Organisational behavior is an emerging filed of study, with sound prospects. Though the study of behaviour has interested psychologists for a number of years, its role in specific organizational situations has caught their attention only of late. The observation that work behavior is instrumental in determining organizational performance has forced organizations to focus greater attention on their employees’ behavior. The trend is noticed to be greater than ever before. The traditional view of considering the employee as just a spoke in the Organizational wheel has almost virtually disappeared. Organizations are constantly infusing the much needed humanistic approaches to keep their employees spirits high.
Organizational behavior is significantly affected by several changes. Of prime importance, is the change in
organizational structures. Bureaucratic models have given way to modern ones like the project and matrix designs. Analyzing the stages in the evolution of organizational structures and their specific implications to behavior in organizations are the focus of this unit.
Every organization has certain objectives or goals which it strives to accomplish. In order to do so, people work together in groups .The activities of each of these individuals and groups are co-ordinated by authority-responsibility relationships. These are determined on the basis of the hierarchy of the jobs. This is what we mean by “organization”. Such clearly marked relationships help to ensure effective work performance. Some of the commonly used definitions of the term are given here, so as to draw a clearer picture of the term and its use.
An organization is a group of individuals co-ordinated into different levels of authority and segments of specialization for the purpose of achieving the goals and objectives of the organization .
The process of identifying and grouping the work to be performed, defining and delegating responsibility and authority, and establishing relationships for the purpose of enabling people to work most effectively together in establishing of objectives.
An organization is the formation of an effective machine, the management of an effective executive and the administration of an effective direction. Administration determines the goals, management strives towards it. Administrator determines the
organization ; the management uses it. An organization is a machine of management in its achievement of the ends determined by its administration.
An analysis of these definitions show that organizations are born out of a necessity for a clear, well defined system or structure, which people require for execution of their work responsibilities . It helps them to relate to each other , co-ordinate their activities , and achieve the organizational goals or objectives. It minimizes confusion, nurtures suitable work behavior , and maximizes effectiveness.
DYNAMICS
Changes are taking place all around in organization. It is but natural that everything changes over time. What remains constant is change itself. Manager finds that changes need to be initiated at different levels within the organization –individual, group, structure, processes and subsystems coping with internal and external environmental changes. By scanning the environment of the organization and deciphering how changes in the environment are likely to widen the gap between desired and actual state of affairs of organization such as productivity, customer and employer satisfactions, profits, the manager can be a change – agent for introducing planned changes in the organization.
The term work change in the organization refers to any alteration that occurs in the work environment.
Planned changes mean those changes which are effected in a planned manner after assessing the need for change and working out the details as to when and how they will be carried out. Planned change is also called proactive change. In contrast, reactive change is one which takes place in random fashion as a crisis situation develops. For proactive or planned change to be initiated, manager shall be sensitive to the environment al changes affecting the organization by being boundary scanners so that organizational crisis situations can be averted.
Planned changes or proactive change is purposeful or goal-directed. There are two widely recognized goals of the planned change. One, it seeks to improve the organizational ability to cope with, or adapt to, changing environment. Second, it seeks to change employee knowledge, attitude and behavior. A few generalizations about change reflect its nature. Change in any part of the organization tends to affect the whole organization. Change is a human as well as a technical problem. Social equilibrium exists in the organization employees are adjusted. When change occurs in the organization, it requires employees to make new adjustments as the organization seeks new equilibrium .Regarding it is the objective of management to restore and maintain equilibrium of work group and personal adjustment which change upsets. Though manager is a primary change agent, employees, outside consultants may also be change agents.
INDIVIDUAL
Why do some people seem to perform relatively better on their jobs than some others? The answer obviously lies in differences in individual behaviors. This unit gives an overview of some of the psychological variables that influence human behavior at work. Since almost all organizational efforts are directed towards ensuring effective performance, it is vital that organizations determine the nature and extent to which these variables affect an individual’s behavior. Once this task is complete, organizations would do well to strengthen desirable behavior. This unit is divided into four distinct parts –the first part concentrates on personality and the factors affecting personality. The second gives a broad outline of the learning process and the various theories associated with it. The third gives a comprehensive discussion of organizational behavior modification and the steps involved in it, besides its application in the organizational context. The last part attempts to define attitudes and describes their formation and measurement.
Defining personality has been one of the most challenging tasks facing management theorists today. This is because different people tend to define personality from different perspectives. While some consider personality in terms of character, some others consider it as a description of success in society, psychologists, however, tend to consider these descriptions as only a part of the whole concept of personality. Theoreticians have constantly been suggesting various propositions about it. No conclusive agreement on the theoretical basis of personality has so far been possible. As such its definition has also remained elusive. Let us now examine a few of the important definitions of personality.
Personality is derived from the Latin word per sona meaning to speak through and it literally means personal identity or distinctive personal character.
Personality represents the Whole person concept. It includes perception, learning, motivation, and more. Definitionally, people’s external appearance and behavior, their inner awareness of self, their pattern of measurable traits, and the person –situation interaction, makeup their personalities.
Events in the external environment strongly influence the way people behave at any particular point in time, yet people always bring something of themselves to the situation. We often refer this ‘something, which represents the unique qualities of the individual as personality.
To some extent, a person’s personality is like all other people’s, like some other people’s and like no other people’s.
POWER AND LEADERSHIP
This lesson first defines power and distinguishes it from authority. Then it identifies sources of power and explains how power is used in organizations. Finally, it presents the political perspective of power in today’s organizations. The underlying premise of this lesson is that acquisition and distribution of power is a natural process in any organization. Power is a determinant of goals to be achieved and of how resources will be distributed. These, in turn, have far reaching implications for an organization ‘s performance and satisfaction and organizational effectiveness.
There is no universally accepted meaning of power has more diverse meanings than any other concept in organizational behaviour. In general it refers to a capacity that one has to influence the behaviour of an other so that the other does something which would not be done otherwise.
A few of the definitions on power are presented here to capture the wide range of the meanings it has assumed over a period of time.
Leadership and power concepts are intertwined. Leaders use power as a means of attaining group goals. In other words, leaders achieve goals and the power is a facilitator of goal achievement. Since, every organization has goals to purpose ,acquisition and distribution of power is a natural process in it . Power determines the goals , the organization seeks and how the resources in the organisation’s members performance and satisfaction as well organizational effectiveness.
They can be better understood by distinguishing power from authority and influence.
Definitions of power are intertwined with the concepts of authority and influence. Chester Barnard defined power as informal authority Many modern organizational sociologists define authority as legitimate power to have better understanding of power , We bring up clearly the distinctions between power and authority and power and influence.
