Week 1

BUS7000

HRC7611

Organizational Behavior and Theory

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Introductions• Who are you?• Where do you work?• Experience with Organizational Behavior?• Expectations of this course?• Your first concert or fun fact

Discuss syllabus Groundrules

Introductions

Chapter 1

Introduction tothe Field ofOrganizational Behavior

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright © 2013 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Practicing OB at Brasilata

Brasilata has become one of

Brazil’s most innovative and

productive companies by applying

organizational behavior

knowledge, including employee

involvement, creativity,

motivation, leadership, teamwork,

and organizational culture.

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Organizational Behavior and Organizations

Organizational behavior• The study of what people think,

feel, and do in and around organizations

Organizations• Groups of people who work

interdependently toward some purpose

• Collective entities• Collective sense of purpose

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Satisfy the need to understand and predict

Helps us to test personal theories

Influence behavior – get things done

OB improves an organization’s financial health

OB is for everyone

Why Study OB?

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Organizational Effectiveness

The ultimate dependent variable in OB

Old approach -- achievement of stated goals

Problem with goal attainment• Could set easy goals• Company might achieve wrong

goals

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Four Perspectives of Organizational Effectiveness

Stakeholder Perspective

High-Performance WP Perspective

Organizational Learning Perspective

Open Systems Perspective

NOTE: Need to consider all four perspectives when assessing a company’s effectiveness

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Organizations are complex systems that “live” within (and depend upon) the external environment

Effective organizations• Maintain a close “fit” with changing conditions• Transform inputs to outputs efficiently and flexibly

Foundation for the other three organizational effectiveness perspectives

Open Systems Perspective

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•Products/services

•Shareholder dividends

•Community support

•Waste/pollution

Technological subsystem

Marketing /Sales

subsystem

Production

subsystem

Cultural

subsystem

subsystem

subsyste

m

Purchasing

subsystem

Engineering

subsystem

Accounting

subsystem

subsyst

em

Socialization subsystem

subs

yste

m

•Raw materials

•Human resources

•Information

•Finances

•Equipment

FeedbackFeedback

subsyste

m

subsystem

subsy

ste

m

Managerial

subsystem

Transforming inputs to outputs

Open Systems Perspective

External Environment

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An organization’s capacity to acquire, share, use, and store valuable knowledge

Need to consider both stock and flow of knowledge• Stock: intellectual capital• Flow: org learning processes

of acquisition, sharing, use, and storage

Organizational Learning Perspective

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Intellectual Capital

Relationship Capital

Value derived from satisfied customers, reliable suppliers, etc.

StructuralCapital

Knowledge captured in systems and structures

HumanCapital

Knowledge that people possess and generate

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Employee knowledge, skills, and abilities Competitive advantage because:

• Helps discover opportunities and minimize threats in the external environment

• Rare and difficult to imitate• Nonsubstitutable: Not easily replaced by

technology

The Human Capital Advantage

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Organizational Learning Processes

Knowledge Acquisition

Knowledge Sharing

KnowledgeUse

Knowledge Storage

• Learning

• Scanning

• Grafting

• Experimenting

• Communication

• Training

• Info systems

• Observation

• Awareness

• Sensemaking

• Autonomy

• Empowerment

• Human memory

• Documentation

• Practices/habits

• Databases

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The storage and preservation of intellectual capital

Retain intellectual capital by:• Keeping knowledgeable employees• Transferring knowledge to others• Transferring human capital to

structural capital

Successful companies also unlearn

Organizational Memory

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High-Performance Practices at American Express

American Express encourages

employees to go “off script,”

meaning that they are

empowered to customize their

conversations rather than rely on

memorized statements. This

autonomy is one of several high

performance work practices.

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Workplace practices that leverage the potential of human capital

Four HPWPs (likely others)1. Employee involvement

2. Job autonomy

3. Employee competence (training, selection)

4. Performance-based rewards

Need to “bundle” them – work best together

High-Performance Work Practices

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Corporate Social Responsibility at MTN Group in Africa

At MTN Group, Africa’s largest

mobile (cell) phone company,

employees help the community

and environment through the

company’s award-winning “21

Days of Y’ello Care” program.

This photo shows MTN

employees in Uganda planting

trees during a Y’ello Care event.

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Stakeholder Perspective

Stakeholders: entities who affect or are affected by the firm’s objectives and actions

Personalizes the open systems perspective

Challenges with stakeholder perspective:• Stakeholders have conflicting

interests• Firms have limited resources to

satisfy all stakeholder needs

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Values and ethics prioritize stakeholder interests

Values• Stable, evaluative beliefs, guide preferences for

outcomes or courses of action in various situations Ethics

• Moral principles/values, determine whether actions are right/wrong and outcomes are good or bad

Stakeholders: Values and Ethics

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Stakeholders and CSR

Stakeholder perspective includes corporate social responsibility (CSR)• Benefit society and environment

beyond the firm’s immediate financial interests or legal obligations

• Organization’s contract with society

Triple bottom line• Economy, society, environment

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Economic, social, and cultural connectivity with people in other parts of the world

Improved communication and transportation systems have increased globalization

Effects of globalization on organizations• Cost efficiencies, innovation, knowledge• Increasing diversity• Increasing competitive pressures, intensification

Globalization

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Increasing Workforce Diversity

Surface-level vs deep-level diversity

Implications• Better knowledge, decisions,

representation, financial returns• Manage challenges of diversity

(e.g. teams, conflict)• Ethical imperative of diversity

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Work/life balance • Minimizing conflict between work and nonwork

demands number one indicator of career success

Virtual work• Using information technology to perform one’s job

away from the traditional physical workplace• Telecommuting – issues of social isolation,

emphasis on face time, employee self-leadership

Emerging Employment Relationships

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Systematic research anchor• OB knowledge is built on systematic research• Evidence-based management – decisions and

actions based on research evidence rather than fads, hype, and untested assumptions

Multidisciplinary anchor• Many OB concepts adopted from other disciplines• OB develops its own theories, but scans other

fields

Organizational Behavior Anchors

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Contingency anchor• A particular action may have different

consequences in different situations• Need to diagnose the situation and select best

strategy under those conditions

Multiple levels of analysis anchor• Individual, team, organizational level of analysis• OB topics usually relevant at all three levels of

analysis

Organizational Behavior Anchors (con’t)

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Discussion

Key learnings? Next weeks assignments.