Transcript CH1 Paradigms Part1

Introducing Organizational Behaviour
Chapter 1: pp.13-28
Organizational Behavior 261
Gabrielle Durepos
Reminders
• Attendance
• Make sure you are registered for this class
• Check the Globe and Mail for articles for your
assignment
– You want to avoid being limited to articles that appear in the
week that the assignment is due
– Assignment is due October 1st, 2012
• Group formation is due on September 19th 2012
Outline
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What is OB
Why Study OB
Different approaches to OB
The Roots of OB
Quick overview of One of Many Different approaches
to OB:
– Managerialist
• Conclusions
What is Organizational Behaviour?
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• The study of relationships between the behavior of
people in organizations and:
– Individual (self-esteem)
– Organizational (effectiveness)
– Societal (gender, racial discrimination)
• Organizations include:
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For profit business
Not for profit organizations
Any institution (church, school)
Any collective with a common goal with individuals who work
together
What is Organizational Behaviour?
• Multidisciplinary as a field of study
– Psychology
– Sociology
– Anthropology
• What is the difference between
– Macro OB
• Focus on collectives and teams
• Focus on what happens between individuals
– Micro OB
• Focus on individuals – individual level of analysis
• Focus on what happens within individuals
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Why Study Organizational Behavior?
• We live in an organizational world
– Organizations SHAPE our expectations of how people should behave
– Shape our expectations of how we should behave
– Normalize…
• Many key decisions that affect our lives occur in organizations
• The success of an organization depends on individuals involved
• Organizations affect:
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Individuals, clients, customers
Local communities
Nation states
World events
Different Approaches to OB
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What is an ‘approach’?
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Managerialist approach (mainstream)
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A paradigm
A lens
This is the dominant approach
Alternative approaches:
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Actionalist (interpretive) approach
Radical approach
Feminist
Racioethnicity
Postmodern
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There is NO correct approach, some are more comfortable…
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QUESTION: why are these different approaches important?
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“But Gabie… no one else cares except academics…” I want you to challenge this... Give me
an instance where we see groups who have adopted each a particular approach – and are
in conversation…
The Roots of Organizational Behavior
• OB developed from an interest in:
– Improving efficiency
– Improving profitability
– And everything else leading to this such as:
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Human relations at work
Culture at work
Diversity at work
Gender at work
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The Roots of Organizational Behavior
• Frederick Taylor
– Midvale steel company
– Concerned with efficiency
– Develops Scientific Approach to Management
• Taylor believed that inefficiency is due to:
– Attitudes of workers
• Deliberately restricting output “Systematic Soldering”
– Methods of work
• Left to workers who were inefficient
– System of management control
• Managers exert arbitrary control
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The Roots of Organizational Behavior
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Taylor corrects the perceived problems at Midvale through:
– Work design and standardization
• Chose routine tasks
• Finding the “one best way”
• Producing a standardized way of completing a task
– Employee selection
• The correct employee for a particular job
– Employee Motivation
• How to improve attitudes?
• Piece work payment incentives
– Hierarchal control
• Managers use rules and regulations associated with their job to exercise control
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Taylor writes “Principles of Scientific Management”
– Refines his theories at Bethlehem Iron Company
– Begins consulting
– His ideas spread throughout the 1920’s and beyond in the:
• United States
• Soviet Union
• Italy
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The Roots of Organizational Behavior
• Taylor is very influential to the study of OB:
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Job redesign
Structure of organizations
Selection
Training
Motivation
Managerial control and style
• His ideas commonly known as:
– Scientific Management
– Taylorism
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The Roots of Organizational Behavior
• Frank and Lillian Gilbreth: Time and Motion Studies
– Eliminate workplace fatigue
• Roethlisberger and Dickson: The Hawthorn Studies at
Western Electric
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Focus on factors of “human relations”
Focused on communication, participation, leadership
People are motivated by social as well as economic rewards
Look at group membership and how this affects behavior
• These theorists were all in:
– Industry as they developed theories
– Time of mass change and industrialization
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Quick overview of different approaches to OB:
The Managerialist Approach
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Steams from the work of Taylor, Gilbreth, Roethlisberger and Dickson and
others
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The most dominant; usually taken for granted as being the only approach
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From the managers point of view
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Concern with:
– Understanding how behavior leads to: Improved efficiency, productivity, profitability,
growth
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Definition is:
– Investigates the impact that individuals, groups and structures have on behavior within
organizations to improve effectiveness
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Also known as (sort of):
– Mainstream
– Functionalist
– Clinical
Conclusions
• Different approaches to OB yield different definitions
• Today we have focused on a Managerial approach, next
class we will explore:
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Actionalist
Radical
Feminist
Racioethnicity
And do the ‘Norma Rae Exercise’
• No approach is “superior” or “correct”