KEY SUMMARY- CHAPTER 1

There are 7 key topics in this chapter:

1-1 Demonstrate the importance of interpersonal skills in the workplace. p43

1-2 Define organizational behavior (OB). p44
1-3 Show the value to OB of systematic study. p49
1-4 Identify the major behavioral science disciplines that contribute to OB. p53
1-5 Demonstrate why few absolutes apply to OB. p54
1-6 Identify managers’ challenges and opportunities in applying OB concepts. p55
1-7 Compare the three levels of analysis in this text’s OB model. p64

What Is Organizational Behavior (OB)? p40

The study of organizational behavior (OB) gives insight on how employees behave
and perform in the workplace. It helps us develop an understanding of the aspects
that can motivate employees, increase their performance, and help organizations
establish a strong and trusting relationship with their employees.

Simply put, OB is the study of what people do in an organization and the way their
behavior affects the organization’s performance. Because OB is concerned
specifically with employment-related situations, it examines behavior in the context
of job satisfaction, absenteeism, employment turnover, productivity, human
performance, and management.

1-1 Demonstrate the importance of interpersonal skills in the workplace. p43

 Interpersonal skills, also known as people skills

 Interpersonal skills are soft skills, or emotional intelligence skills, are
related to the way you communicate and interact with others.

Some examples of interpersonal skills include:

 Effective communication skills (Active listening)

 Teamwork.
 Responsibility.
 Leadership.
 Motivation.
 Flexibility.
 Patience.
 Adaptability.
 Problem-solving.
 etc

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What are interpersonal skills and why are they important?

Interpersonal skill is the ability to interact with people through effective listening
and communication. It is important for students to have interpersonal
skills because it helps them connect with people and benefits their personality
development too.

Hard skills (Technical skills) are related to specific technical knowledge and training
while soft skills are personality traits such as leadership, communication or time
management. Both types of skills are necessary to successfully perform and
advance in most jobs.

1-2 Define organizational behavior (OB). p44

Management and Organizational Behavior

Manager is an individual who achieves goals through other people. There are four
functions of managers:

Planning is a process that includes defining goals, establishing strategy, and

developing plans to coordinate activities.

Organizing is a function determining what tasks are to be done, who is to do them,

how the tasks are to be grouped, who reports to whom, and where decisions are to
be made.

Leading is a function that includes motivating employees, directing others, selecting

the most effective communication channels, and resolving conflicts.

Controlling is a function monitoring activities to ensure they are being accomplished

as planned and correcting any significant deviations.

Management roles

Henry Mintzberg, now a prominent management scholar, undertook a careful

study of executives to determine what they did on their jobs early in his career.

On the basis of his observations, Mintzberg concluded that managers perform

10 different, highly interrelated roles:

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Management skills

Still another way of considering what managers do is to look at the skills or

competencies they need to achieve their goals.

1. Technical skills (hard skills) is the ability to apply specialized knowledge or

expertise.

2. Human skills (interpersonal skills) is the ability to work with, understand, and
motivate other people, both individually and in groups.

3. Conceptual skills is the mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex

situations.

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Effective versus successful managerial activities

Fred Luthans and his associates looked at what managers do from a somewhat
different perspective.15 They asked, “Do managers who move up most quickly in
an organization do the same activities and with the same emphasis as managers
who do the best job?” You might think the answer is yes, but that’s not always
the case.

Luthans and his associates studied more than 450 managers. All engaged in
four managerial activities:

1. Traditional management. Decision making, planning, and controlling.

2. Communication. Exchanging routine information and processing paperwork.
3. Human resource management. Motivating, disciplining, managing conflict, staffing, and training.
4. Networking. Socializing, politicking, and interacting with outsiders.

Let’s take a look at these three types of managers:

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Organizational behavior (OB) is a field of study that investigates the impact
individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior within organizations, for
the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organization’s
effectiveness.

OB includes these core topics:

• Motivation
• Leader behavior and power
• Interpersonal communication
• Group structure and processes
• Attitude development and perception
• Change processes
• Conflict and negotiation
• Work design

1-3 Show the value to OB of systematic study. p49

Complementing Intuition with Systematic Study

Intuition (gut feeling) is an instinctive feeling not necessarily supported by research.

Whether you’ve explicitly thought about it before or not, you’ve been “reading”
people almost all your life by watching their actions and interpreting what you
see, or by trying to predict what people might do under different conditions.
The casual approach to reading others can often lead to erroneous predictions,
but using a systematic approach can improve your accuracy. Seeing is not enough
to jump into any conclusion.
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Evidence-based management (EBM) is the basing of managerial decisions
on the best available scientific evidence.

1-4 Identify the major behavioral science disciplines that contribute

to OB. p53

Disciplines that contribute to the OB Field:

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 Psychology is the science that seeks to measure, explain, and sometimes
change the behavior of humans and other animals.

 Social psychology is an area of psychology that blends concepts from

psychology and sociology to focus on the influence of people on one another.

 Sociology is the study of people in relation to their social environment or

culture.

 Anthropology is the study of societies to learn about human beings and their
activities.

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1-5 Demonstrate why few absolutes apply to OB. p54

There Are Few Absolutes in OB

Laws in the physical sciences—chemistry, astronomy, physics—are consistent

and apply in a wide range of situations. They allow scientists to generalize about
the pull of gravity or to be confident about sending astronauts into space to
repair satellites. Human beings are complex, and few, if any, simple and universal
principles explain organizational behavior. Because we are not alike, our
ability to make simple, accurate, and sweeping generalizations about ourselves
is limited.

Two people often act very differently in the same situation, and the same person’s
behavior changes in different situations. For example, not everyone is motivated by
money, and people may behave differently at a religious service than they do at a
party.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that we can’t offer reasonably accurate explanations
of human behavior or make valid predictions. It does mean that OB concepts must
reflect situational, or contingency, conditions.

Contingency variables are situational factors that moderate the

relationship between two or more variables.

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Example:

1-6 Identify managers’ challenges and opportunities in applying OB concepts.

p55

Challenges and Opportunities for OB:

 Economic Pressures
When the U.S. economy plunged into a deep and prolonged recession in 2008,
virtually all other large economies around the world followed suit. Layoffs and
job losses were widespread, and those who survived the ax were often asked to
accept pay cuts.

 Continuing Globalization
Organizations are no longer constrained by national borders. Samsung, the
largest South Korean business conglomerate, sells most of its products to
organizations in other countries, Burger King is owned by a Brazilian firm, and
McDonald’s sells hamburgers in more than 118 countries on six continents.

o increased Foreign assignments You are increasingly likely to find yourself in a

foreign assignment—transferred to your employer’s operating division or subsidiary
in another country. Once there, you’ll have to manage a workforce very different in
needs, aspirations, and attitudes from those you are used to back home. To be
effective, you will need to understand everything you can about

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your new location’s culture and workforce—and demonstrate your cultural sensitivity—before
introducing alternate practices.

o Working with People from different Cultures Even in your own country, you’ll find
yourself working with bosses, peers, and other employees born and raised in
different cultures. What motivates you may not motivate them. Or your
communication style may be straightforward and open, which others may find
uncomfortable and threatening. To work effectively with people from different
cultures, you need to understand how their culture and background have shaped
them and how to adapt your management style to fit any differences.

o overseeing movement of Jobs to Countries with Low-Cost Labor It is

increasingly difficult for managers in advanced nations, where the minimum wage

o adapting to differing Cultural and regulatory norms To be effective, managers

need to know the cultural norms of the workforce in each country where they do
business. For instance, in some countries a large percentage of the workforce enjoys
long holidays. There will be country and local regulations to consider, too. Managers
of subsidiaries abroad need to be aware of the unique financial and legal regulations
applying to “guest companies” or else risk violating them. Violations can have
implications for their operations in that country and also for political relations
between countries. Managers also need to be cognizant of differences in regulations
for competitors in that country; many times, understanding the laws can lead to
success or failure.

 Workforce demographics
The workforce has always adapted to variations in economies, longevity and
birth rates, socioeconomic conditions, and other changes that have widespread
impact. People adapt to survive, and OB studies the way those adaptations

 Workforce diversity
One of the most important challenges for organizations is workforce diversity,
a trend by which organizations are becoming more heterogeneous in terms of
employees’ gender, age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and other
characteristics. Managing this diversity is a global concern.

Take a quick look at the dramatic changes in organizations. The typical employee is
getting older; the workforce is becoming increasingly diverse; and global competition
requires employees to become more flexible and cope with rapid change. As a
result of these changes and others, employment options have adapted

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  Customer service
Service employees include technical support representatives, fast-food workers,
sales clerks, nurses, automobile repair technicians, consultants, financial planners,
and flight attendants. The shared characteristic of their jobs is substantial interaction
with an organization’s customers. OB can help managers increase the success of
these interactions by showing how employee attitudes and behavior influence
customer satisfaction.
Many an organization has failed because its employees failed to please customers.
Management needs to create a customer-responsive culture. OB can provide
considerable guidance in helping managers create such cultures—in which
employees establish rapport with customers, put customers at ease, show genuine
interest, and are sensitive to a customer’s individual situation.46

 People skills
As you proceed through the chapters of this text, we’ll present relevant concepts
and theories that can help you explain and predict the behavior of people at work.
You’ll also gain insights into specific people skills you can use on the job. For
instance, you’ll learn ways to design motivating jobs, techniques for improving your
management skills, and how to create more effective teams.

 Networked organizations
Networked organizations allow people to communicate and work together even
though they may be thousands of miles apart. Independent contractors can
telecommute via computer and change employers as the demand for their
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services changes. Software programmers, graphic designers, systems analysts,
technical writers, photo researchers, book and media editors, and medical
transcribers are just a few examples of people who can work from home or other
non-office locations. The manager’s job is different in a networked organization.
Motivating and leading people and making collaborative decisions online require
different techniques than when individuals are physically present in a single location.
As more employees do their jobs by linking to others through networks, managers
must develop new skills. OB can provide valuable insights to help hone those skills.

 Social media
As we will discuss in Chapter 11, social media in the business world is here to stay.
Despite its pervasiveness, many organizations continue to struggle with employees’
use of social media in the workplace. In February 2015, a Texas pizzeria fired an
employee before she showed up for her first day of work after she tweeted
unflattering comments about her future job.

 Employee Well-Being at Work

The typical employee in the 1960s or 1970s showed up at a specified workplace
Monday through Friday and worked for clearly defined 8- or 9-hour chunks of time.
That’s no longer true for a large segment of today’s workforce, since the definition of
the workplace has expanded to include anywhere a laptop or smartphone can go.
However, even if employees work flexible hours at home or from half a continent
away, managers need to consider their wellbeing at work. One of the biggest
challenges to maintaining employee well-being is the new reality that many workers
never get away from the virtual workplace. And while communication technology
allows many technical and professional employees to do their work at home, in their
cars, or on the beach in Tahiti, it also means many feel like they’re not part of a
team.

 Positive Work environment

A real growth area in OB research is positive organizational scholarship (also
called positive organizational behavior), which studies how organizations develop
human strengths, foster vitality and resilience, and unlock potential. Researchers
in this area say too much of OB research and management practice has
been targeted toward identifying what’s wrong with organizations and their
employees.

 Ethical Behavior
In an organizational world characterized by cutbacks, expectations of increasing
productivity, and tough competition, it’s not surprising many employees
feel pressured to cut corners, break rules, and engage in other questionable
practices. Increasingly they face ethical dilemmas and ethical choices, in which
they are required to identify right and wrong conduct. Should they “blow the whistle”
if they uncover illegal activities in their company? Do they follow orders with which
they don’t personally agree? Do they “play politics” to advance their career?
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1-7 Compare the three levels of analysis in this text’s OB model. p64

Coming Attractions: Developing an OB Model

A model is an abstraction of reality, a simplified representation of some real world

phenomenon.

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