A Definition of Organizational Behavior
What is Organizational Behavior? Prior to starting this class, I had never heard much about it before and only had a vague idea of what Organizational Behavior (OB) was about. Initially, my idea of OB was that it was the study of Human Resources functions. I thought I would learn how control wage and benefit costs or how to develop appropriate pay structures.
In my research, Brief and Weiss (2002) clarified that achieving “job satisfaction” is important as employees’ feelings play an important role in the success of an organization. I began to understand that if employees didn’t enjoy their job, they were not very likely to do it very well.
I thought of that concept in relation to the various places I worked at. In those organizations that treated their employees well, people were happier and did produce more. At one company I worked at, there were employee appreciation events every couple of months. Generally, these were not huge affairs, but the area executives would cook hamburgers and hot dogs or serve barbecue or pizza. This was an opportunity for them to get to know their employees. The President also had lunch with members of different departments to give people a chance to suggest ideas to him. Things became pretty creative after when a file clerk made a suggestion that saved the company over $5 MM and she received a $50 M bonus. I think it is an interesting note that many of the employees in my old department worked for the company an average of 5 years before moving on.
This is in contrast to another company I worked at. Here, new employees were taken on a “tour” of the executive floor. This management team had special underground parking, special elevators to their offices and staff was summoned to them, if needed. These guys had seen a couple of good years and thought they were great managers. In reality, they were out of touch with their vendors, their organization and their customers. What I remember most from my time there is that no one really had a good time at work. My old department saw 100% turnover within a 2-year period, including myself.
But I still didn’t grasp the full scope of the topic. Wertheim’s (n.d.) explanation that most of us rely on “common sense” and past experience to deal with work issues made sense because it is what I do. Wertheim contends that employees and managers are not only facing new issues at an increasing rate but we are also having to rely increasingly on interpersonal skills which is usually the most underdeveloped skill set for most people. Unfortunately, this is also true for me.
I was thrust into management roles because I had done well in highly technical or analytical situations. I was being rewarded for a job well done and was expected to continue to perform well because I had done so in the past. However, my reward required additional skills, interpersonal skills, I had not mastered or really even worked on. I found myself hating my new role, floundering, not understanding what my staff wanted and not really knowing how to relate to them. Before long I would leave for another job, with both my bosses and myself wondering what went wrong.
So what is Organizational Behavior? I’ve chosen to utilize Clark’s summary as my definition:
Organizational Behavior is the study and application of knowledge about how people, individuals, and groups act in organizations. It does this by taking a system approach. That is, it interprets people-organization relationships in terms of the whole person, whole group, whole organization, and whole social system. Its purpose is to build better relationships by achieving human objectives, organizational objectives, and social objectives (2000).
OB looks to address the needs of all parties in the work relationship. I now understand that management, utilizing interpersonal skills, can be the conduit for achieving employee, organizational and societal goals. I look forward to learning more about how to do this during this class. Count me in and engaged!
Bibliography :
- Brief, A. P., & Weiss, H. M. (2002). Organizational behavior: Affect in the workplace.
- Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 279-307. Retrieved May 6, 2003, from Pro-Quest database.
- Clark, D.R. (2000). Big Dog’s Leadership Page – Organizational Behavior. Retrieved May 8, 2003, from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leadob.html.
- Wertheim, E. G. (n.d.). Historical Background of Organizational Behavior. Retrieved May 8, 2003 from http://web.cba.neu.edu/~ewertheim/introd/history.htm.
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Reference :
- http://essayinfo.com/sample/essay/14
