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Ready Notes

Basic Elements of Individual Behavior in Organizations

Prof. Begum Khaleda Khanam

Slide content created by Joseph B. Mosca, Monmouth University. Copyright Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Understanding Individuals Behavior

In order to understand human behavior in the workplace, what needs to be considered?
We must consider the basic nature of the relationship between individuals and organizations.

What is the psychological contract?

The overall set of expectations held by an organization with respect to what the employee will contribute to the organization and what the organization will provide in return.

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The Psychological Contract

Contributions from individuals:
Effort. Ability. Loyalty. Skills. Time. Competencies.

Inducements from the organization:

Pay. Job security. Benefits. Career opportunities. Status. Promotion opportunities.

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Figure 15.1: The Psychological Contract

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The Person-Job Fit

The specific aspect of managing psychological contracts is managing?
Person-Job fit: the extent to which the contributions made by the individual match the inducements offered by the organization.

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What Is the Nature of Individual Differences?

Individual differences are personal attributes that vary from one person to another. What are individual differences?
Physical. Psychological. Emotional.
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Personality and Individual Behavior

What is personality?
The relatively stable set of psychological and behavioral attributes that distinguish one person from another.

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Can You Name the Big Five Personality Traits?

Agreeableness: a persons ability to get along with others. Conscientiousness: the number of goals on which a person focuses. Negative emotionality: the extent to which a person is poised calm, resilient, and secure. Extraversion: a persons comfort level with relationships. Openness: a persons rigidity of beliefs and range of interests.
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The Big Five Model of Personality

Agreeableness

High agreeableness

Low agreeableness

Conscientiousness
High conscientiousness Low conscientiousness

Negative Emotionally Less negative emotionally More negative emotionally

Extraversion More extraversion Openness More openness Less openness More introversion

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Other Personality Traits at Work

Locus of control:
The extent to which people believe that their behavior has a real effect on what happens to them.

Self-efficacy:
A persons beliefs about her or his capabilities to perform a task.
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What Is Authoritarianism?
The extent to which an individual believes that power and status differences are appropriate within hierarchical social systems like organizations. Machiavellianism:
Behavior directed at gaining power and controlling the behavior of others.

Self-esteem:
The extent to which a person believes that they are a worthwhile and deserving individual.
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What Is Risk Propensity?

The degree to which an individual is willing to take chances and make risky decisions.

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Attitudes and Individual Behavior

What are attitudes?
Complexes of beliefs and feelings that people have about specific ideas, situations, or other people.

Cognitive dissonance:
The conflict individuals experience among their own attitudes.

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Work-Related Attitudes
Job satisfaction or dissatisfaction:
An attitude that reflects the extent to which an individual is gratified by or fulfilled in his or her work.

Organizational commitment:
An attitude that reflects an individuals identification with and attachment to the organization itself.

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Affects and Mood in Organizations

Positive affectivity:
A tendency to be relatively upbeat and optimistic, have an overall sense of wellbeing, see things in a positive light, and seem to be in a good mood.

Negative affectivity:
A tendency to be generally downbeat and pessimistic, see things in a negative way, and seem to be in a bad mood.

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Perception and Individual Behavior

What is perception?
The set of processes by which an individual becomes aware of and interprets information about the environment.

What is selective perception?

The process of screening out information that we are uncomfortable with or that contradicts our beliefs.

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The Perceptual Process

Stereotyping:
The process of categorizing or labeling people on the basis of a single attribute.

Attribution:
A mechanism through which we observe behavior and then attribute causes to it.

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Figure 15.3: Perceptual Processes

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Stress and Individual Behavior

What is stress?
An individuals response to a strong stimulus, which is called a stressor.

What is general adaptation syndrome?

General cycle of the stress process.

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Figure 15.4: The General Adaptation Syndrome

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Can You Name the Personality Types?

Type A:
Individuals who are extremely competitive, are very devoted to work, and have a strong sense of time urgency.

Type B:
Individuals who are less competitive, are less devoted to work, and have weaker sense of time urgency.

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Figure 15.5: Causes of Work Stress

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Organizational Stressors:

Task demands Physical demands Role demands Interpersonal demands

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What Is Burnout?

A feeling of exhaustion that may develop when someone experiences too much stress for an extended period of time.

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What Are the Ways to Manage Stress?

Exercise Relaxation Time management Support groups

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Creativity in Organizations
What is creativity?
The ability of an individual to generate new ideas or to conceive of new perspectives on existing ideas.

What are the components of the creative process?

Preparation Incubation Insight Verification
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Types of Workplace Behavior

What is workplace behavior?
A pattern of action by the members of an organization that directly or indirectly influences organizational effectiveness.

What are the behaviors?

Performance behaviors: the total set of work-related behaviors that the organization expects.

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Withdrawal Behavior

What is it?
Absenteeism: When an individual does not report for work.

Turnover:
When people quit their jobs.

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What Is Organizational Citizenship?

The behavior of individuals that makes a positive overall contribution to the organization.

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