executive capacity. Ego is rational and
logical and in essence it is the conscious mediator between the realities of the world and the id's demand. It
constantly work to keep a healthy psychological balance between id's impulsive demands and super ego's
restrictive guidance. Ego regulates and integrates the inner motives and conflicting demands, defends the person
by using defense mechanisms and master's the person's goals. The ego develops by creating an effective
perceptual mechanism that enables a person to adjust to the reality principle viz., tolerance of tension,
expectation of punishment, awareness of things and associated inhibitions of actions. The most important
characteristics of ego is that it has the ability to distinguish between mental images and actual sources of tension
release, and it responds to the real sources of tension education. If the ego succeeds, the individual is content,
otherwise he will be dissatisfied and have a menial stress, ambivalence and burn out.

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 20
Super ego: It represents noblest thoughts, ideals, feelings that are acquired by a person from his parents,
teachers, friends, religion, organisation and colleagues etc. As a child grows and absorbs parental and cultural
altitudes and values, he develops a super ego. It is also labeled as 'ago-ideal' that tells the individual what is

acceptable. The primary concern of super ego is to determine whether the action proposed by ego is the right or
wrong so that the individual acts in accordance with the values and standards of the society. If people violate the
prohibitions of super ego they may feel guilty.

In Freudian theory of personality, the instinctual drives of id and super ego are constantly battling each other and
seeking to breakout of bonds of reason the ego. As a person becomes torn between this conflict, a friction
develops and results in anxiety, an ominous feeling that all is not well. Anxiety creates tension and as such as a
person resorts 10 defensive mechanism in order to reduce tension.

Adler and Jung theory : Adler emphasized the thrust for superiority as a drive which motivates the individual.
He developed the concepts of compensation and the inferiority complex based on the drive for power.
Individuals who are weak in one area of work tend to excel in another area of work. Adler stressed social
relationships instead of innate or biological factors. This as well as his stress on individual uniqueness, style of
life and the creative self bring him close to modern theorists who consider themselves as psychoanalytic in
approach.

Jung developed analytical psychology stressing the unconscious aspect of psychoanalysis. He postulated (he
collective unconsciousness. According to him, personality is based on predisposing patterns borrowed by the
individual from his ancestors. His collective unconscious extends back through previous generations to the dawn
of history. It is his notion of heredity transference of acquired features, which is the least acceptable to modem
theorists. Despite in stress in the past Jung asserted that the operation of an individual's personality is as much
future oriented as rooted in the past. To the extent he asserted that the individual was not bound to the past but
could effectively build his future was a dynamic optimist.

(c) Social learning theory : The theory considers the situation as an important determinant of behaviour as
against trait theories which assume that personality is characterized by the enduring traits of an individual.
According to this theory, an individual's action in a given situation, individual 's appraisal of the situation and
post enforcement to behaviour is some what similar situations. When the situation they encounter are relatively
Stable, individual's behaviour will be more or less consistent.

The main focus of the learning approach is on the patterns of behaviour the individual learns in coping with
environment. Some behaviour patterns are learned or acquired through direct experience. Responses can also be
acquired or learned without direct reinforcement. Social learning theorists believe that reinforcement is not
necessary for learning but they accept the view (hat reinforcement facilitates learning by focussing attention.
According to social learning school, much of the human learning is vicarious or observational.

Reinforcement though not necessary for learning is very crucial for the performance of learned behaviour. The
assumption of this theory is that people behave in the ways likely to produce reinforcement. An individual's
repertoire of learned behaviors is extensive; the particular action chosen for specific situation depends upon me
expected outcome. The reinforcement that controls the expression of learned behaviour may be

(a) Direct: Refers to the social approval or disapproval or alleviation of aversive conditions and other tangible
rewards.
(b) Vicarious : Refers to observation of some one else receiving reward or punishment for similar behaviour.
(c) Self-administered: Refers to evaluation of one's own performance with self praise or reproach.

Of all these, self administered reinforcement theory plays a vital role in social learning theory.

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 21

(b) Holistic Theories : Kolasa has grouped several theorists under a common title-Holistic theorists. They
include holistic, organismic and field theorists who stress on the totality and inter relatedness of all kinds of

human behaviour. In spite of the common aspect of emphases on the individual as a whole, they differ in many
ways.

Maslow has focused on the concept of needs derived from the positive and optimistic dimensions of the
individual's total functioning He has structured several levels of needs i.e. the hierarchy of needs. His concept of
self actualization need is of great significance. His concept of hierarchy of needs has been greatly relied upon to
understand human behaviour in organisational settings.

Rogers visualizes personality in terms of the organism (or of the whole individual) functioning in a phenomenal
field (or the entire experience). The patterns of perceptions in this field provide the basis for me self which seeks
to become consistent with itself and its environment If this is not possible for any reason the organism is
exposed to threats . Based on his approach a new school of thought called phenomenology has developed . This
viewpoint assumes that the reality for the individual consists of what he perceives in his field or experiences
instead of things as they factually are.

Herzberg approach considers man in his two aspects. One aspect of the man is 'Adam' or the animal nature
which aims to avoid the pain of adjustment to the environment, which the other aspect is Abraham which
motivates him to achieve and add to his existence the Adam aspect of man possesses hygiene needs which are
satiated through salary, working conditions and fringe benefits. The Abraham aspect of man involves needs
which are motivators including those related to psychological growth of the individual in work settings, job
enlargement, etc.

According to Lewin (field theorists) Lewin interprets Lumen behaviors and depicts the individuals personality in
a perceptual field in physical units. The field has been considered on the psychological life space of the
individual with forces attracting or diverting him in respect of a goal.

Festinger has postulated cognitive dissonance as a motivating condition in the individual. As soon as two
conditions of an individual are inconsistent with each other, he tends to change one of them to adhere to the
other minimising the dissonance.

Q. 7.4. Write a brief note on personality traits.

Personality Traits : Personality traits are the enduring characteristics

that describe an individual's behaviour. The early work in the structure of personality revolved around attempts
to identify and level enduring characteristics that describe an individual's behaviour. Popular characteristics
include shy, aggressive, submissive, lazy, ambitions, loyal and timid. Efforts to isolate traits have been hindered
because there are so many of them. In one study, 17,953 individual traits were identified. One researcher isolated
171 traits but concluded that they were superficial and lacking in descriptive power. Then he reduced these set of
traits in sixteen set of traits (Table 7.2). These sixteen traits have been found to be generally steady and constant
source of behaviour, allowing prediction of an individual's behaviour in specific situations by weighting the
characteristics for their situational relevance.

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 22

PRIMARY TRAITS:

1. Reserved vs. Outgoing

2. Less intelligent vs. More intelligent
3. Affected by feelings vs. Emotionally stable
4. Submissive vs. Dominant
5. Serious vs. Hapy-go-lucky
6. Expedient vs. Conscientious
7. Timid vs. Venturesome
8. Tough-minded vs. Sensitive
9. Trusting vs. Suspicious
10. Practical vs. Imaginative
11. Forthright vs. Shrewd
12. Self-assured vs. Apprehensive
13. Conservative vs. Experimenting
14. Group-dependent vs. Self-sufficient
15. Uncontrolled vs. Controlled
16. Relaxed vs. Tense

Traits can additionally be grouped to form personality types. Instead of looking at specific characteristics, we
can group these qualities that go together into a single category. For example, ambition and aggression tend to be
highly correlated. Efforts to reduce the number of traits into common groups tend to isolate introversion
extroversion and something approximating high anxiety and extroversion would be tense, excitable, unstable,
warm, sociable and dependent.
High anxiety Low anxiety

Tense, excitable, unstable Composed, confident, trustful,

warm, sociable,Extrover
and adaptable, warm, sociable and
dependent dependent
Tense, excitable, unstable Composed, confident, trustful,
cold, and sky Introvert adaptable, calm, cold, and sky

Four Types Thesis

As the trails ignore situational contents, they are not contingent oriented and therefore largely ignore the
dynamic interchange that occurs between a person's personality and his environment. As a result, personality
trails tend to be more valuable as predictors with individuals who hold a trait at its extreme. We might be able to
predict some common behaviours among extreme extroverts or individuals who are highly anxious. But since
the majority of people are in the vast middle range on most trait characteristics, personality traits must be
considered in their situational context.

THE ABILITY –JOB FIT (PERSONALITY-JOB FIT)

This explains and predicts the behaviour of people at work. Jobs make deferring demands on people and that
people differ in the abilities they possess. Employee performance, therefore, is enhanced when there is a high
ability-job fit. for adequate job performance depend on the ability requirements of the job. So, for example,

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 23
airline pilots need strong spatial-visualization abilities; beach lifeguards need both strong spatial visualization
abilities and body coordination; senior executives need verbal abilities; high-rise construction workers need
balance; and journalists with weak reasoning abilities would likely have difficulty meeting minimum job

performance standards. Directing attention at only the employee's abilities or the ability requirements of the job
ignores that employee performance depends on the interaction of the two.

What predictions can we make when the fit is poor? As alluded to previously, if employees lack the required
abilities, they are likely to fail. If you are hired as a word processor and you can't meet the job's basic keyboard
typing requirements, your performance is going to be poor irrespective of your positive attitude or your high
level of motivation. When the ability-job fit is out of sync because the employee has abilities that far exceed the
requirements of the job, our predictions would be very different. Job performance is likely to be adequate, but
there will be organizational inefficiencies and possible declines in employee satisfaction. Given that pay tends to
reflect the highest skill level that employees possess, if an employee's abilities far exceed that necessary to do
the job, management will be paying more than it needs to. Abilities significantly above those required can also
reduce the employee's job satisfaction when the employee’s desire to use his or abilities is particularly strong
and is frustrated by the limitation of the job.

MATCHING PERSONALITY AND JOBS

Obviously, individual personalities differ. So, too, do jobs. Following this logic, efforts have been made to
match the proper personalities with the proper jobs. The most researched personality job-fit theory is the six-
personality-types model. This model states that an employee's satisfaction with and propensity to leave his or her
job

Holland's Typology of Personality and Sample Occupations

Type Personality Characteristics Sample Occupations
Realistic: Prefers physical activities Shy, genuine, persistent, stable, Mechanical, drill press operator,
that require skill, strength and conforming, Practical assemblyline worker , farmer
coordination
Investigative: Prefers activities Analytical, original, Curious Biologist, economist, Mathematician,
Involving thinking , organising and ,independent news reporter
understanding.
Social: Prefers activities that involve Sociable, friendly, cooperative, Social worker, teacher, counselor,
helping and developing others understanding clinical psychologist
Conventional: Prefers rule- Conforming, efficient, practical, Accountant , corporate Manager, bank
regulated, orderly and nambiguous unimaginative , inflexible teller, File clerk
activities
Enterprising : prefers verbal Self-confident, ambitious, Lawyer, real-estate Agent, public
activities where there are energetic, domineering Business relations specialist, small
opportunities to influence other and manager
attain power
Artistic: Prefers ambiguous and Imaginative, disorderly, idealistic , Painter, musician, writer, Interior
unsystematic activities that allow emotional, practical decorator
creative expression

Depend on the degree to which the individual’s personality matches his or her occupational environment . Six
major personality types have been identified . They are listed in Exhibit 3-2, along with their compatible
occupations.

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 24

**************************

LESSON NO. 5

ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR MODIFICATION

Organizational behaviour modification (referred to as OBMod, for short) developed separately from goal-setting,
and has different explanations for behaviour. Nevertheless, in recent years links have developed between the two
that make them a powerful combination.

In the chapter on personality we looked at internal, dispositional approaches to understanding behaviour.

Organizational behaviour modification, on the other hand, takes a situational, or external, approach. It
Concentrates on behaviour and the events in the environment that encourage or discourage such behaviour,
rather than on attitudes or personality.

We have already dealt, in Chapter 2, with the links between personality and behaviour, but what of attitudes?
Once again, the assumption underlying the internal, dispositional approach is that attitudes cause behaviour. This
assumption, as we have seen, is questionable. There is considerable evidence to show that there is a fairly weak
relationship between attitudes and behaviour. Indeed, attitudes often express how we think we would like to see
ourselves behaving than rather how we actually behave. For example, attitude surveys suggest that the general
public is against the invasion of privacy by the press. However, newspaper editors have firm evidence that the
pictures and stories resulting from such invasions increase sales. Alistair Cooke has reported that over 70 per
cent of the American public thought that television coverage of the pre-trial of the American hero 0. J. Simpson
was undesirable. But over 90 per cent had watched

It also appears that the assumption that attitudes cause behaviour is only part of the picture. There is evidence
from psychological research to suggest that behaviour can influence the formation and change of attitudes. The
attitude/behaviour relationship is interactive. For example, before the wearing of seat-belts was made
compulsory, the UK government spent considerable sums of money trying to change the public's attitude to seat-
belt wearing. Despite many different publicity campaigns the level of seat-belt usage remained depressingly low.
Upon the introduction of legislation making seat-belt wearing compulsory, with financial and other penalties for
non-compliance, usage leapt to almost 100 per cent. Although we have no direct evidence, we suspect that this
change in behaviour also produced a change in attitude toward seat-belt usage. The same may be true for
drinking and driving.

There are a number of possible explanations of why the way we behave should influence our attitudes, but
perhaps the most appealing involves the concept of consistency. We like to be consistent and keep our
behaviours and attitudes in line with each other. If we behave in a particular way we feel that this must be a
representation of our attitudes.

The OBMod approach, therefore, ignores attitudes and personality and concentrates solely upon observable
behaviour.

Exercise:
Before reading further, you should turn to Appendix 4 and attempt the case study on absenteeism.

The basic postulate of OBMod can be stated very simply - so simply that some may say it is just applied
common sense. It is that behaviour is determined by its consequences. In other words, people learn to behave in
ways that produce rewards, and avoid behaving in ways that produce either no rewards or even punishment.
Inevitably, managers will already be using some of the techniques that will be discussed, but without being
aware of their theoretical background. By providing a theoretical structure, we will enable managers to make

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more effective use of the techniques. OBMod is based on the work of psychologists who studied learning, or
to use the technical term, conditioning. In particular, the names most commonly associated with the theory are

those of Thomdike and, perhaps most commonly, Skinner. Skinner takes the approach that since we cannot
observe mental states such I as attitudes and personality traits, we should concern ourselves only with observable
behaviour. If we extend this to the work situation, what managers should be concerned with is not employees'
attitudes, but how they behave (i.e. what they do). It is often difficult to get managers to talk only of behaviour.
They often, quite understandably,: slip into talking about personalities and attitudes. But employees' attitudes
should not be the manager's concern, as long as they are behaving correctly. Organizations do not pay people for
the attitudes, they hold, but for their behaviour. As such, we are perfectly justified in asking someone to behave
differently. We are not justified in trying to change their personality or attitudes, even if we could. We cannot
change personality; we can change behaviour. As with goal-setting, however, the required behaviour must be
described as precisely as possible.

We have said that behaviour is determined by its consequences. How can these be classified? The possible range
is shown below:

• We receive something nice

• Something nasty is taken away
• Something nice is taken away
• Something nasty is given

NICE NASTY

Positive Punishment
reinforcement
GIVE

Punishment Negative
reinforcement
TAKE
AWAY

The first two consequences lead to an increase in-the behaviour that preceded them. To use the correct technical
term, they are reinforcers, because they reinforce the behaviour concerned. The first, giving something nice, is
called positive reinforcement, the second, negative reinforcement, because something nasty is taken away. The
last two are different forms of punishment. They will tend to suppress the behaviour that occurs before them.

All of these" may be neatly summarized in a diagram, as shown in Figure 5.1. There is one outcome, however,
that will not fit into the diagram, that is if, following the behaviour, it is neither rewarded nor punished. This will
lead to the behaviour not being repeated.

Most managers, we find, are fairly happy with positive reinforcement, but negative reinforcement is not as clear.
Let us take an example from parenthood. We find it unpleasant when a baby cries. If, by picking the baby up, we
stop it crying, we will pick it up the next time it cries. Stopping the cries negatively reinforces our behaviour of
picking the baby up, as it stops the nastiness. (Note that, from the baby's point of view, being picked up is nice
and hence the crying is positively reinforced. Next time the baby wants to be picked up, it will cry.) Another

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

 26
familiar example is a fire alarm. The loud noise of the alarm is unpleasant and people will try to escape from
it. They do so by getting out of the building; leaving the building has been negatively reinforced - the noise
stops.

Now that the range of possible consequences has been described, let us consider how effective each one can be
at influencing behaviour. This is where, in some respects, common sense and psychology part company. We
think you will agree, after considering the arguments, that psychology has the more accurate explanation.

The effectiveness of each of the consequences is largely determined by how frequently it follows, or does not
follow, each occurrence of the behaviour. These patterns of how frequently behaviour is rewarded or punished
are called schedules.

How to maintain behaviour. If we are trying 10 get someone to learn a new behaviour then it is appropriate to
reinforce their successful attempts every time they occur; but what about maintaining behaviour that has already
been learnt? Consider a schedule that has already been learnt, where the behaviour is rewarded, let us say, every
twenty times it occurs. For example, pulling a lever to obtain a reward, If the mechanism was switched off, how
quickly would you realize there was no point in pulling the lever any more? Probably after between 20 and 40
further pulls. Now consider the situation where the reward occurs on average every twenty times. The reward
could be on the next pull of the lever or many hundreds of pulls later. To deter mine when this mechanism had
been switched off would take a very long time indeed. This is the principle, of course, of one-armed bandit
machines. This is also why you keep being trapped by the company 'bore'. You have only (o reward them by
paying attention once every so often and they will continue to pester you. This is called variable ratio
reinforcement. Variable ratio reinforcement is far more effective in maintaining behaviour, even undesirable
behaviour, than reinforcement that occurs every time (fixed ratio reinforcement). The person knows it will pay
off at some time, so they keep trying.

(As well as fixed and variable ratios, there can also be fixed and variable times. The effects are similar; fixed
time reinforcement is a relatively ineffective way of maintaining behaviour. It remains, of course, the most
common way of paying salaries).

How to stop undesirable behaviour. What options are open to us if we now want [o stop undesirable behaviour?
The strategies available are those of punishment and non-reward. (Notice here that non-reward is not the same as
ignoring. Non-reward means that the person gets no benefit whatsoever as a result of their behaviour.) Which of
these strategies, non-reward or punishment is likely to be more effective in changing behaviour?

All the evidence suggests that non-reward leads to the behaviour being extinguished, punishment merely
suppressed it. This is not to say that punishment is never effective. Punishment, by itself, can be effective under
certain conditions. (When reading further it might be instructive to think of the ways in which society tries to
suppress crime.)

Unfortunately for managers (and perhaps for society in general), the ways in which rewards and punishment
influence behaviour are not the same. For rewards to be effective in maintaining behaviour they need occur only
every so often, (Think of the fruit machine as an example.) Punishment, on the other hand, has to fulfil two
criteria if it is to be effective. It must occur every time the behaviour occurs, and as soon as possible after the
behaviour. This may help us under stand why hangovers rarely have a long-term influence over drinking habits.
The rewards of drinking to excess are immediate, the punishment is some way off. In addition, you may
sometimes escape without having a hangover. (Interestingly, one way of treating alcoholics is to use drugs that
produce an unpleasant effect immediately after any alcohol is consumed.) The same argument applies to many
aspects of preventive medicine, e.g. smoking, diet, etc. The rewards are immediate, the possible negative
consequences some way off. It is unlikely that teenagers' smoking habits will be influenced by the prospect of
lung disease when they are old.

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

 27

To summarize: to keep undesirable behaviour going it needs to be reinforced only once every so often (variable
ratio reinforcement), to stop it by using punishment requires punishment to be administered every time. It is
hardly surprising that prisons are a highly ineffective way of influencing the behaviour of criminals.

As an example of how organizations attempt to use punishment, take the case of trying to deal with persistent
lateness by a particular individual. One method commonly used is the memo. A memo pointing out the
requirements for strict time-keeping is sent to everyone, including the culprit. This may affect the culprit's
behaviour for a short time , but they will then start re-offending. The other effect it will have is on those who are
innocent, who may arrive late occasionally but do not abuse the system, and who compensate by working into
their lunch break. Often these individuals will rebel, working strictly to the clock.

The other common method is to ignore the problem in its early stages. Each individual late arrival is recorded,
but is not commented on. When an unacceptable number have accumulated a 'trigger point' is reached. This is
normally a specified number of latenesses over a specified period. What follows is a gradual escalation of
punishment. Oral warnings are followed by written warnings. These are then followed by formal dismissal
procedures. Under these circumstances, punishment is unlikely to be effective. For it to be so, the individual
needs be made aware that each and every incidence will be questioned as soon as it occurs, and that moderate
sanctions will be applied. (Very harsh sanctions would probably lead to avoidance through absenteeism.)

It should be apparent that the conditions for using punishment or discipline effectively are very limited.
Managers, and other individuals with responsibility for enforcement, are rarely in a position where they can
monitor people all the time. The difficulties associated with the effective use of punishment lead us, therefore, to
the following conclusion:

Schemes should concentrate on the encouragement of desirable behaviour rather than trying to use discipline to
eliminate the undesirable.

So far we have been considering the effects of punishment alone. Most effective, however, is when punishment
for the undesirable behaviour is coupled with reinforcement of the desired behaviour. Under such circumstances
the punishment does not have to fulfil the requirements just described; even mild and infrequent punishment
will be effective. Just raised eyebrows from a boss who uses reinforcement effectively will be enough to
discourage unwanted behaviour.

Now that we have dealt with the basic concepts, let us consider some applications. One nice example of the
difference between fixed ratio and variable ratio reinforcement is one that will be immediately applicable, if you
want to improve the productivity of beaver trappers! One group of beaver trappers in the Canadian forests were
given a $1bonus for every beaver skin. Another similar group were given the chance to roll dice each time they
brought in a skin. If they rolled two successive odd numbers they got $4. The cost of each of the schemes was
the same. Productivity in the first group rose by 50 per cent, in the latter group by 108 per cent (Saari and
Latham, 1982).

Another area in which OBMod has been used is in dealing with absenteeism and lateness. At this point you
should turn to your suggestions for solving the problem at Chestnut hospital (Appendix 4). We suspect that you
will have adopted a medical model (no pun intended) in trying to solve the problem. Such a model sees
absenteeism as a symptom of some underlying problem. The assumption is that absenteeism is a symptom of
dissatisfaction with some aspect, or aspects, of the job. The solution, therefore, i? to improve job satisfaction.
This may indeed have some impact, but there is often a limit to what can be done to improve satisfaction, shift-
work still needs to be worked, and many other 'dirty' and undesirable jobs need to be done. In addition, the
rewards for staying away from work are powerful, and rarely capable of being influenced by management.

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 28
OBMod, on the other hand, looks not at the influences that are thought to underlie absenteeism, but rather at
the consequences to the employee of attendance or non-attendance. It adopts a 'direct action' model. Let us
consider some possibilities.

Some schemes have used reinforcement as an alternative. One such example was reported from a factory in
Liverpool. The factory was to be closed and the production lines transferred to another part of the country. The
workers were under notice of redundancy, but it was essential that production be maintained until the new
factory was in production. Unfortunately, the factory was suffering absenteeism levels of 30 per cent and above,
due to a 'mystery virus' that appeared to strike mainly on Mondays and Fridays. Because of the law relating to
redundancy, pay could not be stopped for these absences. In order to improve attendance, management instituted
a weekly prize draw of £500. Participation in the draw was by means of tickets. Each employee received a draw
ticket whenever they attended for work on time. Absenteeism dropped to very low levels and the management
reported that workers were even turning up on their days off in order to collect tickets. Other schemes have used
a cash bonus, paid to every employee who had attended on a number of randomly selected days during a set
period - the random choice of days provided the variable ratio.

These further examples demonstrate one of the conditions under which such reinforcement works best; the
expenditure of a little additional investment on the part of the individual, together with the potential for a large
pay-out - for example football pools and national lotteries. Indeed, the use of prize draws is widely used as a
marketing technique.

Some managers object to such schemes on the basis that you are paying people extra to do what they are already
being paid to do. This is a perfectly legitimate position to take. If, however, you have tried everything else, what
do you do? Your principles may also have a cost - continuing high levels of absenteeism.

It is perhaps worth noting the contrast between schemes that re- ward attendance, and those that punish
absenteeism. Schemes that use punishment usually do so by giving an attendance bonus and then removing it for
an absence. (On initial inspection the attendance bonus may sound like a reward, but this was not the way it was
perceived, as we shall see.) For example, managers recently tried to improve the attendance of a group of UK
civil servants (driving test examiners) by giving a £30 weekly bonus for attendance. The whole sum was
forfeited for any non-attendance during the week, no matter what the reason for the absence. The scheme
provoked a national one-day strike! It might be worth considering how this, not inconsiderable, sum could have
been used to improve attendance by variable ratio reinforcement.

An interesting example of the removal of reinforcers was reported by the Merseyside police. They used to
concentrate upon catching those who were stealing car stereo equipment, to little effect. They then switched their
strategy to that of identifying those cars whose owners might have purchased stolen stereos. They examined
parked cars, looking for incongruities, for example, an old car with a high priced modern stereo, and then
contacted the owners for an explanation. As soon as it became known that this was happening, the market for
stolen stereos declined sharply.

It is very common, in fact, to find organizations actually rewarding the very behaviour that they say they wish to
discourage. Some organizations, for example, give annual budgets to departments. If it is not all spent, ii is
reclaimed by the centre and next year's budget is cut. As the manager of such a department what do you logically
do in these circumstances? - you spend up to your budget limit.

There are also organizations which use positive reinforcement effectively, perhaps without knowing the
terminology involved. One of them employs tanker drivers to deliver hazardous liquids and gases to customers.
These are delivered through complicated valves and pipes that transfer the chemicals from the tanker to the

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

 29
customer's tanks. Drivers who phone for advice receive a bonus each time they do so. It might be
thought that this would encourage drivers to phone for trivial reasons and, indeed, the system may be Open to
some abuse. Consider however, the situation that may occur where workers are discouraged from asking, usually
because they tear some form of punishment, even if only ridicule. Which costs would the company rather bear -
some trivial requests for advice, or a tanker exploding in a city street?

The other examples are from two organizations which are probably aware of the theoretical background. Both
are large American organizations - Xerox and American Airlines. At Xerox, 'X' certificates, redeemable for $25,
were introduced into the personnel department. Every member of the department, not just managers, could give
Xs to others. They could be given for any work-related behaviour, for example excellent attendance or
cooperation. They could also be given to people in other departments. At American Airlines, passengers are
given coupons [hat they may give to staff whom they feel deserve some recognition, (We are not sure how
effectively these schemes might transplant to the culture of the UK.)

A final example concerns the problems associated with routine maintenance procedures ('Komaki et al.., 1977).
All the rewards and punishments are geared Co encourage short-cuts. If a part is not checked, it will probably be
ail right anyway, and the mechanic saves time right now. In addition, there is no reinforcers to encourage them
to carry out the checks as specified. If something does eventually go wrong, then what evidence is there to rebut
the claim that 'it seemed all right when checked'? The evidence of successive reports by the consumer magazine
Which" on the quality of car servicing by garages lends strong support to our analysis. All of these examples
show how behaviour may be influenced by reinforcers, but what different types of re in forcers are there?

REINFORCERS

Reinforcers may be classified in a number of ways. Perhaps the most basic distinction is between primary,
secondary, and generalized. Primary reinforcers are those that are essential for life, such ?s food, water, etc.
They equate closely to the physiological level of Maslow's hierarchy. For this reason they are common to
everyone. Unfortunately they may quickly lose their effectiveness as reinforcers. This process is known as
satiation. Food, for example, is only a reinforcers if you are hungry. Immediately after a big meal the prospect of
food is unlikely to be reinforcing. Secondary reinforcers gain their reinforcing strength through association with
primary reinforcers. Social reinforcers such as attention and praise originally gained their reinforcing value
because other people, e.g. parents, were the source of primary reinforcers. Other reinforcers may gain their
power from social reinforcers. Status symbols, for example, are reinforcing because they are approved of by a
social group that is important to the individual. Finally, generalized reinforcers are so called because of their
general effect. The best example is money. This is reinforcing for most people because it can be exchanged for
items that they find reinforcing. For this reason generalized reinforcers are particularly powerful. In
rganizations, however, secondary reinforcers are widely used. We will return to this shortly.

Another important distinction between reinforcers has already been considered briefly in the sections on
Herzberg and the Job characteristics model (see Chapter 4). This is the distinction between 'intrinsic' and
'extrinsic' motivators.

INTRINSIC VERSUS EXTRINSIC REINFORCERS

The difference between intrinsic and extrinsic reinforcers lies in whether they originate from the job itself, or
from external sources. This distinction is not always clear-cut. As we shall see, some reinforcers may have
elements of both.

Perhaps a good example of intrinsic reinforcement is provided by computer games especially, it would appear,
for adolescent males. The rewards are so powerful that for some the games become almost addictive. This
reinforcement is also an example of what Bandura (1986) would call a 'naturally-occurring' reinforcement. Such

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 30
reinforcers follow automatically from the behaviour concerned. Many intrinsic reinforcers are naturally-
occurring.
Unlike intrinsic reinforcement, extrinsic reinforcement has to be provided 'artificially'. Pay is perhaps the classic
example of an extrinsic reinforcer. Behaviour does not automatically produce pay as reinforcement.
Administrative schemes have to be developed to ensure that it is delivered.

According to Deci (1975'), the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic reinforcement is not one of merely
academic interest- It has considerable practical implications,

Intrinsic reinforcement is, other things being equal, more powerful than extrinsic reinforcement. It is also, from
the organization's point of view, the most cost-effective. If individuals get high levels of reinforcernent just from
doing the job, they are likely to do the job more effectively. As we have seen, jobs can be redesigned so as to
enhance such intrinsic reinforcement. It would, however, be naive to assume that everyone can have a job that is
intrinsically reinforcing. For those in this fortunate situation, doing the job is a pleasure in itself.

What happens when extrinsic motivation, such as pay, is 'added' to a task that is already intrinsically
reinforcing? According to Dec. (1975) the effect of introducing the extrinsic reinforcer is to 'undermine' the
strength of the intrinsic reinforcer. If you start paying people for doing things that they presently do because they
enjoy doing them, you will reduce the level of intrinsic reinforcement. Individuals, when given such extrinsic
reinforcement, seem to switch from being intrinsically motivated, to being extrinsically motivated. This is likely
to mean that once you have started extrinsic reinforcement, you will have to continue with it if you want the
behaviour to continue. You will not be able to rely on a return to intrinsic motivation producing the same levels
of effort.

Whilst initial studies tended to support Deci's theory, later work suggests that the effects of extrinsic
reinforcement are not as simple as originally thought. Pay, for example, does not always reduce intrinsic
motivation. As a result of these, and other, findings, Deci modified and elaborated his ideas into what is now
known as cognitive evaluation theory' (Deci and Ryan, 1980).

Cognitive evaluation theory makes the same basic distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic. It now, however,
makes a further distinction between two different types of extrinsic reinforcement, Extrinsic reinforcers may he
classified, according to Deci, according to whether they are controlling or informational. Controlling extrinsic
motivation will reduce intrinsic motivation, informational extrinsic reinforcers will not reduce it, and may even
enhance it. Information, especially Chat which is seen as providing evidence of personal competence, appears to
enhance intrinsic motivation. On the other hand, people tend to resent being controlled,

Like other aspects of reinforcers, whether they are controlling or informational cannot be determined
objectively. Pay, for example, can be seen as Either. Pay may he perceived as a method of control a bribe to
behave in a particular way. Alternatively, it may be seen as a source of information, indicating how management
evaluates behaviour or performance. Whether it is perceived as controlling, informational, or a mixture of the
two, is something that can only be determined subjectively. The individual's perception of its nature is what
counts. Two individuals may perceive the same pay rise in different ways. This will influence their behaviour. It
will obviously be in the organization's interest to ensure that reinforcers are perceived as informational rather
than controlling.

The subjective nature of reinforcers is important. Many managers make the assumption that everybody's
reinforcers are the same. Indeed, they usually assume that they are the same as their own (another example of the
false consensus effect, see page 99). Some reinforcers are, indeed, almost universal. Money is a good example,
like most universal reinforcers, it is an example of a generalized reinforcer it can be exchanged for other things
that people want. If, however, the pay-off was a night at the opera, how would you feel? Different people will
have different reactions. Some reinforcers arc difficult for others to understand. For example, adolescent

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

 31
children often get reinforcement from 'winding up' their parents. The parents find this difficult to
understand as they feel that by shouting at their children and sending them to their room, they are punishing
them. II may also 'pay off because, when such arguments occur, real issues can be avoided. (This is 'uproar' in
TA terms - page 104.) To take an example that applies to many societies, what are the reinforcers for the
hooliganism of a minority of male adolescents? The only method of accurately determining what the reinforcers
are is to remove potential reinforcers. When the behaviour stops, you have found the key. We can, however,
speculate as to what

They might be. It is quite likely that group approval is involved. As we shall see later, social rewards are
amongst the strongest reinforcers known. The disapproval of society may, strange as it may seem, also be a
potential reinforcer. Appearing in court or in the media may be reinforcing - much like [he adolescent and parent
situation described earlier. Given that these are some of the potential reinforcers, what can society do about it?
As we have seen, punishment is unlikely to be effective. In order for it to work it must occur every time the
disruptive behaviour occurs. This is almost certainly impossible. We may be able to remove some of the
reinforcers, for example, media coverage. But perhaps the only effective method is to change the hooligans'
perception of what is n-reinforcing for them.

SOCIAL COGNITIVE THEORY

Exercise
Before reading further, please complete the career questionnaire in Appendix 5.

Earlier in this chapter we reminded you of the distinction between internal and external explanations for people's
behaviour. Personality theory in general tends to seek an internal explanation for why people behave as they do.
OBMod, on the other hand, tends to concentrate on the situation, in its most radical form (e.g. Skinner, 1993),
the importance of internal, cognitive and affective (i.e. emotional), factors are. discounted altogether. This
dichotomy, between either totally internal or totally external explanations is, however, false. Internal and
external, as we have seen in the chapter on personality, interact with each other.

In behavioral theory this interact ion its approach is best expressed in 'social cognitive theory.' This was
developed by Bandura (1988), and grew out of his earlier social learning theory.

Social learning theory sought to explain some element of behaviour that did not appear explicable in terms of
'radical' behaviorist theory. For example, it is not unusual to observe someone perform a complex sequence of
behaviours without there being of any evidence of them having been previously reinforced. Adolescents who are
keen to start driving often have a very good idea of what to do in their first driving lesson, despite never having
driven before. Radical, behaviorist theory would require that these complex behaviours be shaped. Cruder, and
then increasingly more accurate approximations to each of the behaviours in the complex sequence of 'driving a
car' would need to have been reinforced. Yet the evidence is that learning seems to have taken place, without the
behaviour being undertaken and reinforced. This suggests that other processes are taking place.

It would appear that learning can take place cognitively, rather than behaviorally. We do not apparently have to
undertake the behaviour in order to learn. Nor do we have to experience reinforcement, or punishment, directly.
We can learn indirectly or, to use Bandura's term, incawuaty. For example, when joining a new company we do
not attempt to find out what the norms are about time keeping, by arriving five minutes later each day until some
one in authority objects. Rather, we observe what behaviour in others is rewarded or punished. In other words,
we learn vicariously by watching other people. We assume that if we follow their examples we will reap the
same rewards, and avoid possible punishment. This process learning in the absence of any observable behaviour
- was originally called modeling. It is now more commonly referred to as mastery modeling.

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

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******************

LESSON NO.6

VALUES, ATTITUDES AND JOB SATISFACTION

WHAT ARE VALUES ?

Values have a moral flavour. Values represent an individual's ideas as to what is right. Wrong, good or bad or
desirable. We all have a set of values and what we think is important Values represent basic convictions that
specific mode or conduct is personally or socially preferable to an opposite mode of conduct.

Values are important in the study of Organisation Behaviour, as they help us understand attitudes, perceptions,
and motivations. Values generally influence one's behaviour.

ALLPORT’s CLASSIFICATION OF VALUES

1. Theoretical i.e., discovery of a truth through rational approach.

2- Economic
3. Aesthetic
4. Social
5. Political i.e. relating to power and influence.
6. Religious

Different people have different set of values. Now a days, H is seen (bat particularly younger employees are
bringing a set of new values to the workplace.

WHAT ARE ATTITUDES?

Attitudes are evaluative statements concerning people, events or objects. They reflect how one feels about
something. An attitude can also be defined as an enduring organisation of motivational- emotional. perceptual
and cognitive processes with respect to some aspect of the individual world. An attitude is an entity or a process
which exists in a person even though we are unable to observe it directly A common feature of attitudes is that
they involve emotional reactions, a belief component- and an action component.

The emotional component of an attitude develops as a conditioned response be association with stimuli that have
either rewarding or punishing effects. Thus, affective components are learnt through classical conditioning
methods.

The cognitive component of a social attitude consists of the individual's perceptions, beliefs, and ideas of an
object. The behavioural component of attitude consists of the tendency to act or real towards an object in certain
Things.

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 33
In Organisation Behaviour, we are interested in the Attitude - Behaviour relationship It is not a simple
relationship, because behaviour is determined not only by attitudes, but also by external factors in a given social
system or situation.

Attitudes are not the same as values. Values are broader in concept. So attitudes are more specific than values
contain a moral flavor how ever. Values and attitudes are related to one another.

Attitudes are acquired from parents, teachers and group members Attitudes are somewhat less stable,
Advertisement tends to change people 's attitudes towards a certain product or service .

TYPES OF ATTITUDES

In organisations, attitudes are important because they affect job behaviour. A person has thousands of attitudes,
but from the organisational point of view, only 3 attitudes are of interest, namely. Job satisfaction. Job
Involvement, and Organisation commitment.

Job satisfaction refers to an employee's general attitude towards his job. A person with high level job satisfaction
holds positive attitude towards the job, while an employee not satisfied with his job holds negative attitude
towards his job.

Job involvement measures the degree to which a person identifies with his job, his active participation in it, and
considers his performance important to his self-worth. Individuals who express high commitment see their
identity as closely attached to that of die organiastion. Individuals who express high commitment see their
identity as closely attached to that of the organisation- Highly committed employees will be better performers
and have lower turnover than those having lower levels of commitment to the organisation.

FUNCTIONS OF ATTITUDES

All people have attitudes is to say the obvious. Attitudes are said to contribute to stability and behavioural
consistency. 4 (four) personality functions are served by the maintenance and modification of social attitudes.
They are 1) Adjustment, 2) Value expression, 3) Knowledge and 4) Ego-defensive. Let us study each of them in
some detail:-

1. ADJUSTMENT FUNCTION

The function affirms that people strive to maximise the rewards and to minimise the penalties in their external
environment. Attitudes acquired in the service of the adjustment function are a means for reaching desired goals
or for avoiding undesirable result.

2. EGO-DEFENSIVE FUNCTION

Many of our attitudes have the function of defending our self-image. When we cannot admit to ourselves that we
have feelings of inferiority, we may project those feelings on some convenient -minority group and better our
egos by attitudes of superiority towards this minority group.

3. THE VALUE EXPRESSIVE FUNCTION

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The function of value expressive attitudes is to reveal the self-image of a person. There are some attitudes,
which prevent the man from revealing his true nature to himself, and others, other attitudes have the function of
giving positive expression to his central values and to the type of person he conceives himself to be.

4. THE KNOWLEDGE FUNCTION

This function is based on the need to understand, make sense of and give adequate structure to the universe.
Attitudes which are inadequate for dealing with new and changing situations are discarded because they lead to
contradictions and inconsistencies.

PROCESS OF ATTITUDE CHANGE

An attitude that no longer serves its function will cause the individual holding that attitude to feel frustrated. To
change altitudes which serves an adjustment function, one or the two conditions must be satisfied: -

1. The attitude and the activities related to it no longer provide the satisfaction they once provided- and
2- The individual's level of aspiration has been raised.

For management, one way to change attitudes is to change the environment and its rewards. Changes in attitudes
occur more readily when people perceive that they can accomplish their objectives by raising their existing
altitudes.

The next important agent of attitude change is the opinion leader i.e. who interprets and relays information to the
rank and File members of the community If the manager is an opinion leader, he may have a great influence on
the attitudes developed by workers who hold him in high esteem.

JOB SATISFACTION

Job satisfaction of an individual expresses one's altitude towards the job. It is all a question of one's cognition,
emotions, and behavioural tendencies- According to VROOM, job satisfaction is the positive orientation of an
individual towards the work, which he is presently performing- A person with high level of job satisfaction
holds very positive altitude about the workplace, and conversely, a person dissatisfied with the job embraces
negative attitudes towards the job environment- The opposite of job satisfaction is job alienation.

Job satisfaction typically refers to the attitudes of a single employee. It may also refer to the general level of
attitude within the group.

Job satisfaction is one part of life satisfaction. The nature of one's environment off the job influences one's
feeling on the job. Job satisfaction influences one's general life satisfaction.

Job satisfaction is very important in OB., because it was assumed that high satisfaction leads to high employee
performance. This assumption may not be correct always HERZBERG’s Motivation model suggests that
satisfaction is not always a strong motivator. The more accurate relation ship is that high performance leads to
high job satisfaction, which then becomes feedback top influence future performance.

HIGH GRATER
REWARDS
PERFORMANCE SATISFACTION

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 35

FEEDBACK

When people perform better, they will get higher rewards, which will lead to grater satisfaction. But, if rewards
are seen as inadequate for one’s level of performance, dissatisfaction will occur.

THEORIES OF JOB SATISFACTION

There are 3 Major theories, which are mentioned below:-

1. Need fulfillment
2. Reference Group
3. HERZBERG's 2-Factor theory.

According to Need fulfillment theory, a person is satisfied if he gets what he wants, and the more he wants of
something, the more satisfied he is when he gets it, and more dissatisfied when he does not get it

As per Reference group theory, although it is similar to the Need fulfillment theory, it is predicted that an
individual looks for guidance to a Reference group. If a job needs the interest, desires, and requirements of a
person's reference group, he will like it, and if it does not, he will not like it.

HERZBERG's Theory relates to both performance and job satisfaction. It says that an enriched job leads to job
satisfaction. On the other hand, a non-enriched job can only lead to lack of dissatisfaction, hence it cannot serve
as a motivator leading to performance.

Let us remember that although there are theories, to explain job satisfaction, job satisfaction itself is related to a
number of employee variables like age, occupation, size of the organisation turnover, and absenteeism etc.

ORGANBATIONAL COMMITMENT

In everyday use, the word commitment is used to mean the sense of being bound emotionally or intellectually to
some course of action. In the context of an organisation, a starting point is provided by MOWDAY, PORTER,
and STEERS' definition of oreganisational commitment, which has 3 components as given below: -

1. A strong belief and acceptance of organisational goals and values.

2. A willingness to exert considerable effort on behalf of the organisation.
3. A strong desire to maintain membership in the organisation.

Research in organisational commitment has been examined primarily in relation to employee turnover. Other
researchers have established a relationship between job satisfaction and turnover intentions and between
organisational commitment and Job performance. Individuals who are committed to the organisation are less
likely to leave their jobs than those who are uncommitted. Individuals who are committed to the organisation

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tend to perform at a higher level and also tend to stay with the organisation, thus decreasing turnover and
increasing organisational effectiveness.

HOW TO ENHANCE ORGANISATIONAL COMMITMENT?

Research indicates that the following factors may enhance organisational commitment: -
1. High level of freedom or independence or autonomy.
2. Work tenure, length of service
3. Employee satisfaction with personal performance.
4. Perceived fair performance appraisals.
5. Challenging and interesting work

6. Resources and equipment those employees need to be effective on their jobs.

7. Investment in training and development
8. High quality supportive and friendly supervision.
9. High level of responsibility.
10. Broad task design and teamwork.
11. High employee morale based on a climate of trust and cooperation
12. Effective reward management.
13. Effective channel of communication.
14. Part ownership for employees when possible.
15. Selection based on merit.
16. Career progress or job advancement.
17. Employee satisfaction derived from the non-work environment and activities, including health and physical
conditions.
18. Continuous review of employees' salaries to ensure that a fair and competitive pay is guaranteed by the
organisation at all times.

FACTORS THAT INHIBIT EMPLOYEE COMMITMENT

1. Unclear and ambiguous roles.

2. The use of punishment by the superior.
3. Alternative employment available.
4. Tension on the job
5. A conviction that the organisation is uncaring about employee's welfare.
6. Unfair performance appraisal.

IMPLICATIONS FOR H.R. MANAGERS

Commitment denotes an action that is not only personal to the committed worker, but also to a completely
voluntary and rational action. Management cannot force it Neither can they hire a consultant to initiate it The
employee can also withdraw it if it is considered as no longer serving a mutual purpose, for both the employee
and management Since the committed employee almost always expects something in return, the management of
human resources should find ways of reciprocating committed employees. If persistent decreases in
commitment, resulting in low level of commitment in-groups or experienced employees are found, managers
will need to be aware that low commitment norms may impact on new employees and will need advice on ways
to improve commitment levels. Managers concerned about both turnover and work performance have to be
aware of the need to apply a different set of policies in each case.

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LESSON NO. 7

LEARNING

WHAT IT IS?

According to Mcghee, Learning has taken place if an individual behaves, reacts, responds as a result of
experience in a manner different from the way he formerly behaved.

Learning is change in behaviour through education and training, practice and experience. It is accompanied by
acquisition of knowledge. Skills, and expertise which are relatively permanent. Temporary changes may be only
reflexive and fail to represent any learning. If reinforcement does not accompany the practice or experiences, the
temporary change in behaviour will eventually disappear. It is reinforcement, which makes learning or change in
behaviour enduring by strengthening and intensifying certain aspects of an individual's behaviour.

Learning may be described as " the process of acquiring the ability to respond adequately to a situation which
may or may not have been previously encountered, the favourable modification of response tendencies
consequent on previous experience, particularly the building of a new series of complex coordinated motor
response, the fixation of times in memory so that they can be recalled or organised., the process of acquiring
insight into situation. Thus learning can be defined as a relatively permanent change in behaviour as a result of
prior experience.

NATURE OF LEARNING

1. Learning involves a change, though not necessarily improvement, in

behaviour. Learning may be good or bad from an organisation point of view. For e.g., bad habits, prejudice,
stereotypes and work restrictions may be learnt by individual.
2. Change in behaviour must be relatively permanent. Temporary changes may be only reflexive and fail to
represent any learning. Changes caused by fatigue or temporary adaptations are not covered in learning.
3. The change in behaviour should occur as a result of experience, practice or training. The change may not be
evident until a situation arises in which the new behaviour can occur.
4. The practice or experience must be reinforced in order for learning to occur. If reinforcement does not
accompany the practice or experience, the behaviour will eventually disappear.
5. Learning is reflected in behaviour. A change in an individual's thought process or attitudes, not accompanied
by behaviour, is no learning.

THEORIES OF LEARNING

There are 4 theories, which explain how individuals learn new patterns of behaviour as shown the diagram given
below: -

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TYPES OF LEARNING

Classical
Operant Social
Conditioning Cognitive
conditioning Behaviour
S R Processes
R S
R

Learning

1 CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

The classical behaviorists, particularly PAVLOV, and WATSON, attributed learning to the connection between
stimulus and response. (STIMULUS- ---> RESPONSE).

2 OPERANT CONDITIONING

The operant behaviorists such as SKINNER described the role of consequences in understanding the learning
process. (RESPONSE ---> STIMULUS). Operant behaviour means voluntary or learnt behaviour in contrast to
reflexive or unlearnt behaviour.

3. COGNITIVE LEARNING

Cognitive theories felt that learning is achieved by thinking about the perceived relationship between events and
individual goals . The process within the individual concerned with receiving, and interpreting information make
the individual learn new patterns of behaviour.

4.SOCIAL LEARNING

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It is an integrative theory of learning, which explains that people learn through observation and direct
experience. Modeling is an social learning. People learn through observation and direct experience. Social
learning theory is a behavioral theory. It draws heavily from the classical and operant conditioning concepts and
even goes beyond that. The influence of models is central to the social learning view point. The following
processes determine the influence that a model will have on an individual:-

1.Attentional process - People only learn from a model when they recognise and pay attention to its critical
features. We tend to be most influenced by models that are attractive, repeatedly appearing, which we think are
important or we see as similar to us.

2. Retention process --- A model's influence will depend on how well the individual remembers the model's
action, even after the model is no longer readily available.

3. Motor Reproduction process -- After a person has seen a new behaviour by observing the model, the
watching ,must be converted into doing. This process demonstrates that the individual can perform the modeled
activities.

4. Reinforcement process - Individuals will be motivated to exhibit the modeled behaviour if positive
incentives or rewards are provided. Behaviours that are reinforced will be given more attention, learnt better, and
performed often.

RELATIONSHIP OF LEARNING WITH O.B.

Learning has direct impact on training activities- It can give insights into how best to develop skills that the
employee will need to perform effectively. The manager who undertakes to produce changes in behaviour will
teach employees to engage in behaviour that will help the organisation achieve its objectives. When individuals
are late for work, disobey orders or engage in dysfunctional behaviour, the manager will attempt to teach
functional behaviour. When the employee is performing satisfactorily. Managers will give' the employee
feedback and other forms of rewards so as to strengthen the desirable behaviour.

Learning provides an explanation as to why employers prefer to hire people with job experience. This will result
in higher job performance.

CLASSICAL CONDITIONING THEORY EXPLAINED

The classical behaviorists such as PAVLOV and WATSON attributed learning to the connection between
stimulus and response. This theory was explained by IVAN PAVLOV , who conducted experiments to teach dog
to salivate when a bell rang. He measured the quantity of saliva secreted by a dog. When PAVLOV presented
the dog with a piece of meat (unconditional stimulus), it resulted in increase in salivation (unconditional
response),On the other hand ,when he merely rang a bell (natural stimulus), the dog had no salivation . Next
PAVLOV linked the meat and the ringing the bell. After doing this time ,PAVLOV rang the bell without meal.
This time, the dog salivated merely at the sound of the bell. even when no food was offered. What had happened
was that the dog had learnt to respond to the bell This classical conditioning has a lasting impact on the
understanding of learning Classical conditioning can be explained in another way- Say, the association of
cleaning the administration office of the plant with the visit of a top official from headquarters Every time the
top executive visited the plant, cleaning would take place. This wanton for years. People had learnt to associate
the cleaning of office with the visit of top executive,

Classical conditioning is passive- It represents a small part of total human learning. It can only explain simple
reflexive behaviour. Something happens, and we react in a specific way But most human behaviour is voluntary,

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rather than reflexive. Most human behaviour operates on the environment. The latter type of behaviour is
learnt through OPERANT CONDITIONING.

OPERANT CONDITIONING THEORY EXPLAINED.

Operant is defined behaviour that produces effect. Operant conditioning is based on the work of B.F.SKJNNER,
who advocated that individuals emit responses that are rewarding and will not emit response that are either not
rewarded or are punished- Operant conditioning is voluntarily learnt behaviour and it is determined, maintained
and controlled by its consequences. In contrast respondent behaviour is an involuntary or unlearned response to
an environment stimulus.

Operant conditioning is based on the premise that behaviour is a function of consequences. People learn to
behave to get something they desire or to avoid something they do not like. Behaviour is I likely to be repeated if
consequences are unfavorable. Thus, the relationship between behaviour and consequences is the essence of
operant conditioning

Operant conditioning is a powerful tool for managing people in organisations. Most behaviours in organisations
are learnt, controlled, and altered by consequences. If a manager wants to influence behaviour, he must be able
to manipulate the consequences. Thus, it can be concluded that the behavioural consequences that are rewarding
increase the rate of response, while the adverse consequences decrease the rate of response.

COGNITIVE LEARNING THEORY EXPLAINED

Cognition refers to an individual’s ideas, thoughts, knowledge, interpretations, understanding etc. about himself
and his environment. Cognitive theory of learning assumes that the organism learns the meaning of various
objects and events and learned responses depends upon the meaning assigned to stimuli. Cognitive theorists
argue that the learner forms a cognitive structure in memory, which preserves and organises information about
the various events that occur in a learning situation.

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY EXPLAINED

Social learning is learning achieved through the reciprocal interaction between people, behaviour, and their
environment. Social learning theory integrates the cognitive and operant approaches to learning. People learn
through the observation and direct experience. Social learning theory is a behavioural theory. It draws heavily
from the classical and operant conditioning concepts and even goes beyond that. Through Modeling, people
acquire behaviours by directly observing and imitating others. When the manager or a coworker, who can be
models, demonstrate desirable behaviour, it can have major impact on a person's work efforts. Many patterns of
behaviour are learnt by watching the behaviour of models such as parents, teachers, superiors, role models, film
stars etc.

The influence of models is central to the social learning viewpoint. Social learning also takes place vial)
Modeling, (also called as vicarious learning), 2) Symbolism, and 3) self-control.

SHAPING BEHAVIOUR

In any organisation, managers are concerned with making the subordinates learn those behaviour that are most
beneficial to the organisation. When a manager moulds individuals by guiding their learning in graduated steps,
he is shaping behaviour.

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A manager can shape behaviour by systematically reinforcing each successive step that moves
individuals closer to the desired response. If an employee who has been chronically late for work comes say, in
20 minutes (as against his usual habit of coming 30 minutes late), the manager can reinforce this behaviour so
that it comes more close to the desired behaviour to the work on time.

STRATEGIES FOR REINFORCEMENT

Reinforcement is very important for learning to occur. Reinforcement increases the strength of responses and
tends to induce repetitions of the behaviour that preceded the reinforcement. Four (4) types of reinforcement
strategies can be employed by managers to influence the behaviour of employees. These are;- 1) Positive
reinforcement 2) Negative reinforcement 3) Extinction and 4) Punishment.

POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT EXPLAINED

This strategy uses rewards that stimulate desired behaviour and strengthens the probability of repeating such
behaviour in the future. Positive reinforcers can be primary or secondary. Primary reinforcers have direct
beneficial consequences and include food, clothing and shelter. Secondary reinforcers bring pleasure but have a
variety of meanings for individuals such as money, promotion and praise. Money is considered secondary
because it is used to purchase primary reinforcers. i.e., food.

Effective reinforcers must meet two conditions - First, the reward should be contingent upon the performance.
Second, the reward should match with the needs of the worker. Because positive reinforcers differ among
individuals. Managers must therefore either develop a reward system that is appropriate for all the members of
their workgroup or tailor their rewards to suit each individual.

NEGATIVE REINFORCEMENT EXPLAINED

This is also known as AVOIDANCE LEARNING. Negative reinfiorcers takes place when individuals learn to
avoid or escape from unpleasant consequences. Much lawful behaviour in our society is based on avoidance
learning. For e.g., people learn to drive carefully to avoid accidents. In the workplace, avoidance learning
usually occurs when peers or supervisors criticize an individual's actions.

Negative reinforcement relies on avoidance of punishment or the threat of punishment. For instance, we learn to
watch for traffic when crossing streets, and we learn to bundle up on cold days to avoid accidents and to protect
ourselves from cold. However, punishment or threat of punishment is not implied in any of these actions. In
work environment, training, safety warning, orientation sessions and counseling help alert employees against
negative consequences of undesirable behaviour. When coupled with positive reinforcement for appropriate
behaviour, the effect can be extremely useful.

EXTINCTION EXPLAINED

It is an effective method of controlling undesirable behaviour. It refers to non- reinforcement. It is based on the
principle that if a response is not reinforced, it will eventually disappear. The absence of all forms of
reinforcement is used to remove or extinguish undesirable behaviour. A disruptive employee who, for e.g., picks
fights and is apparently punished by the supervisor may continue the disruptions because of the attention they
bring. By ignoring or isolating the disruptive employee, attention is withheld and possibly also the motivation
for fighting.

PUNISHMENT EXPLAINED

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Through punishment, managers try to correct improper behaviour of subordinates by providing negative
consequences. Giving harsh criticism, denying privileges, demoting, and reducing an individual's freedom to do
his or her job are common forms of punishment in the workplace. Punishment is the historic method of reducing
or eliminating undesirable behaviour. Sometimes, punishment frustrates the punished and leads to antagonism
towards the punishing manager or supervisor. As a result, the effectiveness of the punishing agent diminishes
over a period of time. Because of the possible dangers of punishment, it should be administered properly. The
following points in this regard deserve to be noted: -

1. The specific undesired behaviour, not the person, should be punished. If it is directed at the person,
punishment will receive revenge.

2. The punishment should be enough to extinguish the undesired behaviour. Under punishment may not deter the
behaviour; over punishment may produce unrealistic results.
3. Punishment should be administered privately By administering the punishment in front of others, the worker
is doubly punished in the sense that he loses face in the eyes of coworkers and the management.
4. Punishment should quickly follow the act- It is more effective when applied immediately after the
undesirable behaviour is produced. Further, punishment should follow every occurrence of the undesirable
behaviour.
5. Punishment is effective in modifying behaviour if it forces the person to select a desirable behaviour that is
reinforced. If this is not done, the undesirable behaviour tends to reappear causing fear and anxiety in the
person being punished.
6. Punishment must be administered carefully so that it does not become a reward for undesirable behaviour.

SCHEDULES OF REINFORCEMENT

Reinforcement always does not follow a particular response. For e.g., studying hard for examinations sometimes
yields high grades, and at other times, it may not be so- Another example could be, sometimes-keeping top
performance in one's job may result in high praise and recognition, but it may not be always praised and
recognised. Therefore one can say that reinforcement follows certain definite rules. These rules are known as
schedules of reinforcement. The influence of schedules was systematically studied by B.F.SKINNER and co-
workers there are four (4) distinct schedules of reinforcement- they are as follows: -

Interval Ratio

Fixed Interval Fixed Ratio

Fixed
Variable Interval Variable Ratio
Variable

1. Fixed interval schedule

This schedule demands that a fixed amount of time have to elapse before reinforcement is administered. In
many organisations, monetary reinforcement comes at the end of a period of time- Most workers are paid hourly,
weekly or monthly for the time spent on their jobs- This method offers the least motivation for hard work among
workers because pay tied to time interval rather than actual performance. The occurrence of reinforcement
depends largely on the passage of time

2.Variable Time Schedule

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The availability of reinforcement is also controlled mainly by the passage of time in a variable interval
schedule. In some cases, reinforcement can be obtained after a short period has passed. In others, a much longer
interval must elapse before it again becomes available. As a result of such uncertainty, variable interval
schedule of reinforcement yields moderate and steady rates of response. Suppose a plant manager visits the
Shop floor at 1100 hrs, everyday (fixed interval), performance tends to be high just prior to his visit and
thereafter it declines. Under variable interval schedule, the manager visits at random intervals and none knows
for sure when the manager visits. As a result, performance tends to be higher and there would be less
fluctuations than under the fixed interval schedule

3.Fixed ratio schedule

In this case, rewards are showered after a fixed or constant number of responses. For e.g., piece rate incentive
plan is a fixed ratio schedule. It tends to produce high rate of response which is both vigorous and steady.

Workers try to produce as many as pieces as possible in order to pocket the monetary rewards. Therefore, the
response level here is significantly higher than obtained under an interval schedule.

4.Variable ratio schedule

When the reward varies relative to the behaviour of the individual, he is reinforced on a variable ratio schedule.
Salespersons on commission represent examples of individuals on such a reinforcement schedule. On some
occasions, they make a sale after only two calls on potential customers. On other occasions, they might need to
make twenty or more calls to secure a sale. The reward then, is variable in relation to the members of successful
calls the salesperson makes.

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LESSON NO. 10

ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE AND DESIGN

A structure consists of 3 components, namely, 1) Complexity, 2) Formalisation, and 3)Centralisation. Each of it

is explained below:-

1. COMPLEXITY EXPLAINED

It has 3 differentiations namely, a) The Horizontal Differentiation, b) The vertical Differentiation, and c) The
Spatial Differentiation. Each of which is explained below

a) HORIZONTAL DIFFERENTIATION

Refers to the degree of differentiation between units based on the orientation of members, the nature of the tasks
they perform, and their education and training. The larger the number of different operations within an
organisation that require specialised knowledge and skills, the more horizontally complex that organisation is,
because diverse orientations make it more difficult for organisational members to communicate and more
difficult for managements to coordinate their activities.

b) VERTICAL DIFFERENTIATION

Vertical Differentiation is the depth of the organisational hierarchy. When differentiation increases, complexity
increases as the number of hierarchical levels in the organisation increases. The more levels are there between
top management and operations. The greater the potential for communication distortion, the more difficult it is to
coordinate the decisions of the managerial personnel and the more difficult it is
for top management to oversee closely the actions of operatives.

Vertical and Horizontal differentiation are not independent of one another. Vertical differentiation may be
viewed as a response to an increase in the Horizontal Differentiation. As work is split into smaller parts, it
becomes increasingly necessary to coordinate tasks.

c) SPATIAL DIFFERENTIATION

Refers to the degree to which the location of an organisation's facilities and personnel are geographically
dispersed. The more that an organisation is differentiated along these dimensions, the more complex it is.

2. FORMALISATION

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It means the degree to which jobs within the organisation is highly formalised, then the job incumbent has a
minimum amount of discretion over that is to be done, and how it is to be done. Employees in that case know
how exactly to handle inputs and produce uniform output. The kind of job that people are engaged in also helps
and influences the degree of formalisation. Jobs in the production area are most formalised, whereas those in the
Sales area or R and D cannot be made formal to the same degree, because production involves repetitive
activities, but sales department must be flexible in order to respond to changes in the market place and
environment. Similarly, research activity is made flexible if it has to be innovative.

3.CENTRALISATION
It refers to the degree to which decision making is concentrated at a single point in the organisation. It includes
formal authority. If the top management makes the organisation's key decisions with little input from lower

level personnel, then the organisation is centralised. On the other hand, the more the lower level personnel
provide input, the more decentralised the organisation.

FORCES DETERMINING AN ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE

The following forces have been identified as determinants of an organisation's structure: -

1. SIZE

Size influences structure. As an organisation hires more operations, it will derive more economic benefits from
specialisation. As a result. Horizontal differentiation will be increased, and so also vertical differentiation to
coordinate the horizontally differentiating units This expansion in size will result in spatial differentiation. All
these increases in complexity in top management's abilities to supervise directly the activities within the
organisation. Formal rules and regulations will replace the control through direct surveillance. This increase in
formalisation may be accompanied by still greater vertical differentiation as management creates new units to
coordinate the expanding and diverse activities of organisation! members- Finally, as the top management is
further removed from the operating level, it becomes difficult for senior executives to take quick decisions. The
solution lies in substituting decentralised decision making for Centralisation. There is a strong inverse
relationship between size and centralisation. In a small organisation it is possible for management to exercise
control by keeping decisions centralised. As size increases, management is physically unable to exercise control
in the manner and is forced to decentralise.

2. TECHNOLOGY

The word Technology has 2 roots, namely ,1) Techno, and 2)Logos. Technology consists of skill of hand or
techniques , whereas Logos stands for Knowledge. Technology has 1)Technoware , 2) Humanware ,
3)Infoware. Technology is a body of particular type of knowledge and relates to direct problem solving
intervention . It consists of equipment's, machines or tools ,sets of activities, methods or processes, arrangements
or patterns. In other words, the technology refers to how an organisation transfers its inputs into outputs. Every
organisation has one or more technologies for converting financial, human, and physical resources into
productivity use.

Technology has certain general features., such as specialisation, integration, discontinuity, and change. As
technology increases specialisation also tends to increase. As work is split up into smaller parts, integration is
required to put them back together again to make a whole product, a whole organisation, and a whole society.
The integration is more difficult in a high technology society than in a low technology society, because high
technology tends to make the system more complex and make its parts more interdependent. The technology
revolution produces an associated social revolution. Technology is moving so fast that it is creating social
problems long before society could develop solutions. At the plant level, new forms of organisation, new ways

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of supervision, new compensation structures, and many more changes are required to absorb technology.
More mobility is needed to absorb technology.

As technology changes, jobs also change. Technology needs more professional, scientific and other technical
personnel to keep the system going. In most sophisticated plants the ratio of white collar to blue collar
employees has increased. Technology upgrades the skill and intellectual inputs of the total workforce.

3. ENVIRONMENT

An organizations environment represents anything outside the organisation itself. The environment is composed
of these institutions or forces that affect the performance of the organisation, but over which the organisation has
little control. These include suppliers, government regulatory agencies and so on.

Organisations must adapt to their environments if they are to succeed because organisations are dependent on
their environments if they are to survive. Changing environments produce uncertainties if management cannot
predict in what ways their environments are moving. By changing the organisation's structure the management
can change environmental uncertainty

Formalisation and environmental uncertainty are inversely related. Stable and certain environments lead to high
formalisation because stable environments create a minimal need for rapid response.

The environment also affects centralisation. If the environment is large and multi-faceted, it becomes difficult
for management to monitor. As a result, the structure become decentralized. It is for this reason the marketing
function in organisations is decentralized. Decentralization allows for more rapid response.

4. POWER CONTROL

Size , technology ,and environment cannot explain filly an organisation's structure. Power and politics can
explain why an organisation’s is what it is. Power control explanation states an organisation's structure is the
result of a power struggle by internal constituents who are seeking to future their interests. Like all decision is
organisations, the structural decision is not fully rational. Managers do not necessarily choose that alternative
that will maximise the organisation’s interest. There is much room for the decision -maker to manoeuver. The
power control position argues that those in power will choose a structure that will maintain their control.

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LESSON NO. 11

POWER, AUTHORITY, AND CONTROL MECHANISM

POWER

Power is the ability to influence other's behaviour. Power, from an organisation's point of view, is the degree of
influence an individual has in decision making, without being authorised by the organisations to do so.
Therefore, power is extra-organisational in nature. For E.g., in political organisations, a close relative of a high
up may influence decisions of that high up without having any sanction from the organisation.

Power is not only one's influence over decision-making, but also it limits the scope of actual decision making

TYPES OF POWER

This is also known as Bases of power or springs from which power flows.

1. THE LEGITIMATE POWER

This is positive power or official power. It comes from the rules of the organisation. It gives leaders the power to
control resources and to reward and punish others. People accept this power because they believe it is desirable
and necessary to maintain order and discipline in a society.

2. CHARISMATIC POWER

This is the power of attraction and devotion, the desire of one person to admire another person. The leaders have
a personal magnetism, an air of confidence and a belief in objectives. Joan of Arc, Mahatma Gandhi, and
Subhash Chandra Bose are examples.

3. EXPERT POWER

This is also known as the authority of knowledge, which comes as a result of one's specialised learning. This is
the power of knowledge and skill of special kind that are important in getting the job done. A person's
professional competence or knowledge gives him the expert power- His credibility increases. He can lead other
persons to trust his judgement and decisions.

4. REWARD POWER

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This comes from authority. The leader has the power to give tangible rewards such as promotion, attractive work
assignments, psychological rewards etc. The subordinate has to believe that he has access to higher authorities .
This reward power can also increase the leader's charismatic and legitimate power.

5.COERCIVE POWER

This power comes from authority. It is the ability to threaten or punish. The leader can give tangible
punishments like dismissals, demotion, low rating etc. Self-esteem of a subordinate increases because of reward
power and decreases because of punishment or coercive power.

6.POLITICAL POWER

It arises from a leader's ability to work with people and social systems to gain allegiance and support. It develops
in all organisations. There are a number of tactics that leaders can use to gain political power. For e.g., if you do
something for me, I will do something for you. It relies on the norm of reciprocity in society where two persons
in a continuing relationship feels a strong obligation to repay their social debts. When these trade- off are
successful, both parties get something they want.

AUTHORITY

MAX WEBER defines authority, as the willing and unconditional compliance of people, resting upon their
belief that it is legitimate for superior to impose his will on them and illegitimate for them to refuse to obey. It
can be defined as legitimate right to give orders and get orders obeyed.

CHARACTERISTICS OF AUTHORITY

1. There is existence of RIGHT in authority

2. The RIGHT of giving order is legitimate
3. Authority gives a right to decision making.
4. A person with authority influences the behaviour of others that might otherwise not take place.
5. Exercising authority is subjective.

SOURCES OF AUTHORITY

There are 3 theories, namely, the Formal Authority Theory, the Acceptance Theory, and the Competence
Theory. Let us discuss each of them-

1. FORMAL AUTHORITY THEORY

Authority does not vest in a managerial position. It is delegated from the top management. For e.g., a supervisor
in production department gets authority from the production manager, a CEO gets from the Board of Directors
or owners. In the Indian situation of public limited companies, owners have some limitations of authority.
Similarly , a manager has limited authority delegated by his superior.

2. ACCEPTANCE THEORY

The essence of this theory is that people differ in the degree of effort they contribute to achieve the objectives of
the organisation. The degree of effective authority possessed by the manager is measured by the willingness of
subordinates to accept it- There are numerous problems in this theory. A manager will not know whether the

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subordinate will accept the order. For e.g., For a manger to be successful, he needs both leadership and
authority.

3. COMPETENCE THEORY

There is a feeling that authority is generated by personal competencies. URWICK identifies formal authority as
being conferred by organisation, technical authority as being implicit in special knowledge or skill and personal
authority as being conferred by seniority or popularity.

LIMITATIONS OF AUTHORITY

In an organisation, the quantum of authority decreases at successively lower levels. K is maximum at the highest
level, and minimum at the lowest level. The authority is not absolute. It is subject to various social, legal,

political, and economic factors. Similarly, the use of authority by a superior over his subordinate is restricted by
various factors.

Limits of authority at various level in an organisation

Highest Level

Extent of Authority

Limits of
Authority

Lowest Level

DIFFERENCESBETWEEN POWER AND AUTHORITY

Both power and authority, no doubt, has the objective of influencing the behaviour of others, but they are not
synonymous . Power is q question of one's capability to exert influence in getting the desired result. Power has
no legal sanctity, while authority does. Both have different mount of legitimacy. Authority is institution and
legitimate, while power is personal and carries little legitimacy. Authority is delegated by higher management,
while power is earned and gained by leaders on the basis of their leadership and personality, activities, and in
situations

HOW TO CONTROL O.B.?

Organisations are primarily people oriented. Through people, organisations achieve their established and
predetermined goals. Organisations regulate the behaviour of their people through the process of control. There
is a distinction between CONTROL and CONTROLS. The latter is not simply the plural of the former.
CONTROL is normative in approach, whereas CONTROLS deals with measurement, information, analysis and
operation. CONTROL sets the direction, deals with the expectations of behaviour and performance.
CONTROLS are a means to achieve CONTROL at the end. CONTROL is the process of bringing congruence of

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the gap between the desired and actual state of things in the organisation. It can be taken at any stage -
individual level, group level or organisational level.

WHY CONTROL?

While it is true that in natural social units like a family or community, there is in-built control mechanism, and,
therefore, members fulfil their obligations by carrying on the activities of the units. In organisations, just
because there is a structure of roles, responsibilities, and relation ships they do not automatically contribute to
organisational objectives. The organisations must devise ways and means to achieve conformity of behaviour to
certain specified standards.

PRE REQUISITES OF CONTROL

1. Control should bring about set performance.

2. Therefore, establish a performance standard
3. Communicate the standard to all concerned both orally and in writing.
4. Establish reward and reinforcement systems to support the compliance of behaviour.
5. Study the organisational needs, and try to bring about a fit between the two needs of organisation and the
individual.

MEANS OF CONTROL

According to A.ETZIONI, who has authored the book - MODERN ORGANISATIONS, 1964, an organisation
can apply 3 types of sanctions for controlling behaviour. Sanctions are a kind of rewards and penalties, which
can be applied on individuals or groups to induce people to conform to norms. The 3 types of sanctions are as
follows.

1. PHYSICAL SANCTIONS

This is a kind of coercive power, which includes inflicting pain, restricting movement etc. This is generally
applied at lower levels of employees because they are not largely self motivated. Such people will have to be
coerced to move towards corporate goals. For e.g., dismissals, suspensions, demotion etc.

2. MATERIAL SANCTIONS

These are just the opposite of physical sanctions. These are based on the control and allocation of material
resources and rewards. People perceive benefits when material sanctions are applied, and, therefore, conform to
the expected behaviour. These type of sanctions are common in most of the organisations. Carrot-and-stick
policy in organisations, role of money, and other material awards and rewards at the lower level of employees
become more important.

3. SYMBOLIC SANCTIONS

These sanctions are not a threat to the employees. There is no claim on material rewards too. But, symbolic
sanctions are quite important for those who receive them. These are applied at higher levels of employees who
get psychological satisfaction. Such symbols may be normative like prestige and esteem, love and acceptance
etc.
REMEMBER the use of various sanctions is determined by the possession of power and authority, which are
influencing factors in controlling behaviour. Modem organisations do not like to employ sanctions for

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controlling behaviour. They employ proper leadership, communication, and organisational
climate.

POWER DISTANCE
People are different from one another because of variations in the physical, mental and intellectual capabilities.
This in turn creates differences in wealth and power. According to HOFSTEDE, who used the term POWER
DISTANCE, in societies the inequalities in power and wealth can be measured to the extent to which a society
accepts the fact that power and wealth is unequally distributed. A high power distance society accepts large and
wide differences in institutions and organisations. Employees show a great deal of respect for those in authority.
Designations, ranks and status carry weight. When negotiating in certain countries (where high power distance is
a means to get things done specially) organisations find it negotiable if they send their representatives having
status with those having similar status and recognition. India is one country where there is high power distance.
Examples of DENMARK, AUSTRIA can be cited where there is low power distance.
In simple language, POWER DISTANCE means "WILLING ACCEPTANCE OF UNEQUAL POWER".

LESSON NO. 12

MANAGEMENT OF CONFLICT OR CONFLICT IN ORGANISATION

INTRODUCTION

Conflict is a basic fact of life in groups and organisations. The raison d' etre for conflicts to arise is the
emergence of organisations. First of all, organisations are people oriented. These people have different
personalities and psyches, and so are their perceptions, and values. Next, the assignments of jobs have
contrasting characteristics, there is some inequality in status, and competition takes place. Finally, organisations
have scare resources even for which to get possession, competition occurs. Thus, one can say with all the
authority under one's belt, conflicts are unavoidable in organisations. Wherever there is social interaction and
social interdependence conflicts are bound to arise, and it is just natural. However, only some conflicts are
beneficial, while others are not beneficial to organisations. A manager must understand such situations of
conflict, and deal with it appropriately. The whole idea is to manage conflicts in such a way so as to achieve
both individual and organisational goals. The point to be emphasised is that social conflict,
both good and bad, is normal and a recurring phenomenon of our social system.

MEANING OF CONFLICT

We must, first of all, understand that conflict occurs in various situations \ background \ settings. It is generally
understood as a kind of controversy, clash, strife etc.. Generally speaking, conflict appears to be a disagreement,
contradiction, and incompatibility. According to VSP RAO, and PS NARAYANA - Authors of
ORGANISATION THEORY AND BEHAVIOUR, Published by VIKAS PUBLISHING HOUSE P.LTD. '
CONFLICT IS A PROCESS IN WHICH AN EFFORT IS PURPOSEFULLY MADE BY ONE PERSON OR
UNIT TO BLOCK ANOTHER THAT RESULTS IN FRUSTRATING THE ATTAINMENT OF HIS OR HER
INTERESTS".

FEATURES OF CONFLICT

1. When 2 or more parties pursue mutually incompatible goals, conflicts arise.

2. If 2 parties or more have perspectives differing from one another, conflicts occur. In other words, perceptions
differ.
3. Sometimes, deliberate behaviour also brings about conflict.
4. Conflicts could be hidden or surface up.

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5. Conflicts and competition are not one and the same. In a conflict, one side interferes with the other's
opportunity to acquire resources or perform activities. In competition, both sides try to win, but neither side
actively interferes with the other.

VIEWS ON CONFLICT

There are 3 Schools of Thought on Conflict. They are 1) Classical, 2) Behavioural, and 3) Inter-actionist.

According to the Classical School, conflict if found in organisations is an abnormality, and it will prove to be a
dangerous process. Conflict induces mainly negative outcomes such as, anger, confusion, lack of cooperation
etc.

The Behavioural school is of the view that Conflict is harmful, and it must be avoided at all costs. Those who
generate conflict are trouble makers and were bad for the organisation. However, even this school of Thought
viewed that conflicts are natural occurrences in organisations.

The Inter - actionist school of thought views that in some cases, conflicts are helpful, facilitative, and functional-
Conflict is not an organisational abnormality. On the other hand, it is a normal feature of social intercourse. It is a
fact of life that must be understood, rather than fought. This School further says that conflict is neither good nor bad
for organisations. Even the so-called perfect organisations also come across conflicting situations. This school is of
the view that conflict is not only inevitable, but also desirable. If there is no conflict, there is no change, and no
innovation. That means organisations are apathetic and static, both of which are detrimental.

POSITIVE CONCEQUENCES OF CONFLICT

1. Conflicts are major catalysts and activators of change in organisations. When there is conflict, the effort of
organisations would be diverted to look for and search for new solutions.
2. Sometimes, groups present consensus decisions, which are not necessarily optimal, rational. If conflicts are
found there, then the whole course of decision may change to be in favour of organisations,
3. Conflict arouses interest and curiosity- When there is an open disagreement, people tend to put forward
imaginative solutions. Conflicts also help people to learn and develop themselves.
4. When we observe inter group conflict and competition, chances are that the groups are brought closer together,
instead of deviating from one another. In many situations, if these groups have to face a common enemy,
then organisational groups show up with internal unity.
5. Conflict is necessary to organisational life. It helps balance power relationships between departments.

NEGATIVE CONSEQUENCES OF CONFLICT

1. Any conflict for that matter builds stress in people. Losers feel alienated. A climate of mistrust and suspicion
develops.

2. When there is conflict, we also observe diversion of energy. All the efforts wilt be directed towards winning
the conflict, rather than move towards accomplishment of corporate goals. Narrow interests prevail. Long
term goals are forgotten.

3. When there is intense conflict, people shy away from active collaboration, resulting in tension build up, and
communication breakdowns.

CONFLICT AS A SERIES OF STAGES

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L.R.PONDY, in his article - ORGANISATIONAL CONFLICT: CONCEPTS AND MODELS, published in the
ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUARTERLY, VOL.12, 1967, outlines conflict in various stages namely,
LATENT CONFLICT, PERCEIVED CONFLICT, FELT CONFLICT, and CONFLICT AFTERMATH. He
advocates that conflict to be understood as a dynamic process, thus indicating a series of events. It can be
diagrammatically shown as under: -

Aftermath of Preceding
Conflict of Episode

Latent Conflict Environmental

Effects

Organisational Felt Conflict Perceived Suppression &

& Extra Conflict Attention Focus
Organisational Mechanism
Tension
Manifest Conflict Availability of
Strategic Conflict
Conditions Resolution
Mechanism

Conflict
Aftermath

Now, the explanation of the above diagram.

1. LATENT CONFLICT

Each episode begins with a latent conflict. The sources are within the organisation. Competition for scarce
resources, for positions in the organisation, role conflict etc. However, it has not surfaced up. The conflict is
hidden. These are the antecedent conditions for conflicts to come on surface. So, there is anticipation of conflict.

2. PERCEIVED CONFLICT

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Here, basic sources such as those listed in the patent conflict are not there. Conflicts arise in this stage,
purely due to misunderstanding, which can be improved by improving the communication between the parties
differing in perception.

3. FELT CONFLICT

This arises as a result of disagreement over interpretation. In this stage, conflict will not arise unless the
differences become personalized or internalized.

4. MANIFEST CONFLICT

This is the stage for open confrontation. There could be the negative consequences such as open aggression,
sabotage, apathy, withdrawal - all leading towards organisational ineffectiveness.

5. CONFLICT AFTERMATH

The aftermath of a conflict could be either positive or negative depending upon how the conflict is resolved. If it is
genuinely resolved, it can lead to a more enduring and cooperative relationship between organisational participants.
If, on the other hand, a conflict is merely suppressed but not resolved, the latent conditions of conflict may be
aggravated, and explode in more violent and serious forms. This legacy is called as
CONFLICT AFTERMATH.

ANALYSING CONFLICT

According to VSP RAO and PS NARAYANA, authors of ORGANISATIONAL THEORY AND

BEHAVIOUR, a conflict could be analysed as under. A Diagrammatic sketch is given below: -

Conflict

Individual Group Level Organisational

Conflict Conflict Level Conflict

INTER INTRA INTER INTRA INTER INTRA

INDIVIDUAL LEVEL CONFLICT

Under this, we cover two levels - 1) Inter individual conflict, and 2) Intra individual conflict-

Intra individual conflict is internal to the person and it is quite difficult to analyse. Every one of us has some
needs. To fulfil these needs, we join organisations. If needs are not fulfilled, then frustration begins, and leads to

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negative behaviour, which, in turn, will affect job performance. If the individual goals and organisational
goals are not integrated then, there is incongruity, in which case an individual faces a conflict within himself. He
faces dilemmaic situations. Basically, Intra individual conflict arises due to divergent goals, or arising from out
of multiple roles to be played daily.

Sometimes, an individual faces goal conflict, and role conflict. Goal conflict arises when an individual faces a
goal, which has both positive and negative features or when 2 or more competing goals exist. Goal conflict has
got 3 types, each of which is explained below

1. APPROACH-APPROACH CONFLICT

A person wants two positive situations, but can have only one. The person might be torn between two lucrative
jobs.

2. APPROACH-AVOIDANCE CONFLICT

In this form of goal conflict, the person wants to achieve a goal that has both positive and negative aspects. For
e.g., a marketing executive may get enhanced status in an unpleasant station of posting. A student may work
hard to get a top position in an examination, but it is accompanied by several sacrifices.

3. AVOIDANCE-AVOIDANCE CONFLICT

Here, a person is faced with2 negative goals. He may not choose either of them. He may simply leave them
situation. For e.g., a person may dislike his job, but he has no alternate job.

Now coming to the role conflict, it is the result of divergent role expected of a person on the job. A role is a set
of expectations people have about the behaviour of a person in a position. An individual occupies many different
position s in a variety of organisations and perform multiple roles. Professors may be teachers, researchers,
consultants, community leaders etc. A supervisor is a link between top management and lower level employees.
He has to manage people reporting to him, and he is himself managed by his superior. Thus, he has multiple
roles to perform. In such situations, role conflicts arise.

Role ambiguity is another feature. Ambiguity is said to occur when an individual is not too sure of his duties and
responsibilities. As a result, he is not able to enact the role. When employees are not clear about their duties and
responsibilities, job performance is affected.

Role conflict results in psychological stress leading to emotional problems.

In order to resolve role conflict, participative management techniques help. Persuasion can also help to bring
subordinate's goals nearer to organisational goals. However, it must be remembered that role conflict cannot be
planned away.

INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT

As the heading itself suggests, it is between one person and the other, one department and the other. Each person
is pressurising to acquire some scarce resources. Interpersonal conflicts arise due to personality differences,
different perceptions, changing values and interests, differences in power and status, and when resources are
scarce.

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INTERGROUP CONFLICT

Most of the departments in the organisations compete for allocation of scarce resources and power. Inter group
conflicts over authority and jurisdiction are also quite common. Sources of Inter group conflict are 1) Incompatible
goals, 2) Task interdependence, 3) Resource allocation, 4)Competitive incentives and rewards, and 5) Line and staff
conflicts, 6)Differences in perception and values, and finally, 7) Heterogeneity of members.

INTRA ORGANISATIONAL CONFLICT

Normally, within an organisation, 3 kinds of strains can be seen and experienced. They are 1) The Horizontal
strain, 2) The Vertical strain, and 3) The line and staff conflict.,

The horizontal strain refers to conflict between employees or departments at the same hierarchical level in an
organisation. Sometimes, when one department is interdependent functionally on another dependent, any
breakdown in the performance of one may affect the performance of the other, in which case the strain is bound
to occur.

The vertical strain occurs as a result of superior-subordinate relations going awry. This may be due to inadequate
communication, and a lack of shared perceptions of members at various levels.

The Line and staff conflict is inherent in the very concept itself. The concept says that various functions could be
split into 2 categories, namely, hierarchical, and nonhierarchical. Line manager's look down upon staff
specialists. They consider the latter to be impediments. The staff specialists complain that the line managers
don't heed to their advice, and will use their services as a last resort. Line managers hold the view that staff
specialists oversteps its authority. There are many other differences between these two structures, such as line
managers resent new ideas, and they do not support and implement even the best of ideas offered by the staff
specialists.

INTER ORGANISATIONAL CONFLICT

The bases of inter group conflict are essentially the same as for inter organisational conflict. They are 1)
Incompatible objectives and 2) conflicts over status, prestige and money. However, inter organisational conflict
is more extensive, more diffuse than the conflict of persons or groups.

When one organisation is in conflict with another organisation. It helps both the organisations in 4 ways: -

1. Individuals join together under a common bond to fight for values dear to their organisation.
2. Objectives and values change to that extent so as to fight out the organisation that is in conflict with our
organisation.
3. Making organisational members aware of the strategy and tactics of the antagonist.
4. It acts as an agency of social control.

When do we say that two organisations are in conflict? There are 3 conditions, which explains the above
features. They are as under-
1. Each of the organisations must be present in the image of the responsible decision maker of the other.
Simply stated, if one organisation does not know the other organisation, a conflict cannot exist until each
tries to know the other.
2. A decision on the part of one organisation must affect the other organisation significantly. Two organisations,
which are not in competition, cannot be in conflict.
3. Whenever two organisations are expanding into a common field, so that possession of part of the field by
one excludes the other, conflict is possible.

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MANAGEMENT OF CONFLICT

There are 2 types of conflict, namely, 1) Constructive, and 2) Destructive. There is enormous disagreement over
the consequential effects of conflict on the social system. One school of thought seems to view conflict as
undesirable since it inevitably leads to disruption of the social system. An opposite view considers social conflict
essential to the effective functioning of every social system. In fact, neither view is absolutely accurate. Some
conflict and deviance disrupts the system, and other instances of conflict and deviance are beneficial to the
system. Discriminating between the two, however, is no simple task.

Social conflict also aids group cohesiveness by providing an outlet for hostility. If it does not, then the group
members will become apathetic or drop out of group membership. As group members shed their inhibitions
about expressing negative feelings, they develop stronger ties to their group membership. A group whose
members continuously argue over ideas and issues can be very productive.

According to SAMUEL DEEP - Author of HUMAN RELATIONS IN MANAGEMENT, published by

GLENCOE PUBLISHING CO., CALIF. 1978, P.212, constructive and destructive conflicts can be identified
with the help of following table

CONSTRACTIVE CONFLICT WHEN DESTRUCTIVE CONFLICT WHEN

1. Problems are brought out, identified and
clarified.
2. Group think is avoided.
3. Creativity is promoted.
4. More taught goes into ideas. Individual
effort is estimulated.
5. Encourage group cohesiveness and
provides for a system of checks and
balances within organisation.
Too much stress is created for individual.
Group decision making becomes week.
Cooperation is replaced by infighting
Focus on short range goes at the cost of long range goals.
Goals are distorted and resolution of conflict is viewed as
WIN-LOSE, rather than as WIN-WIN.

There are 2 ways to deal with conflict in an effective way. They are - to create and stimulate constructive
conflict, and to resolve destructive conflict.

CONFLICT STIMULATION TECHNIQUE

We must realise that conflict is not always negative. Its positive features are very many, on which one has to lay
stress. Man looks for challenges both as an individual, and as part of a social group. If there is no novelty, there
is no gain. A manager must determine the optimal level of conflict stimulation, rather than attempt at minimum
conflict. When to stimulate situations in which conflict is too low generally involve people who are afraid to
"ROCK THE BOAT", as the proverb goes. They passively accept things the way they are. There is too much
lethargy, lack of disagreement as group members tolerate each other's weaknesses. If managers are surrounded
by sycophants and "YES" men, and managers believe in maintaining peace, cooperation at all costs. And always
work for consensus decisions, lack of new ideas and employees show high resistance to change them, we have to
presume that all such situations require stimulation of conflict.

According to S.P.ROBBINS, author of "CONFLICT MANAGEMENT AND CONFLICT RESOLUTION,

communication among group members stimulate conflict. Ambiguous or threatening messages encourages

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conflict. Rumours, if plantedvintellugenly, also help in stimulating conflict. Secondly, disturbing the
status quo of organisations by bringing outsiders also helps. Thirdly, restructuring the organisation so that new
entrants or responsibilities will create uncertainty is also a way to stimulate conflict. Fourthly, encourage
competition.

TECHNIQUES OF CONFLICT RESOLUTION

Following are some of the frequently employed techniques:-

1. DOMINANCE THROUGH POSITION

He simplest technique is, of course, elimination of other party. That is to say, to force the opponent to give up
fighting. Conflicting parties are told to maintain calmness and composure, an appearance of grace and drop the
fight. Groups are not allowed to interact with each other. However, it should be noted that it is not always
possible to effectively resolve interdepartmental conflicts through dominance or use
of positional authority.

2 APPEALS PROCEDURE

This is a conventional method. It is the people in disagreement who approach higher authority to help them
arrive at a solution.

3. LIAISON GROUPS / INTERMEDIARIES

It is possible to reduce interdepartmental conflicts by setting up special liaisons between the conflicting
departments. Sometimes, outside consultant are brought to act as arbitrators.

4. MEMBER ROTATION

By rotating members between interdependent departments creates an atmosphere where the new comer can
exchange his views with others. Role reversal or empathy helps them in removing misunderstandings and thus
reduce conflict.

5. REDUCE INTERDEPENDENCE

Where 2 departments have to work in an interdependent fashion and share scarce resources, there is potential for
conflict. In this situation, interdependence will have to be reduced. But how this can be achieved? Departments
be provided with resources and inventories that are independent of those provided for other departments, but this
is expensive. Sometimes, formal integration can be achieved to facilitate coordination and smooth workflow.

6. SUPERORDINATE GOALS

Superordinate goals are goals common to all the parties and hence pooling of resources are required.
Superordinate goals demand interdependence and cooperation between departments. I n that case, opposing
parties work together harmoniously to achieve the common purpose.

7. IDENTIFYING A COMMON ENEMY

" A STRONG ENEMY IS A UNIFYING FORCE" is the principle underlying this method of resolving conflict.
When there is a common threat and overriding common purpose of victory or survival, then the opposing parties
forget their differences and join hands to combat the situation.

THOMPSON'S APPROACH TO CONFLICT RESOLUTION

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There are 5 styles as given in the following diagram. They are - 1) Competing, 2) Collaborating, 3) Avoiding,
4) Accommodating and 5) Compromising.. Under Assertive style. Competing and collaborating techniques are
included, while under Non-assertive style. Avoiding and Accommodating are included. In between these two
classifications lie compromising.

Assertive Competing Collaborating

Compromising

Nonassertive Avoiding Accommodating

COMPETING .. This is power-oriented, and relies on punishment, fights, arguments.

COLLABORATING .. This is WIN-WIN style. There is open sharing of information, and listening. All
alternatives are considered. Both parties get benefit of a permanent nature.

AVOIDING.. This style brings about withdrawal, indifference, apathy, and detachment.
ACCOMODATING .. In this style, parties are generous, and self-sacrificing. Emphasis is on common interests.
Deemphasis on differences.
COMPROMISING.. This style is traditional. Nobody wins. There is give- and- take in this style. That is,
LOSE-LOSE style.
Five style of Conflict Management

Conflict-Hand, Appropriate Conditions

Style
Competing 1. When quick, decisive action is vital ( e.g. emergencies.)
2. On important issues when unpopular actions need implementing (cost cutting, enforcing
unpopular rules, discipline).
3. On issues vital to company welfare when you know you are right.
4. Against people who lake advantage of noncompetitive behavior.

Collaborating 1. To find an integrative solution when both sets of concerns ore too important to be
compromised.
2 . When your objective is to learn. -
3. To merge insight* from people with different perspectives.
4. To gain commitment by incorporating concerns into a consensus.
5. To work through feelings that hove interfered with a relationship.

Compromising 1. When goats ore important but not worm m" effort or potential disruption of more assertive
modes.
2. When opponents with equal power are committed to mutually exclusive goals.
3. To achieve temporary settlements to complex issues.
4. To arrive at expedient solutions under time pressure.
5. As o backup when collaboration or competition is unsuccessful.

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Avoiding 1. When an issue is trivial or more important issue are pressing.
2. When you perceive no chance of satisfying your concerns.
3. When potential disruption outweighs m benefits of resolution.
4. To let people cool down and regain perspective.
5. When gathering information supersedes immediate decision.
6. When others can resolve the conflict more effectively.
7. When issues seem tangential or symptomatic or other issues.

Accommodating 1. When you find you ore wrong-to allow a better position to be heard, to learn, and to show
your reasonableness.
2. When issues are more important to others than to yourself-to satisfy others and maintain
cooperation.
3. 16 build social credits for later issues.
4. To minimize loss when you ore outmatched and losing.
5. When harmony and stability ore especially important.
6. To allow employee to develop by learning from mistakes.

LESSON NO. 13

ORGANISATIONAL CLIMATE AND CULTURE

(This lesson is being dealt with under 2 parts. The first part deals with the CLIMATE, while the second part
deals with the CULTURE)

PART ONE: ORGANISATIONAL CLIMATE

INTRODUCTION

Organisational climate is a set of characteristics that describe an organisation and that distinguishes one
organisation from another, and are relatively enduring over a period of time and influence the behaviour of
people in the organisations. It is the summary perception which people have about the organisation. Thus, it is
the global expression of what is organisation is.

Organisation climate is thus, THE MANIFESTATION OF ATTITUDES OF ORGANISATIONAL MEMBERS

TOWARD THE ORGANISATION ITSELF. An organisation tends to attract and keep people who fit its
climate, so that its pattern is perpetuated atleast to some extent. Organisation climate is a very important factor to
be considered in studying and analysing organisations because it has a profound influence on the outlook, well
being and attitudes of organisational members and thus on their total performance. It affects the behaviour of the
people in 3 ways as under:-

1. Defining the stimuli that confront the individual.

2. Placing constraints upon the individual's freedom of choice
3. Providing source of reward and punishment.

Organisational climate thus provides a useful platform for understanding each characteristics of organisations,
such as stability, creativity, and innovation, communication and effectiveness etc.

Organisational climate should be viewed from total system's point of view. There may exist different climates
within different departments in the organisation and the se sub climates will be integrated to form the
organisation climate.

FACTORS AFFECTING ORGANISATIONAL CLIMATE

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In every organisation, there exist certain elements which exercise influences on the existing climate. These are:-

1. Organisation structure.
2. Organisation context.
3. Physical environment
4. Process
5. System values and norms

Let us study each of the above in some detail: -

1. Organisation Structure

Structure is a framework that establishes formal relationships and delineate authority and functional
responsibility. The actual arrangement of hierarchy affects the climate. Highly decentralised structure results in
sound climate when the management feels the necessity of high degree of inputs to the total output. In a sharp

contrast, if the management feels the necessity of maintaining greater degree of consistency in operations
regarding decision making, it will follow decentralised nature and structure. THUS STRUCTURE AFFECTS
CLIMATE.

2. Organisational Context

If the company is wedded to such a policy, then it is effectively utilising the resources - both human and non-
human. In that case, one can say that the climate is good. The manpower philosophy is generally expressed by
rules, regulations and policies etc. The point is that the reactions of the employees and the degree to which they
welcome and accept the managerial philosophy is very critical to the development of sound and favourable
organisational climate. The climate is said to be highly favourable wen the existing management techniques are
such that the employee's goals are perfectly matched to the ideals of organisation.

3. Physical Environment

It includes the external conditions of environment, the size and location of the building in which am employee
works, the size of place, the size of city - all these affect the organisational climate. Office decor, size and space
a person has in doing the work are important factors to be borne in mind as they affect climate. High level of
noise brings a bad feeling and leads to frustration, nervousness. And aggression and will have a negative effect
on the organisational climate. An employee performing his job in a relatively clean, quiet, and safe
environment will have a favourable perception of organisational climate.

4. Process

There are so many elements of the process which an organisation follows to achieve its objectives. The elements
include communication, decision making, innovation and leadership. In all these processes the relationship
between superior and subordinate is visible and therefore the superior cannot afford to ignore this visible
interface.

A leader has to be aware of the possible influence of his actions on the climate when deciding about the most
appropriate control and supervision technique for a given situation. When a leader mismatches his style to the
situation it might abort any hope of attaining organisational objectives.

5. System values and norms

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Every organisation has a formal value system where certain kinds of behaviours are rewarded and encouraged
and certain kinds of behaviour forces an individual to formal sanctions. The formal value system is
communicated to employees through rules, regulations and policies. From the organisational point of view, both
formal and informal groups are very powerful in exercising influence on climate.

WHAT CONSTITUTES A FAVOURABLE CLIMATE?

Climate can range along a continuum from favourable to neutral to unfavourable. Both employees and
employers want a more favourable climate, because of its benefits, such as better performance and job
satisfaction.

The typical elements which contribute to make a climate favourable are given below: -

1. Quality of leadership.
2. Amount of trust.

3. Communication, both upward and downward.

4. Feeling of useful work.
5. Responsibility
6. Fair rewards
7. Reasonable job pressures
8. Opportunity
9. Reasonable controls, structure and bureaucracy
10. Employee involvement, and participation.

Employee feels that the climate is favourable when they are doing some thing useful that provides a sense of
personal worth. They frequently want challenging work that provides intrinsic satisfaction. Many employees
also want responsibility. They want to be listened to and treated as if they have value as individuals. They want
to feel that the organisation really cares about their needs and problems.

*****************

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PART II

NOW. PART TWO: ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE

INTRODUCTION

Organisational culture represents common perception shared by members of an organisation. Individuals with
altogether different background or at different levels in the organisation have a tendency to describe the
organisation culture in almost similar terms.

According to CAMPBELL, IT IS CONCERNED WITH HOWEMPLOYEES PERCEIVE THE SIX BASIC

CHARACTERISTICS, NAMELY, THE INDIVIDUAL, AUTONOMY, STRUCTURE, REWARD,
CONSIDERATION AND CONFLICT.

Organisation culture refers to a system of shared meaning held by members, which distinguishes one
organisation from another organisation. Organisation culture is always unique and distinct. That is how one can
distinguish one organisation from another.

CHARACTERISTICS OF ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE

Following are the characteristics, which can be called as the essence of culture:-

1. Member identity
2. People focus
3. Group emphasis
4. Control
5. Unit integration.
6. Risk tolerance
7. Reward criteria
8. Means-ends orientation
9. Conflict tolerance
10. Open system focus.

Now, each of the above is discussed in some detail:-

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1. Member Identity: The degrees to which employees identify with the organisation as a whole, rather than
with their type of job or field of professional expertise.
2. People focus: The degree to which management decisions take into consideration to effect outcomes on
people with the organisation.
3. Group emphasis: The degree to which work activities are organised around groups rather than individuals.
4. Controls: The degree to which rules, regulation and direct supervision are used to oversee and control
employee behaviour.
5. Unit Integration: The degree to which units within the organisation are encouraged to operate in a coordinated
or interdependent manner.
6. Risk Tolerance: The degree to which employees are encouraged to be aggressive, innovative and risk taking.
7. Reward criteria: The degree to which rewards such as salary increases and promotions are awarded according
to employee performance, rather than seniority (MERITOCRACY vs. GERONTOCRACY), favoritism, or
other performance factors.
8. Means-ends orientation: The degree to which management focuses on results rather than on the techniques
and processes used to achieve those results or outcomes.

9. Conflict tolerance: The degree to which employees are encouraged to air conflicts and criticism openly.
10. Open system focus: The degree to which the organisation monitors and responds to changes in the external
environment.

Appraising the organisation on these 10 characteristics, then, gives a composite picture of the organisation's
culture. This is the basis for feelings of shared understanding that members have about the organisation, how
things are done in it and the way members are supposed to behave.

FUNCTIONS OF CULTURE

Culture performs a number of functions in organisations. A few of them are given below:-

1. It has boundary defining role i.e., it creates distinctions between one organisation and another.
2. It conveys a sense of identity for organisation members.
3. Culture facilitates the generation of commitment to something larger than one's individual self interest.
4. It enhances the social system stability. Culture is the social glue that holds the organisation together by
providing standards for employees about what to say and do.
5. Culture serves as a sense making and control mechanism that guides and shapes the attitudes and behaviour of
employees.

TRANSMISSION OF CULTURE TO EMPLOYEES

Culture is transmitted to employees in a number of ways. The following 4 ways help us understand how
employees learn culture in the organisations:-

1. Stories: This is circulated throughout organisations, which typically contain events etc. launched by the
organisation's founding fathers. Their philosophy, value systems, attitudes get circulated . There are other
aspects in the organisation, which also get circulated. Some of these are - rule breaking, rags to riches stories,
reductions in work force, relocation of employees, reactions to past mistakes, and coping strategies in the
organisation to manage change and turbulence in the environment. These stories provide explanations and
legitimacy to current practices in the organisation.

2. Rituals: These are repetitive sequences of activities which express and reinforces the Key values of the
organisation, besides, what goals are more important, and which people are important and which of them are
of no consequence.

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3. Material symbols: Some organisations provide their top executives with chauffeur driven car, and other
facilities, travel for self and family at the organisation's cost and other perquisites. The material symbols
include the size and layout of offices, the elegance of furnishings, executive perks and dress. This symbol
conveys to employees who is important, the degree of egalitarianism, and the behaviour like risk taking,
conservatism, authoritarian, participation, individualism, which are appropriate.

4. Language: Many organisations and units within organisations use language as a way to identify members of a
culture or sub culture. By learning this language, members attest to their acceptance of culture and in so doing
help to preserve it.

Organisations over time often develop unique terms to describe equipment, offices, key personnel, suppliers.
Customers or products that relate to its business. New employees are frequently overwhelmed with acronyms
and jargons. This terminology acts as a common denominator that unite members of a given culture or sub
culture.

MAINTAINING ORGANISATION CULTURE

An organisation's culture does not pop out of thin air. Once established, it rarely fades away. An organisation's
current customs, traditions and general way of doing things are largely due to what it has done before and the
degree of success it has had with those endeavors. This leads us to the ultimate source of an organisation's
culture i.e., its founders fathers.

Once a culture is in place, there are practices like the human resources practice which reinforces the
organisation's culture. The selection process, performance evaluation criteria, reward practices, training and
career development activities and promotion procedures ensure that those hired fit in with the culture, reward
those who support it, and penalise those who challenge it. Besides, the following 3 forces play a particularly
important part in sustaining a culture. They are:-

1. Selection process and practices.

2. Actions of top management
3. Socialisation needs.

Let us discuss each of these in some detail:-

1. Selection process and pr actives: The goal of the selection process is to identify and hire individuals who have
knowledge, skill and abilities to perform the jobs within the organisation successfully. But typically more
than one candidate will be identified who meets any given job requirement. When that point is reached, it
would be naive to ignore that the final decision as to who is hired is significantly influenced by the decision
maker's judgement of how well the candidates will fit into organisation. This attempt to ensure a match,
whether purposely or inadvertently results in the hiring people who have values essentially consistent with
those of the organisation or atleast in some values. Additionally, the selection process provides information to
applicants about the organisation. Candidates learn about the organisation and if they perceive conflict
between the values and those of the organisation, they can self-select themselves out of the applicant pool
selection, therefore, selection becomes a two way traffic, allowing either employees or applicants to abrogate
a marriage if there appears to be a mismatch. In this way, the selection process sustains an organisation's
culture by selecting those individuals who might attack or undermines its core values.

2. Actions of top management: The actions of top management also have a major impact on the organisation's
culture. Through what they say and how they behave, senior executives establish norms that filter down

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through the organisation as to whether risk-taking is desirable, how much freedom managers should give
their subordinates. What is appropriate dress, what actions will pay off in terms of pay raises, promotion,
rewards, and the like.

4. Socialisation: It is a continuous process of transmitting key elements of an organisation's culture to its

employees. It consists of both formal methods and informal means for shaping the attitudes, thoughts, and
behaviour of employees. Viewed from the organisation's perspective. Socialisation is like placing an
organisation's finger prints on people. From the employee's point of view, it is the essential process of
learning the ropes to survive and prosper within the company.

Socialisation can be conceptualized as a process consisting of three stages as stated below:-

1. Pre-arrival: It encompasses all the learning that occurs before a new member joins the organisation.
2. Encounter: The new employee sees what the organisation is really like and confronts the possibility that
expectations and reality may diverge.

3. Metamorphosis: It is a relatively long lasting change. Here the new employee adjusts to his work group's
values and norms.

The Socialisation process can be depicted in a diagram, which follows:

OUTCOMES

Productivity

Prearrival Encounter Metamorphosis

Commitment

Turnover

DETAILED EXPLANATION TO THE 3 STAGES OF SOCIALISATION PROCESS

1. THE PRE-ARMVAL STAGE

It explicitly recognise that each individual arrives with a set of values, attitudes, and expectations. These cover
both the work to be done and the organisation. For instance, in many jobs, particularly professional work , new
members will have undergone a considerable Socialisation in the school as well as during training. One major
purpose of a business school, for e.g., is to help students socialise to the attitudes and behaviour, a corporation
would look for. If business executives believe that successful employees will value profit, ethics, loyalty, hard
work, desire to achieve, and willingly accept directions from their superiors, organisations can hire such
employees \ individuals who have been cast in the mould by business schools. The selection process is used in
most organisations to inform prospective employees about the organisation as a whole. The selection process
enables the organisation to select the right person for the right job, who will possess right attitudes, behaviour
and aptitude. This will help the new employee to socialise in the new organisation faster and quicker. The
selection process also enables both the selector and the person seeking selection to know each of them fits into
the other or not. Thus, it becomes a filtering process. Both the organisation and the individual must match to be
successful on both the parts.

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2. THE ENCOUNTER STAGE

In this stage, the individual employee confronts a possible dichotomy between the expectations about co-
workers, the job, boss, and the organisation in general, and realities. As the proverb goes - EXPECTATIONS
MAY NOT ALWAYS CORRESPOND TO REALITIES. When there is a gap between the expectations and
realities, it is better for the new employee to undergo socialisation so that the previous assumptions made about
the organisation and its environment be put aside and replaced with the realities. Even then, if an individual is
not able to come to the grip of realities, one may alienate from the organisation after having joined it. That is
why, during the selection process, all the emphasis be placed on PERSON-JOB FIT, and the PERSON-
ORGANISATION FIT.

Finally, a new member must work out any problems discovered during the encounter stage. This may mean
accepting realities and incorporating changes in one self in attitudes, behaviour etc. Once the change is well
received and accepted and appreciated, the 3rd stage begins, which is called the metamorphosis stage.

3. METAMORPHOSIS STAGE

When the new employee becomes comfortable with the realities, one can say that the metamorphosis has been
accomplished. The new employee has internalised the norms of the organisation and the work group, the new
employee will be accepted by the peers as a trusted and valuable individual.. While with the work group the new

employee must demonstrate that the organisation's norms, expected attitude, and behaviour, organisation's rules
and procedures, policies, appraisal and reward system, and job requirements are acceptable.

Successful metamorphosis should bring positive impact on the new employee's productivity and commitment to
the organisation, and reduce the propensity to alienate from the organisation.

IMPACT OF CULTURE ON PERFORMANCE AND SATISFACTION

The following diagram depicts organisation culture as intervening variable

Objective factors
 Member identity
Strength
 Group emphasis
Performance
 People focus High
 Unit integration
 Control Perceived as
Org. Culture
 Risk tolerance Satisfaction
Low
 Reward criteria
 Conflict tolerance
 Means-ends
orientation
 Open system

Employees form an overall subjective perception of the organisation based on such factors as of degree of group
emphasis, support of people, risk tolerance, and management's willingness to tolerate conflict. This overall

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perception becomes, in effect, the organisation culture or personality. These perceptions could be favourable
or unfavourable. The employee's performance is affected as a result of these perceptions.

Culture does not have an equal impact on both employee performance and satisfaction. There is relatively a
strong relationship between culture and satisfaction, but this is moderated by individual differences. In general,
the satisfaction would be highest when there is congruence between the individual needs and the culture. It can
be straightaway said that job satisfaction often varies according to the employee's perception of the
organisation's culture.

It is a point of debate whether culture and performance is directly related or not. A number of studies show that
the two are inter related, but the relationship is moderated by the organisation's technology. Performance will be
higher when the culture suits the technology. If the culture is informal, creative and supports risk taking and
conflict, performance will move up even if the technology is non-routine and unconventional or extremely new.

LESSON NO. 14

ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT

(THIS LESSON IS IN TWO PARTS. PART – I DEALS WITH ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE

& PART – II DEALS WITH ORGANISATIONAL DEVELOPMENT)

PART – ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE

INTRODUCTION

We are aware of the axiom that the only certainty in this world is that there will be CHANGE. As one English
poet said: THE OLDER ORDER CHANGETH. YIELDING PLACE TO NEW. If we compare closely, we find
that in many respects, an organisation is akin to a living organism. Just like animated, organisations do not
remain the same over a period of time. As a matter of fact, either through a planned change or through efforts an
organisation can adapt to changes in its external and internal circumstances. Just as any animate needs to
respond to the barrage of changes taking place in its environment, organisation do face changing circumstances
in its life cycle,. Organisations must be receptive to changes and in its scheme of things accept, welcome, and
incorporate changes; otherwise, organisations will be overtaken by changes, and find it difficult to manage
change.

WHY ORGANISATIONAL CHANGES?

We begin by comparing organisations with animate human beings. Why organisations change can be better
understood by understanding why individuals change. Individuals experience two types of changes - one, they try to
adjust and adopt to changes happening in the external environment such as the offer of a new job, competition etc, and
second, even if nothing changes in the external environment, still individuals automatically keep changing from
adulthood to old age, family responsibilities etc.

Like human beings, organisations are also open systems. Therefore the same reasons also apply to organisational
changes. So to say, organisations change both because of situational fluctuations in the environmental demands, as
well as because it is in their nature to grow and develop..

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A list of some of the changes which affected almost all organisations in the past few years is given below:-

1. Technological innovations have multiplied, products and know how are fast becoming obsolete.
2. Basic resources have progressively become more expensive.
3. Competition has sharply increased.
4. Communication and computers have reduced the time needed to make decisions.
5. Environmental and consumers interest groups have become active and more influential.
6. The drive for social equity has gained momentum
7. The economic inter dependence among countries has become more apparent and a necessity.

All the reasons for organisational changes can be classified into 2 categories, namely, External reasons, and Internal
Reasons. They are mentioned below, one by one: -

EXTERNAL REASONS

1. Government Rules and Regulations

2. Competition
3. Technological Advances
4. Change in people requirements.

INTERNAL REASONS

1. Change in Leadership
2. Introducing new technology
3. The Domino Effect (One change in a significant area triggering off several major and minor changes)
4. Crisis situations in organisations.
5. Organisational Life Cycle.

LARRY GREINER’S 5 PHASES OF ORGANISATIONAL LIFE

Phase I Phase II Phase III Phase IV Phase V

Big
Crises Crises of?
Redtape
Size of the organisation

Crisis of
Control
Growth
Crisis of through
Autonomy Collaboration
Growth
through
Crisis of Coordinatio
Leadership Growth
Through
Growth Through Delegation
Growth through Direction
Smal Creativity

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Young
Matured
Age of the organisation

TYPES OF CHANGES

They are of 2 types essentially:-

1. Reactive changes
2. Proactive changes.

Reactive changes occur when the forces compel organisation to implement change without delay. In other
words, when demands made by the forces are complied in a passive manner, such a change is called reactive
change.

Proactive changes occur when some factor make organisations sit and look up the changes affecting the
organisation, and accordingly move the organisation towards change, rather than resisting them. That means,
organisation leaders prepare themselves and their organisations to change in a planned manner.

DEFERENCES BETWEEN REACTIVE CHANGE AND PROACTIVE CHANGE

Reactive Change Proactive Change

1. Involves reflexive Behaviour 1. Involves purposive behaviour

2. Covers a limited part of the system 2. Coordinates the various parts of the system as a hole.
3. Responds to immediate symptoms 3. Address to the underlying forces creating symptoms.

Remember, you respond reflexively to a sudden intense light by blinking your eyes or by papillary contraction.
Undoubtedly, this automatic and instant response to a force which you are unable to fight against. But, your
purposive response to the same force may involve devising a plan either to shield the eyes or removing the light.
Obviously, this involves coordination of the central nervous system and psychomotor capacities.

PLANNED CHANGE

We have learnt that proactive changes are effected in a planned manner after assessing the underlying effects of
the forces operating in the external and internal environment. When changes are effected after working when
and how they will be introduced and carried out in the organisations, they become planned changes. In that case,
the manager or leader must constantly assess the changes in both the environments, and take immediate
corrective measures to bring about planned changes in a planned and deliberate manner.

Changes can be introduced successfully when there are conducive factors in the system. KURT LEWIN has
developed a useful technique, namely, THE FORCE FIELD ANALYSIS, for diagnosing whether or not the
given system is conducive for introducing change.

FORCE FIELD ANALYSIS

LEWIN'S model of CHANGE is derived from the laws of physics, which state that the position of an object and
its direction are determined by the forces operating on it. In his model, LEWIN used three terms, namely, the

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driving forces, the resisting forces, and quasi-static equilibrium, to explain human behaviour at any given
point of time. He contends that a person's behaviour is the product of two opposing forces. One force pushes
toward preserving the status quo (i.e., restraining or resisting force), and another force (i.e., the driving force)
pushes for change. When the two opposing forces are approximately equal ( i.e., quasi-static equilibrium),
current behaviour has occurred. For changing behaviour, the forces maintaining status quo must be overcome.
This can be accomplished by increasing the driving forces, reducing the restraining forces or by converting a
restraining force to driving force

LEWIN'S CHANGE MODEL

LEWIN's Change model is a three-step process consisting of UNFREEZING, CHANGING, AND RE-
FREEZING. Each of these steps is explained below:-

UNFREEZING
No change occurs in a vacuum. To the extent the new perspective differs from the old one, the old one implies
doubting of its own existence. This necessitates unlearning of old things in order to learn new things. This is
called as UNFREEZING.

Unfreezing involves encouraging individuals to discard old behaviour by taking up the equilibrium state that
maintains status quo. Unfreezing is accomplished by linking rewards with willingness to change, and
punishment with unwillingness to change. Thus, individuals are made to feel that they have to forget their old
ways and accept the new ways. They are convinced to accept that change needs to happen. In this way, the
individuals are made to surrender themselves by boundaries of their status quo to be opened in preparation for
change.

CHANGING

The second step in the change process is changing or moving. Having unlearnt the previous experience and
practices, the concerned person is now ready for accepting new behaviour and the change perspective. Then
efforts are made to bring new attitude, values and behaviours, which become substitutes to the old ones.
Individuals are provided models to emulate their behaviour. This helps them to identify themselves.
Intemalisation is another process of changing. Intemalisation refers to such situation where an individual is
required to behave in a new manner in order to operate effectively in such given situation. What happens when
an individual behaves time and again in the same way and that particular behaviour becomes the individual's
usual or routine behaviour. Thus, this implies the trial and error learning of a new behaviour.

REFREEZING

Refreezing is the final step in the change process. In this step, new attitudes, values, and behaviours are
established as the new status quo. For this, the new ways of operating are cemented and reinforced. The
managers need to ensure the organisational compatibility so that the new behaviour is repeated time and again.
In the absence of organisational compatibility, the new behaviour is likely to extinguish.

In most of the training programmes for business executives, what happens is during the training programme, the
executives learn umpteen number of behaviours. Some of them they accept also as necessary. But, when they go
back to their organisation, they soon to forget the new behaviour because of want of appropriate atmosphere inn
the organisation to display their newly learnt behaviour. Therefore, this calls for reinforcement of new
behaviour to make it one's usual or status quo behaviour.

RESISTANCE TO CHANGE

Although change is inevitable, people tend to resist it in a rational response based on self interest. Resistance to
change is not always bad or harmful. In some cases, resistance to change is positive also. Resistance to change

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can also be a source of conflict in the various functions of the organisation.. for e.g., resistance to change in
product line can stimulate a healthy debate over the merits of the idea, and, thus, result in a better decision.
However, it also hinders adaptation and progress.

Some evidence of resistance to change is overt such as wildcat strikes, work stoppages, protests, sit-in-strikes
etc. Resistance to change is very subtle and indirect, sometimes. For e.g., dissatisfaction, grievances, requests for
transfer, absenteeism and conflict among the members of a work team. Resistance to change can be divided for
analytical purposes into two broad categories, namely, the individual and organisational resistance. The
following diagram shows the various reasons for resistance to change:-

DIAGRAM SHOWING VARIOUS REASONS OF RESISTANCE TO CHANGE

Driving Forces for Change Forces Resisting Change

Internal forces Individual Resistance

1. New Technology 1. Fear of the unknown
2. Changing work values 2. New learning
3. Creation of new knowledge 3. Disruptions of stable friendship
4. Product obsolescence 4. Distrust of management
5. Desire for leisure and alternative work schedule.

Environmental Forces Organisational Resistance

1. Competition 1. Threat to the power structure
2. Change in consumer demands 2. Inertia of organisational structure
3. Resource availability 3. System relationship
4. Social and political change 4. Sunk costs and vested interest
5. International changes

INDIVIDUAL RESISTANCE

Individuals resist change for various reasons. Given below are 4 reasons why individuals may resist change:-

1. FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN

Changes often bring with it ambiguity and uncertainty. If, for example, the introduction of a new computer
system requires that the em employees learn some specific statistical techniques, some may fear that they will be
unable to do so. They may, therefore, develop a negative attitude toward the introduction of new computer
system.

2. NEWLEARNIING

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For doing a new task, one requires to learn a new language, develop a new technology, or adjust to a
totally new culture. No doubt, learning new ideas can be exciting, most people report that excitement comes
only after the learning has taken place and absorbed.

3. DISRUPTION OF STABLE FRIENDSHIP

Almost all organisational changes disrupt the previous stable friendship. This, in turn, results in uncomfortable
feelings of social isolation and loneliness. This may serve as a source of indirect resistance to change.

4. DISTRUST OF MANAGEMENT

There are well documented findings available from the history of labour relations that managers exploited
labour. That is why employees often suspect the reason for change and try to oppose them.

ORGANISATIONAL RESISTANCE

The organisational structure itself resists changes. The 4 reasons in this regard are given below:-

1. THREATS TO POWER SRUCTURE

Most changes have the capacity to disrupt the organisational power structure. Introduction of decentralised
decision making is example of change that is often seen as threats to power of supervisors and middle level
managers but a welcome by lower level of employees.

2. STRUCTURAL INERTIA

Organisational structures have several mechanisms designed to bring stability. Accordingly, job assignments,
selection and training of new employees, and performance reward systems are designed to bring and maintain
stability. These by themselves act as resisting change. Whenever 'an organisation is confronted with change, this
structural inertia acts as a counterbalance to maintain stability.

3. SYSTEM RELATIONSHIPS

As stated earlier, any change has a Domino effect. Changes in one subsystem affects changes in other
subsystems also. For e.g.. a change in the accounting department may influence the methods of reporting and
record keeping of every other department. Hence, the other departments may resist to change.

4. SUNK COSTS and VESTED INTERESTS

Sunk costs are investments in fixed assets, such as land and building, machinery etc. Vested interests are the
personal commitments of individuals to programmes, policies, or other people. As individuals find it difficult to
abandon, so the organisations fins it difficult to recoup the sunk cost. This is a source of resistance to change.

REMEMBER IT IS WELL ACCEPTED THAT UNLESS THE PRESENT CONDITIONS CREATE ENOUGH
DISCOMFORT, THERE IS NO MOTIVE TOCHANGE. THEREFORE, THE CHALLENGE BEFORE
MANAGEERS (WHO ARE CALLED TO BECOME CHANGE AGENTS) TO ASSESS EMOTIONAL
ASPECTS OF PEOPLE WITH REGARD TO CHANGE ISSUES FOR MANAGING RESISTANCE TO
CHANGE.

MANAGING RESISTANCE TO CHANGE

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In a sense, resistance to change is simply a form of feedback that can be used very productively to manage
the resistance to change i.e. one can usher change. There are six key strategies for managing resistance to
change. They are summarised below: -

1. EDUCATION AND TRAINING

If reasons are known, why employees resist change details can be provided to the employees at various levels as
to why change is called for - its pros and cons. Employees can be educated about the change through face-to-
face discussions, memos, group presentations etc.. New information is a powerful force for change in ambiguous
situations. For e.g.. New employee orientations are particularly effective in changing the behaviour of new
employees, because they would not have known how to behave otherwise. Studies on the introduction of
computers in the workplace indicate that providing employees with opportunities for hands-on experience helps
alleviate some of the fears about the new technology. Employees who have experience with computers display
more positive attitudes and greater efficiency.

2. PARTICIPATION

Before a change is introduced, it is better to involve people in bringing about the change so badly required by
the organisation. Once employees participate in decision making, they can not disown. Sometimes, employees
even after participation in the decision making process may resist change due to peer pressures and work group
pressures. Such resistance can be minimised, provided the leader for such employees is a votary of change.

3. FACILITATION AND SUPPORT

Another strategy for managing resistance to change is providing support and empathy to those employees who
have trouble in dealing with change. Counseling and therapy, skill training are examples of support extended by
the employees. However, like education and participation strategies, as explained above, this strategy also
suffers from drawbacks, such as time-consuming and expensive also.

4. NEGOTIATION

Negotiation with a group of powerful individuals resisting change is yet another strategy. A specific reward
package can be negotiated with the powerful employees to meet their individual needs. Of course, it can be
expensive if too much money change s hands,

5. MANIPULATION

It implies covert attempts to influence people resisting change. Sometimes, the facts may have to be twisted to
make them more attractive. Withholding information deliberately (such information if received becomes
unpleasant), and planting rumours intelligently among those who resist change may force employees accept
change. Like other strategies, this strategy has its own drawbacks.

6. COERCION

The organisation, as a last resort, can apply direct threats on those who resist change. Threats of transfer, loss of
promotion, unsatisfactory recommendations from supervisors are all examples of coercion.

SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF CHANGE IN ORGANISATIONS

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First of all, let us understand that resistance to change is normal in the initial stages. However, for managing
change, the change strategy must include the three steps advocated by LEWIN, namely, THE UNFREEZING,
CHANGING, AND REFREEZING. This facilitates the achievement of organisational changes in a consistent
and desired manner. GRIENER 'S study has revealed that successful changes appeared to follow a relatively
consistent pattern, while there was inconsistent pattern in unsuccessful changes. GREINER has identified the
following 8 eight stages through which organisations can successfully implement change: -

1. Internal or external pressures create a need for change, which is shared in the organisation, particularly at the
top level.
2. An outsider, either a new executive or consultant who has the reputation for creating change enters the
organisation.
3. This change agent encourages the organisation to reexamine its past practices and present problems.
4. The top team assumes a direct role in conducting the reexamination of past practices.
5. The change agent provides people at different levels with new ideas and methods for developing solutions to
the organisational problems.
6. The change agent with the help of top management involves at different levels in the organisation to diagnose
previous practices and their relevance in the future or present context.

7. The initial solutions are tested or implemented on a small scale, and, if found successful, applied over the whole
organisation or in some more parts of the organisation.
8. As the change efforts spread, they get absorbed permanently, and they will become the way of life in
organisations.

NOW, THE SECOND PART OF THE LESSON

PART II: ORGANISATION DEVELOPMENT

MEANING OF 0. D.

According to KOONTZ et al: OD is a systematic, integrated and planned approach to improve the effectiveness
of the enterprise. It is designed to solve problems that adversely affect the operational efficiency at all levels.

According to BURKE, O.D. is a planned process of change in an organisations culture through the utilization of
behavioural science technology, research, and theory.

According to FRENCH and BELL, O.D. is a systematic approach to organisational improvement that applies
behavioural science theory and research in order to increase individual and organisational well being and
effectiveness,

From the above narration, one can understand that OD IS A LONG TERM, MORE ENCOMPASSING
CHANGE APPROACH MEANT TO IMPROVE INDIVIDUAL AS WELL AS ORGANISATIONAL WELL
BEING IN A CHANGED SITUATION.

NOTABLE POINTS ON ORGANISATIONAL DEVELOPMENT (O.D.)

1. An on-going process of change in the context of an organisation.

2. Systematic approach.
3. Makes use of Behavioural sciences, technology, research etc.
4. Pro-active, long-range research effort.
5. Focuses on the culture of the formal work teams,

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6. Originated out of experiments conducted by DOUGLAS McGREGOR in UNION CARBIDE,
USA. Other names associated with OD are - BLAKE AND MOUTON, HERBERT SHEPARD etc.
7. In India, it emerged in 1960's.
8. Professors PAREEK, T.V.RAO, ABAD AHMAD, NITISH DE, GAURANG CHATTOPADHYAY, GOPAL
VALECHA have been the researchers and consultants in OD Area.
9. HMT and L&T, KAMANI GROUP, TISCO, ORIENT PAPER MILLS. BOKARO STEEL PLANT,
INDIAN ALUMINUM COMPANY, HINDUSTAN STEEL, SBI are some of the prominent organisations
which have embarked on the journey to OD.
10. Institutions like - ASCI, IIMs JSABS, etc. conduct OD training programmes regularly.
11. OD deals with problems of Organisational Change.
12. OD is a social invention and a hangs technique.
13. It is NOT a set of techniques, but a process of Change.
14. OD seeks improvements and improvements are necessary for survival and growth.
15. OD is a planned approach organisation-wide.
16. OD starts from the upper echelons of the organisation.
17. OD can also be applied to new organisations to shape it in a particular mould.

A PRAGMATIC APPROACH TO O.D.

1. Don't start off in a big way.

2. Choose receptive points of entry.(i.e.. Departments we people are receptive to change).
3. Focus on the link pins. This will help in Team-building.
4. Work with autonomous parts (i.e., a Department which does not depend on other departments for approval to
initiate change).
5. Use internal resources and develop them from the very beginning.
6. Start up at the top and get their commitment.
7. Work with forces supportive of change.
8. Have multiple points of entry.
9. Work on organisation's problems as perceived, NOT as imagined.
10. Use pro-active behaviour.

TECHNIQUES USED IN THE TEAM BUILDING

1. Role Analysis Technique (RAT)

2. Role Negotiation Technique (RNT)
3. Interdependency Exercise.
4. The Appreciations and Concerns Exercise.
5. Responsibility Charting.
6. Appreciable Inquiry.
7. Visioning.
8. Force Field Analysis.
9. A GESTALT Approach to Team-building.

CHARACTERISTICS OF 0. D

1. OD is a systematic approach to planned change. It is a structured cycle of diagnosing organizational problems

and opportunities .
2. OD is grounded in solid research and theory. It involves the application of our knowledge of behavioral
science to the challenges that the organisations face.
3. OD recognises the reciprocal relationships between individuals and organisation. It acknowledges that for
organizations to change, individuals must change also.

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4. OD is goal oriented. It is a process that seeks to improve both individual and organisational well being
and effectiveness.
5. OD is designed to solve problems.

OBJECTIVES OF OD

1. Improve organisational performance as measured by profitability, market share, innovativeness etc.

2. Make organisation better adaptive to environment.
3. Make the members willing face organisational problems and contribute to creative solutions to the problems
of the organisation.
4. Improve internal behaviour patterns such as interpersonal relations, intergroup relations, level of trust and
support among the role players.
5. Understand one's own self and others, openness and meaningful communication and involvement in planning
for organisational development.

MODELS OF OD

There are three Models of OD. They are: THE KURT LEWIN'S THREE STEP MODEL, THE GRINER'S
SEQUENTIAL MODEL, AND THE LEAVITT'S SYSTEM MODEL. Let us take each of these in the following
paragraphs

1. THE KURT LEWIN'S MODEL

This Model is based on the premises that before actually introducing a change, organisation needs to be prepared
for change, motivated to change, stabilised and integrated the change into behaviours of organisation.
Accordingly, LEWIN'S change model includes three steps in its process, namely, the UNFREEZING, THE
CHANGING, and THE REFREEZING.(Students have been told about this in the first part of this lesson, while
dealing with ORGANISATION CHANGE)

2. THE GREENER'S MODEL

According to this Model, change occurs in terms of certain sequences. The external stimulus pressures the
management of organisations to initiate the change process. The management in response to stimulus is
motivated to take actions to introduce change in the organisation. Following the actions to introduce change, the
various change stages occur in a subsequential manner such as diagnosis of the problem, invention of a new
solution, experimentation with the new solution and reinforcement from positive results. It is depicted below:-

Phase I II III IV V VI
Pressure Intervent Diagnosis Invention Experimenta Reinforce-
Stimulus On Top -ion at of the of the new tion of the ment from
the power Manage- the top problem solution new solution positive result
structure ment area

Arousal Reorient Recognit Commit Search Acceptance of

Reaction of to take ation to ion of the ment to for the new practices
the power action internal specific new results
structure problem problem course of

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THE LEAVITT'S MODELL
This Model is founded on the interactive nature of the various subsystems in a change process. In an
organisational system, there are 4b interacting subsystems, namely, the people, the environment, the structure
(SUB TASKS), and the Technology. Due to their interacting nature, change in anyone of the sub system tends to
have consequences for the other sub systems also. Change s in any one of the sub systems can be worked out
depending upon the situation. How the various sub systems interact with each other in a change process is
depicted in the following diagram:-
DIAGRAM SHOWING INTERACTING SUBSYSTEMS OF LEAVITT’S MODEL

STRUCTURE

TASK TECHNOLOGY

PEOPLE

OD INTERVENTIONS

How to bring about OD? The answer is through OD intervention. Interventions are the set of structural activities
in which selected organisational units, be they individual or groups, engage with a task or a sequence of task.
Goals are directly or indirectly related to organisational improvement. For this, an umpteen number of
alternatives i.e., OD interventions exist. One way of classifying these methods is by knowing the target of
change. In practice, the target of change may be the individuals, their groups within the organisations or the
organisation as a whole. OD interventions aimed at these targets are discussed below in seriatim.

1. INDIVIDUAL FOCUSSED INTERVENTIONS

Targeted at individuals are the skills training, sensitivity training, job redesign, role negotiation, and career
planning.

a) THE SENSITIVITY TRAINING

Also called as T-Group training or Laboratory training, this training is designed to help individuals understand
how their behaviour affects others. Members are brought together in a free and open environment in which
participants discuss themselves. The discussion is loosely directed by a professional behavioural scientist called
as the facilitator, who intervenes only to help the group move forward. The objective of training is to increase
sensitivity towards others. The outcome of such training should, therefore, help employees understand others
better, become aware of own feelings and perceptions and improve communication.

SKILLS TRAINING

This refers to increasing the job knowledge, skills, and abilities that are necessary to do a job effectively. Skill
training is imparted either in formal class room setting or on the job. The need for imparting skill training arises
as a result of the rapid changes that organisations face in the technical management. The job knowledge needs to
be continuously updated to move with change. This way, the organisation can ensure that their workforce not
only get motivated but also they are prepared to accept changes in the technology without a whimper of protest.
Another advantage is that the new employees' level of output can also be increased along with the old
employees.

JOB REDESIGN

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As an OD intervention, job redesign helps jobs to improve the fit between individual skills and the demands of
the job. We have already known that job redesign can be accomplished by such interventions as job enrichment,
job enlargement, job simplification, and job rotation. These methods are used as OD techniques for realigning
task demands and individual capabilities.

ROLE NEGOTIATION

Sometimes, group members have differing expectations of one another within the working relationship. Role
negotiation is a simple technique whereby individuals meet and clarify their psychological contract. In doing
this, the expectations of each party are clarified and negotiated. The outcome of role negotiation is improved
understanding between the members.

CAREER PLANNING

It refers to matching an individual's career aspirations with the opportunities available in the organisation. In
other words, it involves activities offered by the organisation to individuals to identify strengths, weaknesses,
specific goals and they would like to occupy. Career planning activities benefit both the individuals and the

organisation. Counseling sessions are held to help employees identify their skills and deficiencies, if any. The
organisation can then plan its training and development programmes based on the information to improve
individual's skills required for assuming higher responsibilities. Such a process may help the organisation
identify and also nurture the talented employees for potential promotion.

f) MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT TRAIN ING

This encompasses a host of techniques designed to enhance a manager's skills on the job. Training for
management development generally focuses on 4 types of learning, namely, verbal information, intellectual
skills, attitudes, and development. Management development training becomes successful when it becomes
experiential training or action learning. Simulation, business games, role playing, case studies, group and
syndicate discussions, and sensitivity training are some of the methods employed for management development
training, out of the several available. The most appropriate ones should be chosen and targeted, as otherwise,
training efforts go in vain

2 ORGANISATION AND GROUP FOUSSED INTERVENTIONS

OD interventions aimed at changing the organisation itself or changing the work groups within the organisation
include SURVEY FEEDBACK,MBO,QUALITY OF WORKLIFE, TEAM BUILDING, ANDPROCESS
CONSULTATION. These are briefly discussed below: -

1. SURVEY FEEDBACK

Widely used intervention whereby employee attitudes are solicited using a questionnaire. This is called as
SURVEY FEEDBACK. The questions included in the questionnaire intend to diagnose the problem within the
organisation and to identify areas or opportunities for change. The data so generated is attitudinal in nature. The
data is tabulated and distributed to employees. These data then become springboard for identifying problems and
clarifying issues that may be creating difficulties for people. Generally, feedback of results is given only to the
group which generated the idea. Thus, once the problems are diagnosed, necessary corrective measures are taken
to resolve the organisational problems. After sometime, a second survey is conducted to measure improvement
in the situation.

2. M.B.O.

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It involves joint goal setting between employees and managers. The process includes the setting of initial
objectives, periodic progress reviews, and problem solving to remove the obstacles to goal achievement. All
these are steps involving participation actively by both the employees and their managers.

As an OD intervention, MBO has a 3-step approach. First, it clarifies what an organisation expects from its
employees, Second, I it provides knowledge of results, which is very much required as essence in effective job
performance, and Third, MBO is an opportunity to improve performance, meaningful communication and
increased participation in decision making.

If MBO is rightly implemented in organisations as an OD intervention, the organisation will be successful in

linking the organisation goals with the goals of the organisation.

3. QUALITY OF WORKLIFE (QWL)

QWL consists a whole package of terms and notions, all of which speak about the common goal of humanizing
the workplace. DAVID and NEWSTROM have perceived a wide range of QWL activities as open
communication, equitable reward systems, a concern for employee job security and participation in job design.

The INTERNATIONAL LABOUR OFFICE (ILO) has listed the following interventions of QWL:-

a) Hours of work and arrangements of working time

b) Working organisation and job content
c) Impact of new technologies on working conditions
d) Working condition of women, young workers, older workers and other special categories.
e) Work related welfare services and facilities
f) Shop floor participation in the improvement of working conditions.

Any comprehensive list of QWL programmes would encompass job redesign, participative management and
involving unions, education, training and legislative measures. The very purpose of this intervention is to change
the climate at work so that a better quality of work life is created.

4. TEAM BUILDING

All organisations consist of people, primarily as important inputs. People are required to work in teams or work
groups. Hence, there is a need for TEAM BUILDING. It is an OD intervention designed to improve the
effectiveness of a work group. It usually begins with defining the goals and priorities of the group. The
following 4 areas in TEAM BUILDING are critical:_

1. Team building should develop effective communication amongst members

2. Team building encourages members to interact and learn that their work is interdependent.
3. Team building should emphasis team goals
4. Team building should stress on flexibility. It should exemplify effective teamwork.

5. PROCESS CONSULTATION

In reality, no organisation operates perfectly. When managers sense that there is room for improving their
company's performance, but do not know hoe to improve it, the process consultation comes to their rescue. This
concept has been clearly conceptualized by EDGAR SCHEIN. The distinguishing feature of process
consultation approach is that an outside consultant is used to assist usually a manager to perceive, understand
and act on process events. Rather, the consultant acts as a guide or coach who advises the process to help the

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clients or managers to solve their own problem. The role of the consulted is to help employees help
themselves. The processes most often targeted are COMUNICATION, CONFLICT RESOLUTION, DECITION
MAKING, GROUP ENTER ACTION, AND LEADERSHIP. The steps involved in process consultation are the
following :

a) Entering the organisation.

b) Defining the relationship.
c) Choosing and approach.
d) Gathering data and diagnosing problems.
e) Intervening, and finally.
f) Leaving the organisation gradually

We must remember that the various OD interventions are merely the just means to an end. Interventions
themselves do not drive change, where as certainly business compulsions and business emergencies and business
need do. OD interventions are a means for moving the organisation and its employee in amore effective
direction.

FACTORS INFLUENCING CHOICE OF 0. D. INTERVENTION

The selection of a right OD intervention is quite crucial. If the managers are not aware of the right intervention,
they had better involve outside consultant to undertake the necessary job. Selection of an OD intervention is
influenced by three important factors, each of which is described in some detail: -

1. APPLICABILITY:

It means the potential of a given intervention to bring disered result. It also means to address enough the real
problem and also to be a ware if it is promising for being solved. One have to examine the pros and comes
associated with every intervention on a given problem. Next, the consultant will need to evaluate the client
system care fully and with grate concern before actually introducing any intervention, however right and
adequate it may be.

2. FEASIBILITY:

Feasibility means the suitability of unintervention to suight the client system that is to say, the consultant needs
to evaluate whether unintervention can actually be effectual introduced in given type of client system.

3. ACCEPTABILITY:

Whatever applicability an fusibility an unintervention carries, it has no use and effeteness unless it is acceptable
to the client system. It means unintervention needs to be accepted by its client system to bring desired result. It
simply means that sufficient preparatory work is required in working out and appropriate intervention.

O.D. AND MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT

OD is a strategy which is planned and implemented from the top with a view to bring planned organisation
change for increasing organisational effectiveness. By, management development, on the other hand is the
means to, increase the skills and ability of management staff. Since managers are expected to be conversant with
the latest changes in social, economic, technological and political environments, organisations usually send their
managers to attend management development programmes to institutes of higher learning. Some organisations

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do arrange in-house programmes, because in that case many managers can avail of that opportunity of
learning at the doorsteps itself. Moreover, the costs are also spread. However, if a few managers attend outside,
there will be rich learning, and the opportunity of discussing cases from divergent industries and businesses.

An organisation development Programme is specially designed in keeping with the traditions and the culture of
the organisation. Moreover, since OD programmes or interventions are decided on the basis of diagnosis by the
process consultant, focus in the training program will be to bring it on the floor by appropriate techniques like
role playing, sensitivity training, MBO etc.

The goal of all OD programmes will be to usher change and to create an energetic team, changing the attitudes
of organisation members and developing new values. In the case of management development programmes,
these are addressed to help the managers to discharge their responsibilities productively and effectively. In
many cases, management development programmes becomes a part of OD programmes, because OD seeks to
improve the entire system including management development Programme.

BENEFITS OF ORGANISATION DEVELOPMENT

MARGULEES and RAIA have given the following points: -

1. Provides opportunities for people to function as human beings, rather than mere resources in the productive
process.
2. Gives each member of the organisation opportunities to develop to his full potential.
3. Seeks to make the organisation more effective in meeting all its goals.
4. Tries to create an environment in which exciting and challenging work can be found.
5. Gives people in organisations the chance to influence how they relate to work; the organisation and the work
environment
6. Treats each human being as a person with a complex set of needs, all of which are important in his work and
life.

LIMITATIONS OF O.D.
O.D. is an important technique of introducing planned change in the organisation. However, it suffers from the
following limitations: -

1. OD is heavily based on the behavioural sciences and their concepts. Behavioural sciences themselves have
some limitations, which become applicable to OD.
2. OD requires use of certain person who can take initiative to bring about change. Complacent people cannot be
helpful in implementing OD.
3. OD cannot be applied without giving due consideration to the circumstances existing within the organisation.
The local circumstances may pose a problem in adapting to changes.

CHANGE APPROACHES

Approach Commonly Used in Advantages Disadvantages

Situations
Education and When there is a lack of information Once persuaded, people Can be very time
Communication or inaccurate information And will often help with the consuming if lots of
analysis implementation of change people are involved
Participation and When the initiators do not have all People who participate Can be very time

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involvement the information they need to design will be committed to consuming if
the chance and when others have implementing change participators design
considerable power to resist an inappropriate
change
Facilitation and When people are resting because of No other approach works Can be time
support adjustment problems as well with adjustment consuming and still
problems fail
Negotiation and When someone or some group will Sometimes it is a Can be too expensive
agreement clearly lose out in a change and relatively easy way to in many cases if it
when that group has considerable avoid major resistance alerts other to
power to resist negotiate for
compliance
Manipulation When other tactics will not work or It can be a relatively Can led to future
and co-optation are too expensive quick and inexpensive problems if people
solution to resistance feel manipulated
problems
Explicit and When speed is essential and the It is speedy and can Can be risky if it
implicit coercion change initiators possess overcome any kind of leaves people mad at
considerable able power resistance the initiators

LESSON NO. 15

ORGANISATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

Organisational effectiveness is a function of specificity of organisational objectives, structures, and process

variables. Organisational effectiveness defies a single definition. It requires multiple criteria that the different
organisational functions are subject to evaluation employing different characteristics.

According to DRUCKER, "TO BE EFFECTIVE IS THE JOB OF THE EXECUTIVES". According to SINHA,
the term “EFFECTIVENESS" is often used interchangeably with productivity and efficiency.

FLORENCE and BROWN employed the term "PRODUCTIVITY" to mean output from one particular factor of
production or particular form of input, and the term "EFFICIENCY", to mean total output from the total inputs.

STEERS observed that effectiveness is best judged against an organisation's ability to compete in a turbulent
environment and successfully acquire and use its resources.

THE TERM EFFECTIVENESS EXPLAINED

Effectiveness is concerned with goal accomplishment. It answers two questions. One, whether the goal was
achieved? and. Two, whether the goal was appropriate? It is not concerned with the cost of achieving the goal;
rather, it is concerned with the appropriateness and the accomplishment of the goal.

Suppose you are incharge of a project to build a new plant to manufacture small cars for an automobile
entrepreneur. Suppose this plant is built in the desired time limit set out and planned, and that it meets all design
requirements and specifications. Thus, we can say tentatively you and your work group in the organisation got
the plant built in time. You have been EFFECTIVE. The goal was reached and the goal was appropriate.

THE TERM EFFICIENCY EXPLAINED

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Efficiency is concerned with the cost of goal achievement. It answers the question of how much it
costs us in terms of money, personnel, equipment, psychological factors etc., to achieve the goal. Thus, it is a
ratio of output to input. Efficiency is concerned with accomplishing the goal using the best possible method.
Suppose in the above example of building a plant for the automobile entrepreneur, you exceed the your budget
by a large margin, and there is much waste, and overtime, rework etc. In other words, the resources that you
used greatly exceeded that which should have been used in building this plant, we can conclude that EVEN
THOUGH YOU HAVE BEEN EFFECTIVE, YOU HAVE NOT BEEN EFFICIENT. The plant was built, no
doubt, but at larger costs than planned and budgeted.

REMEMBER: IT IS DIFFICULT TO ESTABLISH A CORRELATION BETWEEN THESE TWO TERMS,

NAMELY, EFFECTIVENESS, AND EFFICIENCY. EFFECTIVENESS CENTERS MORE ON THE HUMAN
SIDE OF ORGANISATIONAL VALUES AND ACTIVITIES, WHEREAS EFFICIENCY CENTRES ON
TECHNOLOGY. IT IS THE RESULT OF A BLEND OF VAST NUMBER OF VARIABLES INCLUDING
TECHNOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, PERSONAL COMPETENCIES OF THE EMPLOYEES AND THE
INNOVATIVE ABILITIES OF THE MANAGERS ETC.

Let us take another example for a better understanding. Suppose you are incharge of Departmentation of
Transportation task force for your city. Your group decided that it is necessary to build an expressway through
the middle of the middle of the town. You design all specifications for this road contract for its construction and
its cost remained within the allotted budget (a rare case indeed). At first glance, you conclude that your group
has been both effective and efficient; the road was built; it meets specifications, and it was built with minimum
resources being employed. However, let us assume that once the road is built, traffic usage is significant.
Furthermore, additional projections show that for the next 5 years, usage will be 50% below the road capacity.
After evaluation carefully and research, you find that the people of city would have preferred a mass transit
system, and that the expressway has not delivered results as planned. Or preferred.

Thus, your group did not meet the second test of EFFECTIVENESS; namely, the goal was not appropriate. If
your group had more citizen input, you might have known this prior to constructing the road, but you did not.
Therefore, the final conclusion is that you, indeed, you were efficient - the road was built and met with
specifications, but you were not effective.

APPROACHES TO ORGANISATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

There are 4 approaches, namely: -

1. The Goal Attainment Approach

2. The Systems Approach
3. The Strategic Constituencies Approach, and
4. The Behavioural Approach.

Each of these approaches is described below: -

1. THE GOAL ATTAINMENT APPROACH

An organisation is born with the objectives, by the objectives, and for the objectives. According to CHESTER
BARNARD, what we mean by effectiveness is the accomplishment of recogised objectives of cooperative
effort; the degree of accomplishment indicates the degree of effectiveness. Organisations effectiveness is
appraised in terms of the accomplishment of ends, rather than the means.

2. THE SYSTEMS APPROACH

According to this approach, it is the ability of the organisation to transform inputs into outputs, for which
purpose, the total effectiveness of a system is dependent on the performance of all sub-parts, whereas goal

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attainment aims at accomplishment of goals. The systems approach views such factors as relations with
the environment to assure continued receipt of inputs and positive acceptance of outputs, responsiveness to the
changing environment, efficiency with which transformation may take place, employee satisfaction, clarity of
communication etc.

3. THESTRATEGIC CONSTITUENCIES APPROACH

It is similar to the systems approach, but with a slightly different emphasis. It farther says that an organisation
faces competing demands from various interest groups, both within, and outside the organisational environment.
Therefore, an organisation will have to remove unimportant and non-competing groups, and choose only critical
or strategic constituencies in the environment to survive. THIS APPROACH IS QUITE DIFFICULT BECAUSE
WHAT IS CRITICAL TODAY, IT MAY NOT BE TOMORROW.

4. THE BEHAVIOURAL APPROACH

In this approach, the behaviour of individuals assumes importance, because it affects success or failure of
organisations. When there is compatibility between the individual goals and that of the organisation, there is a
high degree of organisational effectiveness, which is, an IDEAL situation, rarely met. When there is no
Compatibility, there is less effectiveness. Here lie the challenges for organisations to bring compatibility,
diagnose the causes for underlying low effectiveness,

PROBLEMS IN MEASUREMENT OF ORGANISATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

All organisations would like to work with effectiveness, but in this process, the organisation must take up the
serious exercise of demarcating what constitutes HIGH EFFECTIVENESS, and WHAT CONSTITUTES LOW
EFFECTIVENESS. ALWIN BROWN has identified the following reasons for the failure of organisations to
achieve organisational effectiveness: -

1. Failure of administrators to act when they need to act.

2. Delay in taking action.
3. Taking wrong action.
4. Lack of sufficient effort.
5. Excessive effort in relation to the need.
6. Excessive quality or effort in relation to the problem.
7. Wasted effort.

After diagnosing the causes for low effectiveness, the organisation can take necessary and corrective action over
the controlled factors.

The study to measure the organisational effectiveness is difficult because of the following reason:-
1. There is a difficulty to set the standards for ensuring objective oriented measurement. None is able to say
whether an organization should be regarded as effective although profits are high, while accompanied by
labour unrest, and absenteeism etc.
2. If goals are evenly set, then it is difficult to set the acceptable standards, both tangible and intangible.
3. The very important aspect is that there is no way of estimating the degree to which a great number of variables
other than the organisational elements may have contributed to the achievement of certain objectives.
4. Organisations can hardly be classified as good or bad on the basis of their earnings records alone.
5. The criteria used to measure effectiveness may not be sufficiently stable. Their meaning for organisational
performance may change. In times of fast changing price levels, comparing profits for one year with those of
another year may be of no use. Instability effectively precludes the possibility of a long lasting generalisable
set of performance indicators on which the manager, the administrator or researchers can rely.

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TYPICAL ORGANISATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS OF STRATEGIC CONSTITUENCY

Constituency Typical of criteria

Owners Return on investment, growth in earnings
Employees Compensation, fringe benefits, satisfaction with the working conditions
Customers Satisfaction with price, quality, services
Suppliers Satisfaction with payments, future sales potential
Creditors Ability to pay for indebtedness
Unions Competitive wages and benefits satisfactory, working conditions,
willingness to bargain fairly.
Local community Involvement of membership organisation in local affairs, no damned to the
community environment
Government agencies Compliance with laws: avoidance of penalties.

COMPARISON OF THE 4 APPROACHES TO ORGANISATIONAL EFFECRTIVENESS

Approach Definition When useful

An organisation is effective tot he extent that-

The approach is preferred when-
Goal attainment It accomplishes its stated goals Goals are clear time bound and
measurable
Systems It acquires needed resources A clear connection exist between
input and output
Strategic constituencies All strategic constituencies are atleast Constituencies have powerful
minimally satisfied influences on the organisation and
the organisation must respond to
the demands.
Competing values The emphasis of the organisation in the four The organisation is unclear about
major areas matches constituents’ preferences. its own emphasis or changes in
criteria over time are of interest.

FACTORS IN ORGANISATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

Knowing only the criteria or approach to OE is not sufficient enough for managers and researchers. It is also
equally important for them to, identify the underlying factors towards organisational effectiveness. Besides, one
should also know the interrelationship among the 3 factors mentioned below. Viewed from this angle, LIKERT
has classified all the factors under 3 groups, which are given below: -

1. Causal factors
2. Intervening factors
3. End result factors

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TABLE SHOWING THE INTERRELATIONSHIP AMONG THE 3 FACTORS

Causal variables Intervening variables End result variables

Leadership strategies, Commitment to objective Production costs sales

skills and styles motivation and morals of earning
members Management and union
Management decisions
relation
Organisational philosophy Skills in leadership,
and structures communication conflict, Turnover etc.
resolutions, decisions
Technology etc. making, problem solving
etc.

Implication of ‘Efficiency’ and ‘Effectiveness’

Consider this: A manager may be very efficient, but that does not necessarily make him effective as
well. Efficiency is generally concerned with ‘how well’ and ‘how much’ a task has been performed.
Some of the factor contributing to the efficiency of a person is his intelligence, Knowledge, skill and
imagination. A highly intelligence person can be clever, but that does not make him wise as well. A
highly efficient manager can be competent, but that alone cannot guarantee his being effective as well.
Effectiveness relates to the contribution a manager may have made while performing his task – in term of ‘what
results’, ‘how much’ and ‘what quality’. The factor that determine a managers effectiveness are

♦ The extent to which he achieves results – not just performs tasks;

♦ The extent to which he goes beyond what is normally required of him ;and
♦ The extent to which this quality in him is (a) self – sustaining; (b) on –going; and (c) motivational for others.

Effective people are not problem- minded; they are opportunity minded. The feed opportunities and starve
problems.

But is there a chance that efficiency is not the answer? Is getting mare things done in less time doing to make a
difference – or will it just increase the pace at which I react to the people and circumstances that seem to
control my life.

Could there be something I need to see in a deeper, more fundamental way – some paradigm within myself that
the way I see my time, my life, and my own nature?
- Stephan R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

This comes from dedicated, Systematic working by person mellowed with maturity. Intelligence,
Knowledge, Skill and imagination –the components of efficiency – are, no doubt, important supportive
factors and are welcome; but they alone are not enough. Many brilliant people turn out to be failures as
result- achievers, whereas even plodders (like the tortoise in that famous allegory) emerge as very effective
result – achievers.

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The features of efficiency and effectiveness can be summarized as shown in table
TABLE what is Efficiency and Effectiveness

Efficiency is
♦ Concerned with ‘how well’ and ‘how ♦
much’ of a performed task.
♦ Relies on intelligence, knowledge, ♦
skill and imagination.
♦ Almost Uni.-dimensional
• The specific ‘target’ is the target; and •
• Neither the manager nor his superiors •
expect anything more.
♦ Doing thing right.
Effectiveness
Concerned with desired results:
• Delivers the goods;
• Happens on time;
• Is cost-effective; and
• Leaves on side effect.
Relies on : wisdom
♦ Multi-dimensional:
The ‘contribution ’ is the targer;
Going beyond the confines of current
assignment ; and
• A ‘motivational process’ which is self-
sustaining and ongoing.
♦ Doing the right thing.

How do you go about acquiring effectiveness? Is there a set of exercise, prescribed steps, or exclusive qualities
that we can adopt, and thus hope to make ourselves effective as managers? Disappointing thought it may seem,
the answer is ‘No’. Effectiveness does not even have an entity of its own; it is the sum total of a number of
attributes, qualities and attributes that go into ‘distilling’ effectiveness in you.

Take the case of a chemical compound. It too has no entity of its own; it is created when a number of specific
ingredients are put together in such a manner that the desired chemical reaction is set into motion. Some atoms
of a specific kind and potency are brought together to produce the required molecules, and some molecules of
desired number and potency are brought together to , finally , create the desired compound . Take away the
atoms, and the molecules will not be formed, and thus the compound itself will not come into being; or you may
get a monstrous compound instead!

So much for the ingredients making a compound! Then there is the important question of providing, and
maintaining, the ambiance; for example, the right combination of temperature, atmospheric pressure and other
catalytic factor. In other words the right environment. It is true that for creating the same compound under
varying combinations of temperature, pressure and catalytic factors, the formulation of the ingredients
themselves may required suitable variations.

This is equally true of managerial effectiveness. In order to upgrade yourself from an efficient to an effective
manager, you will not only need to imbibe certain ‘ingredients’ determining yours style of management, but also
create and maintain a conductive ‘environment ‘.

I shall now attempt to suggest both the ‘ingredient ’ and the ‘environment ’ which ought to propel you towards
managerial effectiveness. Let me emphasize here that these ‘ingredients’ are essentially the managerial qualities
and know- how that have already been discussed in the preceding chapters; and the ‘atmosphere’ comprises the
attitudinal alignments that have been recommended earlier. While summarizing those qualities and attitudinal
factors here, I hope to convince you that your managerial effectiveness can be acquired only when you make use
of those qualities and attitudinal factors in unison and in an integrated manner.

PROF. K.V. MURTHY

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PROF. K.V. MURTHY