UNIT-I

INTRODUCTION TO ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

Introduction

Organizational behaviour describes how people interact with one another inside of an
organization, such as a business. These interactions subsequently influence how the
organization itself behaves and how well it performs. Organizational behaviour is the study of
both group and individual performance and activity within an organization.

Meaning

 Organizational Behaviour is concerned with the understanding, prediction, and

control of human behaviour in organizations. -- Fred Luthans
 John Newstram and Keith Devis, “Organisational behaviour is the study and
application of knowledge about how people as individuals and as groups act within
organisations. It strives to identify ways in which people can act more effectively.”
 It is the study and application of knowledge about how people act with organizations.
 It is a human tool for human benefit. It applies broadly to the behaviour of people in
all types of organizations. Wherever organizations are, there is a need to understand
organizational behavior.

NATURE OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

Organizational behaviour is an applied behavioural science that is built on contributions from

a number of behavioural disciplines. The following are mainly discussed as the nature of
organizational behaviour.

 Separate Field of Study and Not a Discipline Only: O.B. has a multi-
interdisciplinary orientation and is, thus, not based on a specific theoretical
background. Therefore, it is better reasonable to call O.B. a separate field of study
rather than a discipline only.
 An Interdisciplinary Approach: Organizational behaviour is essentially an
interdisciplinary approach to study human behaviour at work. It tries to integrate the
relevant knowledge drawn from related disciplines like psychology, sociology and
anthropology to make them applicable for studying and analysing organizational
behaviour.
 An Applied Science: The very nature of O.B. is applied. What O.B. basically does is
the application of various researches to solve the organizational problems related to
human behaviour.
 A Normative Science: Organizational Behaviour is a normative science also. While
the positive science discusses only cause effect relationship, O.B. prescribes how the
findings of applied researches can be applied to socially accept organizational goals.
Thus, O.B. deals with what is accepted by individuals and society engaged in an

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 organization. Yes, it is not that O.B. is not normative at all. In fact, O.B. is normative
as well that is well underscored by the proliferation of management theories.
 A Humanistic and Optimistic Approach: Organizational Behaviour applies
humanistic approach towards people working in the organization. It, deals with the
thinking and feeling of human beings. O.B. is based on the belief that people have an
innate desire to be independent, creative and productive.
 A Total System Approach: The system approach is one that integrates all the
variables, affecting organizational functioning.

SCOPE OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

“OB is a field of study that investigates the impact that individual, group, and structure has on
behaviour within organizations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge towards
improving an organisation’s effectiveness”. The scope of OB involves three levels of
behaviour in organizations: individuals, groups and structure.

1. Individual Behaviour

- Personality
- Perception
- Values and Attitudes
- Learning
- Motivation

2. Group Behaviour

- Work groups and group dynamics

- Dynamics of conflict
- Communication
- Leadership
- Morale

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3. Organization: Structure, Process and Application

- Organizational Climate
- Organizational Culture
- Organizational Change
- Organizational Effectiveness
- Organizational Development

FEATURES OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

The essential characteristics or features of organizational behaviour are as follows

 An Integral Part of Management: OB is a part of general management and not the

whole of management. It represents behaviour approach to management. It is
significant to note that because of the importance of human behaviour in
organisations. OB has assumed the status of a distinct field of study.
 A Field of Study: OB is a field of study, research and application associated with a
growing concern for people at the workplace. Its study helps in understanding the
human behaviour in work organizations. It includes creative thinking among the
managers to solve human problems in organisations.
 Inter-disciplinary Approach: The field of organisational behaviour is heavily
influenced by several other behavioural sciences and social sciences. The prominent
among these are psychology, sociology and anthropology. Organizational behaviour
draws a rich array of research from these disciplines.
 Levels of Analysis: OB involves three levels of analysis of behaviour; Individual
behaviour, Group behaviour and Organizational behaviour.
 Goal-Oriented: OB is an action-oriented and goal-directed discipline. The major
goals of organisational behaviour are to understand, explain and predict human
behaviour in the organisational context so that it may be moulded into result-yielding
situations. It provides a rational thinking about people and their behaviour.
 Human Tool: OB is a human tool for human benefit. It helps in understanding and
predicting the behaviour of individuals. It provides generalisations that managers can
use to anticipate the effects of certain actions on human behaviour.
 Science and Art: OB is both a science as well as an art. The systematic knowledge
about human behaviour is a science. The application of behaviour knowledge and
skills clearly leans towards being an art. However, organisation behaviour is not an
exact science like physics or chemistry. It cannot provide specific answers to all
organisational problems. The exact prediction of behaviour of people in organizations
is also not possible.

SIGNIFICANCE OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR:

 Good work place relations: It is hard to build meaningful workplace relationships.

As a leader, you have to look out for any instances of conflict. Or situations that can
hamper employee relationships. The main objective is to improve
communication among people. On top of that, it reduces any chances of
misunderstanding that can harm relationships.
 Employee motivation: Motivation is a crucial element when we talk about employee
engagement. Without motivation, it is difficult to improve productivity. A lack of
motivation is why people don’t give their 100% effort to the job.

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  Builds psychologically safe workplace: Organizational behaviour study helps a
leader to understand their influence on the employees. It determines your attitude
towards them. It draws a clear picture of how to make your workplace
psychologically safe. This is a workplace that will inspire and build morale.
 Nature of employees: Achieving success in the long term can be a difficult task. And
maintaining consistency is even more significantly challenging. However, it will all
depend on how employees behave at work. Their attitude towards their work will
reflect on the results.
 Higher efficiency in Teams: The study of behaviour in an organization is vital
for team collaboration. It gives you insights into the similarities and differences that
people share. Understanding the dynamics will assist a leader in facilitating better
team unity.

LEVELS AND CONTRIBUTING DISCIPLINES TO ORGANIZATIONAL

BEHAVIOR

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  Individual Level: Deals with the concepts at the individual level. Examples of
individual-level concepts are perception, personality, learning, motivation, and
attitude.
 Group Level: Deals with the concepts at the group level. Examples of group-level
concepts are team, conflict, leadership, power, and politics. Group-level concepts
may include how groups are formed, how to make effective teams, how individually
and collectively the group activities can be improved, how to motivate employees,
and which type of group would be suitable for a particular assignment.
 Organizational Level: Deals with the concepts at the organizational level.
Examples of organizational-level concepts are change management and
organizational culture. Other topics discussed at organizational level include the
concept of organization, different organizational models, and organizational change
along with its impact and implementation. The working conditions and stress
management are also discussed at the organizational level.

Contributional disciples to organizational behaviour

 Psychology: Psychology is the study of human behaviour which tries to identify

thecharacteristics of individuals and provides us with useful insight into areas such as
human motivation, perceptual processes or personality characteristics
 Sociology: Sociology is the study of social behaviour, relationships among social
groups and societies, and the maintenance of social order. The main focus of attention
is on the social system. This helps us to appreciate the functioning of individuals
within the organization which is essentially a socio-technical entity.
 Social Psychology: Social Psychology is the study of human behaviour in the contest
of social situations. This essentially addresses the problem of understanding the
typical behavioural patterns to be expected from an individual when he takes part in a
group.
 Anthropology: Anthropology is the science of mankind and the study of human
behaviour as a whole. The main focus of attention is on the cultural system, beliefs,
customs, ideas and values within a group or society and the comparison of behaviour
among different cultures. In the context of today’s organizational scenario. It is very
important to appreciate the differences that exist among people coming from different
cultural backgrounds as people are often found to work with others from the other
side of the globe.
 Economics: Any organization to survive and sustain itself must be aware of the
economic viability of their effort. This applies even to non-profit and voluntary
organizations as well.
 PoliticalScience: The contributions of Political Scientists are significant to the
understandingof arrangement in organizations. It studies individuals and groups
within specific conditions concerning power dynamics. Important topics under here

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 include the structuring of conflict, allocation of power, and how people manipulate
power for individual self-interest, etc.

EMERGING ISSUES AND CHALLENGES OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR:

Challenges and opportunities for organizational behavior are massive and rapidly changing
for improving productivity and meeting business goals.Although the problems with
organizations and the solutions over the ages have not changed, the emphasis and
surrounding environmental context certainly have changed.

Although the resulting lean and mean organizations offered some short-run benefits in terms
of lowered costs and improved productivity, if they continued to do business, as usual, they
would not be able to meet current or future challenges.

The nature of work is changing so rapidly that rigid job structures impede the work to be
done now, and that may drastically change the following year, month, or even week.

Main challenges and opportunities of organizational behavior are;

 Improving People’s Skills: Technological changes, structural changes,

environmental changes are accelerated at a faster rate in the business field. Unless
employees and executives are equipped to possess the required skills to adapt to those
changes, the targeted goals cannot be achieved in time. These two different categories
of skills – managerial skills and technical skills. Some of the managerial skills include
listening skills, motivating skills, planning and organizing skills, leading skills,
problem-solving skills, decision-making skills.
 Improving Quality and Productivity: Quality is the extent to which the customers
or users believe the product or service surpasses their needs and expectations. For
example, a customer who purchases an automobile has a certain expectation, one of
which is that the automobile engine will start when it is turned on. If the engine fails
to start, the customer’s expectations will not have been met and the customer will
perceive the quality of the car as poor. The key dimensions of quality as follows.
 Total Quality Management (TQM): Total Quality Management (TQM) is a
philosophy of management that is driven by the constant attainment of customer
satisfaction through the continuous improvement of all organizational processes. The
components of TQM are;
-An intense focus on the customer
-Concern for continual improvement
-Improvement in the quality of everything the organization does
-Accurate measurement and, Empowerment of employees

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  Managing Workforce Diversity: This refers to employing different categories of
employees who are heterogeneous in terms of gender, race, ethnicity, relation,
community, physically disadvantaged, elderly people, etc. In general, employees
wanted to retain their individual and cultural identity, values and lifestyles even
though they are working in the same organization with common rules and regulations.
The major challenge for organizations is to become more accommodating to diverse
groups of people by addressing their different lifestyles, family needs, and work
styles.

 Responding to Globalization: Today’s business is mostly market-driven; wherever

the demands exist irrespective of distance, locations, climatic conditions, the
businessoperations are expanded to gain their market share and to remain in the top
rank, etc. Business operations are no longer restricted to a particular locality or region.

 Empowering People: The main issue is delegating more power and responsibility to
the lower level cadre of employees and assigning more freedom to make choices
about their schedules, operations, procedures and the method of solving their work-
related problems.

 Coping with Temporariness: In recent times, the product life cycles are slimming,
the methods of operations are improving, and fashions are changing very fast. In those
days, the managers needed to introduce major change programs once or twice a
decade.

 Stimulating Innovation and Change: Today’s successful organizations must foster

innovation and be proficient in the art of change; otherwise, they will become
candidates for extinction in due course of time and vanished from their field of
business.

 The emergence of E-Organisation & E-Commerce: It refers to the business

operations involving the electronic mode of transactions. It encompasses presenting
products on websites and filling the order. The vast majority of articles and media
attention given to using the Internet in business are directed at online shopping.

 Improving Ethical Behaviour: The complexity in business operations is forcing the

workforce to face ethical dilemmas, where they are required to define right and wrong
conduct to complete their assigned activities.

 Improving Customer Service: OB can contribute to improving organizational

performance by showing drat how employees’ attitudes and behavior are associated
with customer satisfaction.

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  Helping Employees Balance Work-Life Conflicts: The typical employee in the
1960s or 1970s showed up at the workplace Monday through Friday and did his or her
job 8 or 9-hour chunk of time. The workplace and hours were specified. That’s no
longer true for a large segment of today’s workforce. Employees are increasingly
complaining that the line between work and non-work time has become blurred,
creating personal conflict and stress..

 Flattening World: In this point that the Internet has “flattened” the world and
created an environment in which there is a more level playing field in terms of access
to information. This access to information has led to an increase in innovation, as
knowledge can be shared instantly across time zones and cultures. It has also created
intense competition, as the speed of business is growing faster and faster all the time.

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