Download Organizational Behavior 11e.

University of Bahrain
College of Business Administration
MGT 233: Organizational Behavior
Managing People and Organization
Chapter : 3
Foundations of Individual Behavior
Dr.Mahmood Asad
MGT 233
3–1
Chapter Learning Objectives
After studying this chapter you should be able to:
1. Explain the nature of the individual-organization
relationship.
2. Define personality and describe personality attributes that
affect behavior in organizations.
3. Discuss individual attitudes in organizations and how they
affect behavior.
4. Describe basic perceptual processes and the role of
attributions in organizations.
5. Explain how workplace behaviors can directly or indirectly
influence organizational effectiveness.
Dr.Mahmood Asad
MGT 233
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•
People
in
Organizations
Psychological Contracts: A psychological contract is the overall set of
A.
expectations held by an individual with respect to what he or she will contribute to the
organization and what the organization, in return, will provide to the individual. It is
similar to a standard legal contract, except that it is usually less formal and less well
defined.
1. The individual makes several contributions to the organization, including effort, ability,
loyalty, skills, time, and competencies, in return for the inducements offered by the
organization.
2. Inducements offered by the organization include pay, job security, benefits, career
opportunities, status, and promotion opportunities.
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(cont’d)
3. Either party may seek changes in the contract if an imbalance
or inequity is felt. The task of management is to properly
manage the psychological contracts with all employees.
4. Increasing globalization of business also complicates the
management of psychological contracts because the array of
inducements that employees deem to be of value varies
across cultures. Also, the psychological contract becomes
even more complex for employees who take international
assignments.
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FIGURE 3.1
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The Psychological Contract
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(cont’d)
B.The Person-Job Fit: Part of managing the psychological
contract is making sure that the contributions made by the
individual fit with the inducements offered by the
organization. Hiring processes, training programs,
performance appraisal systems, and other organizational
processes are techniques that organizations can use to assist
in helping the person fit the job.
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MGT 233
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People in Organizations
• Person-Job Fit
– The extent to which the contributions made by
the individual match the inducements offered by
the organization
• Individual Differences
– Personal attributes that vary
from one person to another
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
C. Individual Differences. Although people are similar to one another
in many ways, there are significant differences. We all have a unique
set of individual differences in the ways we think, interpret our
environment, and respond to that environment.
1. Individual differences are personal attributes that vary from one
person to another and may be physical, psychological, and
emotional.
2. The basic categories of individual differences include personality,
attitudes, perception, and creativity. The way these individual
differences affect employee work behaviors depends on the work
situation.
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Personality and Organizations
• The “Big Five” Personality Traits
– A set of fundamental traits that are especially relevant to
organizations
Agreeableness
The ability to get along with others
Conscientiousness
The number of goals on which a person focuses
Neuroticism
Experiencing anger, anxiety, moodiness/insecurity
Extraversion
The quality of being comfortable with relationships
Openness
The capacity to entertain new ideas and to change
as a result of new information
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
II. Personality and Organizations. Personality is the relatively
stable set of psychological attributes or traits that distinguish
one person from another. Personality plays a major role in
how a person perceives his or her work environment,
evaluates it, and responds to it. A person’s personality starts
forming at birth and continues through adolescence. By the
time most people reach adulthood, their personalities are
clearly defined and generally stable. Significant events can
contribute to changes in an adult’s personality.
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
1. Agreeableness refers to a person’s ability to get along with others. It
causes some people to be gentle, cooperative, forgiving, understanding,
and good-natured in their dealings with others. But it may result in others
being irritable, short-tempered, uncooperative, and generally antagonistic
toward other people.
2. Conscientiousness refers to the number of goals on which a person
focuses. Research has found that more conscientious people tend to be
higher performers than less conscientious people across a variety of
different jobs.
3. Neuroticism refers to people who experience unpleasant emotions such
as anger, anxiety, depression, and feelings of vulnerability more often than
do people who are relatively less neurotic. People who are more neurotic
are more excitable, insecure, reactive, and subject to extreme mood
swings.
Dr.Mahmood Asad
MGT 233
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(cont’d)
4. Extraversion refers to a person’s comfort level with relationships. People
who are called extroverts are sociable, talkative, assertive, and open to
establishing new relationships. Research suggests that extroverts tend to
be attracted to jobs based on personal relationships like sales and
marketing positions and tend to be higher overall job performers than
introverts.
5. Openness refers to a person’s rigidity of beliefs and range of interests.
People with high levels of openness are willing to listen to new ideas and
to change their own ideas, beliefs, and attitudes as a result of new
information. They may also have broad interests and be curious,
imaginative, and creative. Openness may also indicate more receptivity to
change rather than resistance to change.
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FIGURE 3.2
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The “Big Five” Personality Framework
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Personality and Organizations (cont’d)
 The Myers-Briggs Framework
◦ Differentiation across four general dimensions




Sensing
Intuiting
Judging
Perceiving
◦ Sixteen personality classifications result from the higher
and lower positions of the general dimensions
◦ Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a popular
questionnaire used to assess personality types
 Communications styles
 Interaction preferences
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MGT 233
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Personality and Organizations (cont’d)
• Emotional Intelligence (EQ)
– The extent to which people are self-aware, can
manage their emotions, can motivate themselves,
express empathy for others, and possess social skills
• Dimensions of EQ
–
–
–
–
–
Self-awareness
Managing emotions
Motivating oneself
Empathy
Social skills
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MGT 233
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Other Personality Traits at Work
Locus of Control
The extent to which a person believes his/her
circumstances are a function of either his/her own
actions or of external factors beyond his/her control
Self-Efficacy
A person’s beliefs about his/her capabilities to perform a
task
Authoritarianism
The belief that power and status differences are
appropriate within hierarchical social systems such as
organizations
Machiavellianism
Behavior directed at gaining power and control of others
Self-Esteem
The extent to which a person believes he or she is a
worthwhile/deserving individual
Risk Propensity
The degree to which a person is willing to take chances
and make risky decisions
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MGT 233
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Attitudes in Organizations
• Attitudes
– A person’s complexes of beliefs and feelings about
specific ideas, situations, other people
• Structural Components of Attitudes
– Cognition: the knowledge a person presumes to have
about something
– Affect: a person’s feelings toward something
– Intention: a component of an attitude that guides a
person’s behavior
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FIGURE 3.3
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Attitude Formation
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Attitudes in Organizations (cont’d)
• Cognitive Dissonance
– The anxiety a person experiences when he/she
simultaneously possesses two sets of knowledge
or perceptions that are contradictory or
incongruent
• Why Attitudes Change ? Employees’ attitudes may be
changed if management provides employees with information
that supports the desired change. Another way to change
attitudes is to take action that eliminates the cause of the
undesired attitudes. Attitudes may also be changed through
processes associated with dissonance reduction.
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Attitudes in Organizations
Key Work-Related Attitudes
Job satisfaction
The extent to which a person is gratified or
fulfilled by his or her work
Organizational
commitment
(job commitment)
A person’s identification with and attachment to
an organization
Affect and Mood in Organizations
Positive affectivity
Upbeat and optimistic, overall sense of wellbeing, seeing things in a positive light
Negative affectivity
Downbeat and pessimistic, seeing things in a
negative way, seeming to be in a bad mood
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Perception in Organizations
 Perception
◦ The set of processes by which an individual becomes aware
of and interprets information about the environment
 Selective perception :is the process of screening out information with
which we are uncomfortable or that contradicts our beliefs.
 Stereotyping : is the process of categorizing or labeling people on the
basis of a single attribute or characteristic.
 Attribution Theory
◦ We attribute causes to behavior based on our observations
of certain characteristics of that behavior
 Consensus
 Consistency
 Distinctiveness
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
• Attribution Theory
– We attribute causes to behavior based on our
observations of certain characteristics of that
behavior
• Consensus :is the extent to which other people in the
same situation behave in the same fashion.
• Consistency: is the extent to which the same person
behaves in the same fashion at different times.
• Distinctiveness : is the extent to which the same
person behaves in the same fashion in other situations.
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
d)Attributions can be internal or external.
(1) Internal attributions are those that attempt
to explain a situation in terms of factors internal
to the person involved (the person is unqualified,
too lazy, too immature for the job, etc.).
(2) External attributions are those that attempt
to explain a situation in terms of factors external
to the person (the job is too difficult, time is too
short, the equipment is obsolete, etc.).
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FIGURE 3.4
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Basic Perceptual Processes
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FIGURE 3.5
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The Attribution Process
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Types of Workplace Behavior
V. Types of Workplace Behavior. Workplace behavior is a pattern
of action by the members of an organization that directly or
indirectly influences organizational effectiveness.
A. Performance behaviors are the total set of work-related
behaviors that the organization expects the individual to
display.
1. Performance behaviors derive from the psychological
contract.
2. Performance behaviors may be either narrowly defined and
easily measured or more diverse and difficult to assess.
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MGT 233
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Types of Workplace Behavior (cont’d)
• Dysfunctional Behaviors
– Behaviors that detract from organizational
performance
• Absenteeism: when an individual does not show up for
work
• Turnover: when people quit their jobs
• Organizational Citizenship
– The extent to which a person’s behavior makes a
positive overall contribution to the organization
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
B. Dysfunctional Behaviors. Another important type of workplace behavior
is that which results in employee withdrawal: absenteeism and turnover.
1. Absenteeism occurs when an individual does not show up for work.
Absenteeism may be for legitimate reasons or feigned. In either case the
work normally done by an absent employee does not get done, so
organizations usually try to reduce absenteeism of either type.
2. Turnover occurs when people quit their jobs. Turnover usually results
from a number of factors, including aspects of the job, the organization,
the individual, the labor market, and family influences. Some turnover is
inevitable and may even be desirable in certain situations.
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MGT 233
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(cont’d)
C. Organizational citizenship refers to the behavior of individuals
who make a positive overall contribution to the organization.
1. An employee who fulfills the basics of the job (the
psychological contract) but is never around when the extra
effort is required may not be considered a good organizational
citizen.
2. Fulfilling the basics of the job, helping out whenever needed,
and performing the extra level of effort is often termed good
citizenship.
3. Good citizenship is a complex mosaic of individual, social, and
organizational variables
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MGT 233
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Organizational Behavior in Action
• After reading the chapter:
–What specifically would convince you that an
organization would be likely to honor its psychological
contract with you?
–What actions could you personally take to increase the
person-job fit for your first job after graduation?
–Which of the “Big Five” personality traits would be the
easiest to fake in an interview? Which would be the
hardest?
Dr.Mahmood Asad
MGT 233
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