HM 365 Exam 2

Extrinsic Motivation

Motivation that is controlled by some contingency that depends on task performance

Intrinsic Motivation

Motivation that is felt when task performance serves as its own reward.

Trust propensity is a product of both:

Nature and nurture

Negative Life Events

Non-work hindrance stressors also come in this form.

Verbal Persuasion

Self-efficacy is also dictated by this, because friends, coworkers, and leaders can persuade employees that they can "get the job done".

Goal Commitment

The final moderator, which is the degree to which a person accepts a goal and is determined to try to reach it.

Motivational Force =

(E ----> P) x [sigma (P ----> O) x V)] The sigma symbol in the equation signifies that instrumentalities and valences are judges with various outcomes in mind, and motivation increases as successful performance is linked to more and more attractive outcomes.

Recency Bias

The tendency to weigh recent events more than earlier events

Bounded rationality says we are likely to:

-Boil the problem down to something that is easily understood -Come up with a few solutions that tend to be straightforward, familiar, and similar to what is currently being done -Evaluate each alternative as soon as we think of it -Use distorted and inaccurate information during the evaluation process -Pick the first acceptable alternative

Characteristics of explicit knowledge

-Easily transferred through written or verbal communication -Readily available to most -Can be learned through books -Always conscious and accessible information -General information

Consumer Reports serves as a good example of procedural justice in action.

-Helps ensure bias suppression by refusing to include advertisements in its magazine. -Helps ensure accuracy by putting 5,000-6,000 miles on a car for as long as 10 months and taking the car through approximately 50 different tests. -Helps ensure consistency by putting each vehicle through the exact same set of examinations.

Employees can judge the fairness of an authority's decision making along four dimensions:

1. Distributive Justice 2. Procedural Justice 3. Interpersonal Justice 4. Informational Justice

Characteristics of tacit knowledge

-Very difficult, if not impossible, to articulate to others -Highly personal in nature -Based on experience -Sometimes holders don't even recognize that they possess it -Typically job- or situation-specific

Motivation

A set of energetic forces that originates both within and outside an employee, initiates work-related effort, and determines its direction, intensity, and persistence.

Research suggests that we gauge the track record of an authority along three dimensions:

1. Ability 2. Benevolence 3. Integrity

The symbolic value of money can be summarized in at least three dimensions:

1. Achievement 2. Respect 3. Freedom

For behavioral modeling to occur successfully, a number of processes have to take place:

1. Attentional Processes-- Learner focuses attention on the critical behaviors exhibited by the model. 2. Retention Processes-- Learner must remember the behaviors of the model once the model is no longer present. 3. Production Processes-- Learner must have the appropriate skill set and be able to reproduce the behavior. 4. Reinforcement-- Learner must view the model receiving reinforcement for the behavior and then receive it themselves

Steps of the rational decision-making model:

1. Identify the criteria that are important in making the decision, taking into account all involved parties. 2. Generate a list of all available alternatives that might be potential solutions to the problem 3. Evaluation of those alternatives against the criteria laid out in step 1. 4. Select the alternative that results in the best outcome. 5. Implement the alternative

Crisis Situation

A change, whether sudden or evolving, that results in an urgent problem that must be addresses immediately. -Almost all crises must have decisions made quickly.

Trust Propensity

A general expectation that the words, promises, and statements of individuals and groups can be relied upon. The importance of this is most obvious in interactions with strangers, in which any acceptance of vulnerability would amount to "blind trust". Research also suggests that this is shaped by early childhood experiences. The more our needs are met as children, the more trusting we become. The nation in which we live also affects this.

Hindrance stressors have a weak negative relationship with job performance.

A general explanation for this negative relationship is that hindrance stressors result in strains and negative emotions that reduce the overall level of physical, cognitive, and emotional energy that people could otherwise bring to their job duties.

As a general rule of thumb, as employees move up the corporate ladder,

A larger percentage of their decisions become less and less programmed

In cases in which the welfare of a particular employee is the critical concern:

A need norm may be judged fairer.

Corporate Social Responsibility

A perspective that acknowledges that the responsibilities of a business encompass the economic, legal, ethical, and citizenship expectations of society. -This perspective maintains the belief that the foundation of any business is profitability, because organizations must fulfill their economic responsibilities to their employees and their shareholders.

Stress

A psychological response to demands that possess certain stakes for the person and that tax or exceed the person's capacity or resources.

Emotional Support

A second type of social support, which refers to the help people receive in addressing the emotional distress that accompanies stressful demands.

Self-talk

A technique in which people learn to say things about stressful demands that reflect rationality and optimism.

Financial Uncertainty

A third type of non-work hindrance stressor, which refers to conditions that create uncertainties with regard to the loss of livelihood, savings, or the ability to pay expenses. -This type of stressor is highly relevant during recessions or economic downturns.

Equity Distress

According to equity theory, any imbalance in ratios triggers this, which is an internal tension that can only be alleviated by restoring balance to the ratios.

Secondary Appraisal

After people appraise a stressful demand, they ask themselves "What should I do?" and "What can i do?" to deal with the situation. These questions center on the issue of how people cope with the various stressors they face.

The first step in managing stress is to assess the level and sources of stress in the workplace.

Although there are many ways to accomplish this type of evaluation, often referred to as a stress audit, managers can begin by asking themselves questions about the nature of the jobs in their organization to estimate whether high stress levels may be a problem. -The first category of questions might involve the degree to which the organization is going through changes that would likely increase uncertainty among employees. -A second category of questions might center on the work itself. These questions typically focus on the level and types of stressors experienced by the employees. -The third category of questions could involve the quality of relationships between not only employees but also employees and the organization.

One type of strain-reducing practice involves training in relaxation techniques, such as progressive muscle relaxation, meditation, and miscellaneous calming activities.

Although these relaxation techniques differ, the basic idea is the same-- they teach people how to counteract the effects of stressors by engaging in activities that slow the heart rate, breathing rate, and blood pressure.

Research shows that feelings of under-reward inequity are:

Among the strongest predictors of counterproductive behaviors, such as employee theft.

Climate for Transfer

An environment that can support the use of new skills. There are a variety of factors that can help organizations foster such a climate: -The degree to which the trainee's manager supports the importance of the newly acquired knowledge and skills and stresses their application to the job is perhaps the most important factor. -Peer support is helpful, because having multiple trainees learning the same material reduces anxiety and allows the trainees to share concerns and work through problems. -Opportunities to use the learned knowledge are also crucial, because practice and repetition are key components of learning.

Task Complexity

Another moderator, which reflects how complicated the information and actions involved in a task are, as well as how much the task changes.

Four-Component Model of Ethical Decision Making

Argues that ethical behaviors result from a multistage sequence beginning with moral awareness, continuing on to moral judgment, then to moral intent, and ultimately to ethical behavior.

Fundamental Attribution Error

Argues that people have a tendency to judge others' behaviors due to internal factors.

Social Learning Theory

Argues that people in organizations have the ability to learn through the observation of others. -Many would argue that social learning is the primary way by which employees gain knowledge in organizations.

Compresses workweeks, which is used by approximately 1/3rd of all companies in the survey, allows full-time employees to work additional hours on some days and have shorter days or time off on others.

As with flextime and telecommuting, compressed workweeks give employees the ability to manage both work and non-work role demands.

The most sophisticated moral thinkers reach the principled (or post-conventional) stage.

At this stage, right versus wrong is referenced to a set of defined, established moral principles.

As people mature, their moral judgment reaches the conventional stage.

At this stage, right versus wrong is referenced to the expectations of one's family and one's society. -At first, people seek the approval of friends and family members, conforming to stereotypes about what's right. Over time, people come to emphasize the laws, rules, and orders that govern society.

People begin their moral development at the pre-conventional stage

At this stage, right versus wrong is viewed in terms of the consequences of various actions for the individual.

On the whole, a performance-prove orientation tends to:

Be a mixed bag, producing varying levels of performance and outcomes.

Justice provides the observable behavioral evidence that an authority might be trustworthy,

Because authorities who treat employees more fairly are usually judged to be more trustworthy.

Merit pay and profit sharing offer little in the way of difficult and specific goals,

Because both essentially challenge employees to make next year as good (or better) than this year.

The motivating force with the strongest performance effect is self-efficacy/competence,

Because people who feel a sense of internal self-confidence tend to outperform those who doubt their capabilities.

Instrumentality and equity are more achievable with gainsharing,

Because the relevant unit is smaller and the relevant outcomes are more controllable.

Third, and perhaps most important, the Type A Behavior Pattern has been directly linked to:

Coronary heart disease and other physiological, psychological, and behavioral strains.

As another example, 37% of the organizations in the survey allowed telecommuting on a part-time basis.

By providing the opportunity to work at home or some other location with computer access, employees are put in a better position to cope with demands that might be impossible to cope with otherwise.

Participation strategy for fostering goal commitment:

Collaborate on setting the specific proficiency level and due date for a goal, so that the employee feels a sense of ownership over the goal.

Competence

Captures a person's belief in his/her capability to perform work tasks successfully. This is identical to the self-efficacy concept Managers can instill a sense of competence in their employees by providing opportunities for training and knowledge gain, expressing positive feedback, and providing challenges that are an appropriate match for employees' skill levels.

Meaningfulness

Captures the value of a work goal or purpose, relative to a person's own ideals and passions. Managers can instill a sense of meaningfulness by articulating an exciting vision or purpose and fostering a non-cynical climate in which employees are free to express idealism and passion without criticism.

Unethical behavior can be triggered by:

Characteristics of a person or the situation.

Needs

Cognitive groupings or clusters of outcomes that are viewed as having critical psychological or physiological consequences.

Occupational Equity

Compare with others doing essentially the same job in other organizations

Job Equity

Compare with others doing the same job in the same organization.

Company Equity

Compare with others in the same organization doing substantially different jobs.

Age Equity

Compare with others of the same age

Educational Equity

Compare with others who have attained the same educational level

External Comparisons

Comparisons that refer to someone in a different company.

Internal Comparisons

Comparisons that refer to someone in the same company.

People with strong moral identities define themselves as:

Compassionate, generous, honest, kind, fair, and hardworking.

The most important area in which motivation concepts are applied in organizations is in the design of:

Compensation systems

Another way of judging the motivational impact of the compensation plan elements is to:

Consider the correspondence between individual performance levels and individual monetary outcomes.

One way of judging the motivational impact of compensation plan elements is to:

Consider whether the elements provide difficult and specific goals for channeling work effort.

Programmed Decisions

Decisions that become somewhat automatic because people's knowledge allows them to recognize and identify a situation and the course of action that needs to be taken. -For experts who possess high levels of explicit and tacit knowledge, many decisions they face are like this.

Psychological strains that result from stressors include:

Depression, anxiety, anger, hostility, reduced self-confidence, irritability, inability to think clearly, forgetfulness, lack of creativity, memory loss, and a loss of sense of humor.

Expectancy Theory

Describes the cognitive process that employees go through to make choices among different voluntary responses. Drawing on earlier models from psychology, this argues that employee behavior is directed toward pleasure and away from pain or , more generally, toward certain outcomes and away from others. The theory suggests that our choices depend on three specific beliefs that are based in our past learning and experience: Expectancy, Instrumentality, and Valence.

Variable Interval Schedule

Designed to reinforce behavior at more random points in time. -A supervisor walking around at different points of time every day is a good example.

Research also shows that desired behaviors tend to:

Disappear much more quickly when reinforcement is discontinued under fixed plans.

Employees who don't trust their authorities have:

Economic exchange relationships that are based on narrowly defined, quid pro quo obligations that are specified in advance and have an explicit repayment schedule. -Economic exchanges are impersonal and resemble contractual agreements, such that employees agree to fulfill the duties in their job description in exchange for financial compensation.

Employees who feel a sense of equity are:

More emotionally attached to their firms and feel a stronger sense of obligation to remain.

Intuition

Emotionally charged judgments that arise through quick, non-conscious, and holistic associations -There is almost unanimous consent among researchers that intuition is largely a function of learning-- tacit knowledge gained through reinforcement, observation, and experience allow a decision maker to decide more quickly and confidently.

Vicarious Experiences

Employees also consider this by taking into account their observations and discussions with others who have performed such tasks.

Trusting an authority also makes it more likely that a sense of obligation will develop, because:

Employees feel more confident that the authority deserves that obligation.

Your ratio of outcomes to inputs is greater than your comparison other's ratio.

Equity distress again gets experienced, and the tension likely creates negative emotions such as guilt or anxiety.

An enormous amount of research shows that people have a tendency, when presented with a series of decisions, to:

Escalate their commitment to previous decisions, even in the face of obvious failures

Personal Development

Examples of these activities include participation in formal education programs, music lessons, sports-related training, hobby-related self-education, participation in local government, or volunteer work.

Most of the research linking learning to task performance focuses on:

Explicit knowledge, which is more practical to measure. It's difficult to measure tacit knowledge because of its unspoken nature, but clearly such knowledge is relevant to task performance.

Emotional Cues

Finally, efficacy is dictated by this, in that feelings of fear or anxiety can create doubts about task accomplishment, whereas pride and enthusiasm can bolster confidence levels.

The motivational force created by high levels of valence, instrumentality, and expectancy is the next most powerful motivational variable for task performance

Finally, perceptions of equity have a somewhat weaker effect on task performance.

Moral intensity is driven by two general concerns, both of which have more specific facets.

First and foremost, a particular issue is high in moral intensity if the potential for harm is perceived to be high. Second, a particular issue is high in moral intensity if there is social pressure surrounding it.

Bounded rationality results in two major problems for making decisions:

First, people have to filter and simplify information to make sense of their complex environment and the myriad of potential choices they face. This simplification leads them to miss information when perceiving problems, generating and evaluating alternatives, or judging the results. Second, because people cannot possibly consider every single alternative when making a decision, they satisfice.

Physiological Strains that result from stressors occur in at least four systems of the human body

First, stressors can reduce the effectiveness of the body's immune system. Second, stressors can harm the body's cardiovascular system, cause the heart to race, increase blood pressure, and create coronary artery disease. Third, stressors can cause problems in the body's musculoskeletal system, such as tension headaches, tight shoulders, and back pain. Fourth, stressors cause gastrointestinal system problems. Symptoms of this type of strain include stomachaches, indigestion, diarrhea, and constipation. Furthermore, the negative physiological effects of stress persist over time and may not show up until far into the future.

Why exactly do specific and difficult goals have such positive effects?

First, the assignment of a specific and difficult goal shapes people's own self-set goals They trigger the creation of task strategies

A third category of strain-reducing practices involves health and wellness programs.

For example, almost 3/4 of the organizations in one survey reported having employee assistance programs intended to help people with personal problems such as alcoholism and other addictions. -More than 60% of organizations in this survey provided employees with wellness programs and resources.

Because tacit knowledge is so difficult to communicate, modeling might be the single best way to acquire it.

For that reason, modeling is a continual process that is used at all levels of many organizations.

Knowledge Transfer

Gaining knowledge from the older, experienced workers to the younger employees.

Of the two individual-focused elements, merit pay is by far the more common

Given that it is difficult to apply piece-rate plans outside of manufacturing, sales, and service contexts.

Sabbatical

Gives employees the opportunity to take time off from work to engage in an alternative activity. Relative to job sharing, sabbaticals allow for a cleaner break from the stressful routine for a fairly lengthy period of time. However, because the level of stressors never changes in the job itself, the employee is likely to experience the same level of stress upon returning from the sabbatical.

Antecedents in organizations are typically:

Goals, rules, instructions, or other types of information that help show employees what is expected of them.

Communities of Practice

Groups of employees who work together and learn from one another by collaborating over an extended period of time.

Ways to restore balance to under-rewarded inequity:

Grow your outcomes by talking to your boss or by stealing from the company Shrink your inputs by lowering the intensity or persistence of effort.

On the whole, research has consistently shown that variable schedules lead to:

Higher levels of performance than fixed schedules.

Hindrance stressors have a strong negative relationship with organizational commitment.

Hindrance stressors evoke strains, which are generally dissatisfying to people, and satisfaction has a strong impact on the degree to which people feel committed to their organization.

Social Identity Theory

Holds that people identify themselves by the groups to which they belong and perceive and judge others by their group memberships. -These groups could be based on demographic information, occupational information, where they work, what country they're from, or any other subgroup that makes sense to the perceiver.

When employees rank the importance of extrinsic and intrinsic outcomes, they often put pay in fifth or sixth place.

However, research studies show that financial incentives often have a stronger impact on motivation than other sorts of outcomes. -One reason is that money is relevant to many of the needs. -However, money also conveys a sense of esteem, as it signals that employees are competent and well-regarded.

Challenge stressors have a weak relationship with job performance and a moderate relationship with organizational commitment

However, these relationships are positive instead of negative. In other words, employees who experience higher levels of challenge stressors also tend to have higher levels of job performance and organizational commitment.

When goal commitment is high, assigning specific and difficult goals will have significant benefits for task performance.

However, when goal commitment is low, those effects become much weaker.

Your ratio of outcomes to inputs is less than your comparison other's ratio

In an under-rewarded case, the equity distress likely takes the form of negative emotions such as anger or envy.

Second, in addition to the effect on stressors, the Type A Behavior Pattern is important because it influences the stress process itself.

In essence, Type A individuals are simply more likely to appraise demands as being stressful rather than being benign.

A second general category of strain-reducing practices involves cognitive-behavioral techniques.

In general these techniques attempt to help people appraise and cope with stressors in a more rational manner.

Learning is only weakly related to organizational commitment

In general, having higher levels of job knowledge is associated with slight increases in emotional attachment to the firm. Moreover, it may be that employees with higher levels of expertise become more highly valued commodities on the job market, thereby reducing their levels of continuance commitment.

In team-based work, building harmony and solidarity in work groups can become just as important as individual productivity

In such cases, an equality norm may be judged fairer, such that all team members receive the same amount of relevant rewards.

Some have argued that trust propensity represents a sort of "faith in human nature"

In that trusting people view others in more favorable terms than do suspicious people.

The ratio of outcomes to inputs is balanced between you and your comparison other

In this case, you feel a sense of equity, and you're likely to maintain the intensity and persistence of your effort.

Lump-Sum Bonuses

Individual-focused compensation plan element. A bonus is received for meeting individual goals but no change is made to base salary.

Piece-Rate

Individual-focused compensation plan element. A specified rate is paid for each unit produced, each unit sold, or each service provided.

Merit Pay

Individual-focused compensation plan element. An increase to base salary is made in accordance with performance evaluation ratings.

Recognition Awards

Individual-focused compensation plan element. Tangible awards (gift cards, merchandise, trips, time off) or intangible awards (praise) are given on an impromptu basis to recognize achievement.

Research suggests that distributive justice and procedural justice combine to:

Influence employee reactions.

Abusive Supervision

Interpersonally unjust actions create this, which is the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors, excluding physical contact.

Affect-based Trust

It depends on feelings toward the authority that go beyond any rational assessment. More emotional than rational We trust them because we like them Acts as a supplement to the types of trust discussed previously

Cognition-based Trust

It's rooted in a rational assessment of the authority's trustworthiness.

Employees who are abused by their supervisors report:

More anxiety, burnout, and strain, as well as less satisfaction with their lives in general. They are also more likely to strike back at their supervisors with counterproductive behaviors

Benign Job Demands

Job demands that tend not to be appraised as stressful.

The Consequential Principles

Judge the morality of an action according to its goals, aims, or outcomes.

The Non-Consequential Principles

Judge the morality of an action solely on its intrinsic desirability.

Employees who enter learning situations with a fear of looking bad in front of others tend to:

Learn less and have substantially higher levels of anxiety.

Task Strategies

Learning plans and problem-solving approaches used to achieve successful performance. In the absence of a goal, it's easy to rely on trial and error to figure out how best to do a task.

Although organizations often struggle to foster instrumentality in the best of times:

Linking performance to outcomes is even more difficult during an economic downturn.

From an organization's perspective, the tacit knowledge its employees accumulate:

May be the single most important strategic asset a company possesses.

Who's more likely to view money from these more symbolic perspectives? Some research suggests that:

Men are more likely to view money as representing achievement, respect, and freedom than are women. Research also suggests that employees with higher salaries are more likely to view money in achievement-related terms. Younger employees are less likely to view money in a positive light, relative to older employees Differences in education do not appear to impact the meaning of money, however.

We can tell when people have learned by:

Observing their behaviors

One study showed that job equity was the most powerful driver of citizenship behaviors, whereas:

Occupational equity was the most powerful driver of employee withdrawal.

Positive Reinforcement

Occurs when a positive outcome follows a desired behavior. It's perhaps the most common type of reinforcement and the type we think of when an employee received some type of reward. -Increased pay, promotions, praise from a manager or coworkers, and public recognition would all be considered positive reinforcement when given as a result of an employee exhibiting desired behaviors.

Moral Awareness

Occurs when an authority recognizes that a moral issue exists in a situation or that an ethical code or principle is relevant to the circumstance. This depends in part on characteristics of the issue itself, as some issues have more built-in ethical salience than others. Also depends on the way authorities observe and perceive the events that happen around them.

Punishment (Positive Punishment)

Occurs when an unwanted outcome follows an unwanted behavior. In other words, employees are given something they don't like as a result of performing behaviors that the organization doesn't like. -Suspending an employee for showing up to work late, assigning job tasks generally seen as demeaning for not following safety procedures, or even firing an employee for gross misconduct are all examples of this.

Negative Reinforcement

Occurs when an unwanted outcome is removed following a desired behavior.

Stereotype

Occurs when assumptions are made about others on the basis of their membership in a social group.

Whistle-Blowing

Occurs when former or current employees expose illegal or immoral actions by their organizations. -This can be viewed as especially ethical because whistle-blowers risk potential retaliation by other members of the organization, especially when the whistle-blowers lack status and power.

Transfer of Training

Occurs when the knowledge, skills, and behaviors used on the job are maintained by the learner once training ends and generalized to the workplace once the learner returns to the job This can be fostered if organizations create a climate for transfer

Role Overload

Occurs when the number of demanding roles a person holds is so high that the person simply cannot perform some or all of the roles effectively. -Studies have shown that this source of stress is more prevalent than both role conflict and role ambiguity.

Extinction (Negative Punishment)

Occurs when there is the removal of a consequence following an unwanted behavior. -The use of this to reinforce behavior can be purposeful or accidental.

Self-Serving Bias

Occurs when we attribute our own failures to external factors and our own successes to internal factors.

Positive reinforcement doesn't have to be in the form of material rewards to be effective.

Offering praise, providing feedback, public recognition, and small celebrations are all ways to encourage employees and increase the chances they will continue to exhibit desired behaviors.

Rational Decision-Making Model

Offers a step-by-step approach to making decisions that maximize outcomes by examining all available alternatives.

Work-Family Conflict

One example of non-work hindrance stressors, which is a special form of role conflict in which the demands of a work role hinder the fulfillment of the demands of a family role (or vice versa).

What explains the ability of some people to resist situational pressures and stay true to their moral judgment?

One factor is moral identity-- the degree to which a person self-identifies as a moral person.

Informational injustices are all too common, for a variety of reasons.

One factor is that sharing bad news is the worst part of the job for most managers, leading them to distance themselves when it's time to play messenger. Another factor may be that managers worry about triggering a lawsuit if they comprehensively and honestly explain the reasons for layoff, a poor evaluation, or a missed promotion. -Ironically, that defense mechanism is typically counterproductive, because research suggests that honest and adequate explanations are actually a powerful strategy for reducing retaliation responses against the organization.

How do people choose a particular coping strategy?

One factor that influences this choice is the set of beliefs that people have about how well different coping strategies can address different demands. Another critical factor is the degree to which people believe that a particular strategy gives them some degree of control over the stressor.

Daily Hassles

One final type of work-related hindrance stress, which refers to the relatively minor day-to-day demands that get in the way of accomplishing the things that we really want to accomplish.

Once a stress audit reveals that stress may be a problem, the next step is to consider alternative courses of action.

One general course of action involves managing stressors, which may be accomplished in one of two ways -First, organizations could try to eliminate or significantly reduce stressful demands.

Feedback

One moderator which consists of updates on employee progress toward goal attainment.

Why does trust also influence citizenship behavior and counterproductive behavior?

One reason is that the willingness to accept vulnerability changes the nature of the employee-employer relationship.

Why does trust affect job performance?

One reason is that trust is moderately correlated with task performance.

Why does trust also affect organizational commitment?

One reason is that trusting an authority increases the likelihood that an emotional bond will develop, particularly if that trust is rooted in positive feelings for the authority.

Why are interpersonally unjust actions so damaging?

One reason may be that people remember unfair acts more vividly than fair ones.

A number of factors constrain instrumentality and equity in most application of merit pay.

One such factor is budgetary constraints, as many organizations freeze or limit pay increases during an economic downturn. Another factor is the accuracy of the actual performance evaluation Another factor that can hinder the effectiveness of merit pay is its typical once-a-year schedule.

The study of business ethics has two primary threads on it

One thread is prescriptive in nature, with scholars in philosophy debating how people ought to act using various codes and principles. -This model is the dominant lens in discussions of legal ethics, medical ethics, and much of economics. The second thread is descriptive in nature, with scholars relying on scientific studies to observe how people tend to act based on certain individual and situational characteristics. -This model is the dominant lens in psychology.

Instrumental Support

One type of social support, which refers to the help people receive that can be used to address the stressful demands directly.

Time Pressure

One type of work-related challenge stressor, which is a strong sense that the amount of time you have to do a task is just not quite enough. -Time pressure demands tend to be viewed as something worth striving for because success in meeting such demands can be intrinsically satisfying.

Role Conflict

One type of work-related hindrance stressor, which refers to conflicting expectations that other people may have of us. (Ex. Call center operators- supposed to spend little time/but have to respond to questions

Profit Sharing

Organization-focused compensation plan element. A bonus is received when the publicly reported earnings of a company exceed some minimum level, with the magnitude of the bonus contingent on the magnitude of the profits. No change is made to base salary.

The ethical component of corporate social responsibility argues that:

Organizations have an obligation to do what is right, just, and fair and to avoid harm. -Fulfilling this component is relevant to the benevolence and integrity of the organization and suggests that it has reached the principled level of moral development.

The citizenship component of corporate social responsibility argues that:

Organizations should contribute resources to improve the quality of life in the communities in which they work. Sometimes this component involves philanthropic efforts, in which donations of time or cash are given to charitable groups. It may also involve efforts geared toward environmental sustainability.

The first supportive practice example is flextime, which was used by 56% of the organizations in the survey.

Organizations that use flextime give employees some degree of latitude in terms of which hours they need to present at the workplace. -Flexible working hours give employees the ability to cope with demands away from work.

Some studies of business ethics focus on unethical behavior-- behavior that clearly violates accepted norms of morality.

Other studies focus on what might be termed "merely ethical" behavior-- behavior that adheres to some minimally accepted standard of morality.

Two contingencies of reinforcement are used to increase desired behaviors:

Positive Reinforcement Negative Reinforcement

As an alternative to managing stressors, many organizations use:

Practices that reduce strains.

When we eventually gain enough knowledge to gauge the authority's trustworthiness:

Our trust begins to be based on cognitions we've developed about the authority, as opposed to out own personality or disposition. -In this way, cognition-based trust is driven by the authority's "track record".

Effective intuition results when:

People have a large amount of tacit knowledge.

Difficult goals are the second most powerful motivating force;

People who receive such goals outperform the recipients of easy goals.

High levels of challenge stressors may have negative consequences that only become apparent over the long term.

People whose jobs are filled with challenge stressors experience strains that can result in illness, but because they tend to be more satisfied, committed, and engaged with their jobs, they come to work anyway. -This phenomenon, which is referred to as PRESENTEEISM, can result in prolonged illness, as well as the spread of illness, and ultimately a downward spiral of impaired performance and employee health.

Performance-Prove Orientation

People with this focus on demonstrating their competence so that others think favorably of them.

Performance-Avoid Orientation

People with this focus on demonstrating their competence so that others will not think poorly of them.

Fixed Interval Schedule

Probably the single most common form of reinforcement schedule. With this schedule, workers are rewarded after a certain amount of time, and the length of time between reinforcement periods stays the same. -Ex. Paycheck

Support strategy for fostering goal commitment:

Provide supportive supervision to aid employees if they struggle to attain the goal.

Resources strategy for fostering goal commitment:

Provide the resources needed to attain the goal and remove any constraints that could hold back task efforts.

Publicity strategy for fostering goal commitment:

Publicize the goal to significant others and coworkers to create some social pressure to attain it.

Two contingencies of reinforcement that are designed to decrease undesired behaviors:

Punishment (Positive Punishment) Extinction (Negative Punishment)

Philosophers have identified a number of moral principles that serve as prescriptive guides for making moral judgments.

Rather than viewing a given principle as the single, best lens for making decisions, it's better to view the principles as a prism for shedding light on a given situation from a number of different angles.

Only in the case of cognition-based trust do we:

Rationally evaluate the pluses and minuses of an authority.

Research shows that procedural justice tends to be a stronger driver of:

Reactions to authorities than distributive justice.

Family Time Demands

Refer to the time that a person commits to participate in an array of family activities and responsibilities.

Role Ambiguity

Refers to a lack of information about what needs to be done in a role, as well as unpredictability regarding the consequences of performance in that role. -This is often experienced among new employees who haven't been around long enough to receive instructions from supervisors or observe and model the role behaviors of more senior colleagues.

Problem-focused Coping

Refers to behaviors and cognitions intended to manage the stressful situation itself.

Coping

Refers to the behaviors and thoughts that people use to manage both the stressful demands they face and the emotions associated with those stressful demands

Escalation of Commitment

Refers to the decision to continue to follow a failing course of action. -Decision makers may feel an obligation to stick with their decision to avoid looking incompetent. They may also want to avoid admitting that they made a mistake.

Work Complexity

Refers to the degree to which the requirements of the work, in terms of knowledge, skills, and abilities, tax or exceed the capabilities of the person who is responsible for performing the work.

Expertise

Refers to the knowledge and skills that distinguish experts from novices and less experienced people.

Work Responsibility

Refers to the nature of the obligations that a person has toward others. -Generally speaking, the level of responsibility in a job is higher when the number, scope, and importance of the obligations in that job are higher.

Decision Making

Refers to the process of generating and choosing from a set of alternatives to solve a problem.

Cognitive Coping

Refers to the thoughts that are involved in trying to deal with a stressful situation.

Emotion-focused Coping

Refers to the various ways in which people manage their own emotional reactions to stressful demands.

Self-Determination

Reflects a sense of choice in the initiation and continuation of work tasks Managers can instill a sense of self-determination in their employees by delegating work tasks, rather than micromanaging them, and by trusting employees to come up with their own approach to certain tasks.

Moral Intent

Reflects an authority's degree of commitment to the moral course of action.

Psychological Empowerment

Reflects an energy rooted in the belief that work tasks contribute some larger purpose. This represents a form of intrinsic motivation, in that merely performing the work tasks serves as its own reward and supplies many of the intrinsic outcomes shown in Table 6-2. Four concepts are particularly important: meaningfulness, self-determination, competence, and impact

Learning

Reflects relatively permanent changes in an employee's knowledge or skill that result from experience.

Valence

Reflects the anticipated value of the outcomes associated with performance (abbreviated V). It can be positive (I would prefer having outcome X to not having it), negative (I would prefer not having outcome X to having it), or zero. Salary increases, bonuses, and more informal rewards are typical examples of "positively valenced" outcomes, whereas disciplinary actions, demotions, and terminations are typical examples of "negatively valenced" outcomes.

Ability to Focus

Reflects the degree to which employees can devote their attention to work, as opposed to "covering their backside", "playing politics", and "keeping an eye on the boss".

Ethics

Reflects the degree to which the behaviors of an authority are in accordance with generally accepted moral norms. When employees perceive high levels of ethics, they believe that things are being done the way they "should be" or "ought to be" done.

Justice

Reflects the perceived fairness of an authority's decision making. When employees perceive high levels of justice, they believe that decision outcomes are fair and that decision-making processes are designed and implemented in a fair manner

Distributive Justice

Reflects the perceived fairness of decision-making outcomes. Employees gauge this by asking whether decision outcomes, such as pay, rewards, promotions, are allocated using proper norms. -In most business situations, the proper norm is equity, with more outcomes allocated to those who contribute more inputs.

Procedural Justice

Reflects the perceived fairness of decision-making processes. This is fostered when authorities adhere to rules of fair process. -One of those rules is voice, or giving employees a chance to express their opinions and views during the course of decision making. -A related rule is correctability, which provides employees with a chance to request an appeal when a procedure seems to have worked ineffectively. Research suggests these rules improve employees' reactions to decisions, largely because they give employees a sense of ownership over the decisions.

Informational Justice

Reflects the perceived fairness of the communications provided to employees from authorities.

Interpersonal Justice

Reflects the perceived fairness of the treatment received by employees from authorities.

Moral Judgment

Reflects the process people use to determine whether a particular course of action is ethical or unethical. -One of the most important factors influencing moral judgment is described in Kohlberg's theory of cognitive moral development

Reputation

Reflects the prominence of an organization's brand in the minds of the public and the perceived quality of its goods and services. -This is an intangible asset that can take a long time to build.

Impact

Reflects the sense that a person's actions "make a difference"-- that progress is being made toward fulfilling some important purpose. Managers can instill a sense of impact in their employees by celebrating milestones along the journey to task accomplishment, particularly for tasks that span a long time frame.

Plans that reward unit or organizational performance are designed to:

Reinforce collaboration, information sharing, and monitoring among employees, regardless of their impact on motivation levels.

Fixed Ratio Schedule

Reinforces behaviors after a certain number of them have been exhibited. -Ex. Piece-Rate Pay

Studies suggest that continuous or fixed schedules can be better for:

Reinforcing new behaviors or behaviors that don't occur on a frequent basis.

Training

Represents a systematic effort by organizations to facilitate the learning of job-related knowledge and behavior.

Expectancy

Represents the belief that exerting a high level of effort will result in the successful performance of some task. More technically, it is a subjective probability, ranging from 0 (no chance) to 1 (its a lock) that a specific amount of effort will result in a specific level of performance (abbreviated E ----> P).

Instrumentality

Represents the belief that successful performance will result in some outcome(s). More technically, it is a set of subjective probabilities, each ranging from 0 (no chance) to 1 (lock) that successful performance will bring a set of outcomes (abbreviated P ----> O). Unfortunately, evidence indicates that many employees don't perceive high levels of instrumentality in their workplace.

Satisficing

Results when decision makers select the first acceptable alternative considered. Additionally, decision makers tend to come up with alternatives that are straightforward and not that different from what they're already doing.

Variable Ratio Schedules

Reward people after a varying number of exhibited behaviors. -Ex. Commission Pay

For positive reinforcement to be successful, employees need to:

See a direct link between their behaviors and desired outcomes.

Research has shown that a learning goal orientation improves:

Self-confidence, feedback-seeking behavior, learning strategy development, and learning performance.

Ways to restore balance to over-rewarded inequity:

Shrink your outcomes (taking less money, giving something back to the comparison other), but the theory acknowledged that such actions are unlikely in most cases. Instead, the more likely solution is to increase your inputs in some way. You could increase the intensity and persistence of your task effort or decide to engage in more "extra mile" citizenship behaviors. -An alternative (and less labor-intensive) means of increasing your inputs is to simply rethink them-- to reexamine your mental ledger to see if you may have "undersold" your true contributions.

Research in cognitive psychology shows that people pay more attention to stimuli that are:

Significant, vivid, and recognizable.

Cognitive-behavioral training also typically involves instruction about tools that foster effective coping.

So, in addition to self-talk, the person might be trained on how to prioritize demands, manage time, communicate needs, and seek support.

Behavior Modeling Training

Some companies are using variations of THIS to ensure that employees have the ability to observe and learn from those in the company with significant amounts of tacit knowledge.

Comparison Other

Some person who seems to provide an intuitive frame of reference for judging equity.

Hindrance Stressors

Stressful demands that people tend to perceive as hindering their progress toward personal accomplishments or goal attainment.

Challenge Stressors

Stressful demands that people tend to perceive as opportunities for learning, growth, and achievement.

A difficult goal is one that:

Stretches employees to perform at their maximum level while still staying within the boundaries of their ability.

A second way that organizations provide resources to employees so that they can cope more effectively is through:

Supportive practices that help employees manage and balance the demands that exist in the different roles they have.

Self-Efficacy

The belief that a person has the capabilities needed to execute the behaviors required for task success. Think of this as a kind of self-confidence or a task-specific version of self-esteem Employees who feel more "efficacious" (self-confident) for a particular task will tend to perceive higher levels of expectancy-- and therefore be more likely to choose to exert high levels of effort.

Trustworthiness

The characteristics or attributes of a trustee that inspire trust.

Procedural justice is fostered when authorities adhere to four rules that serve to create equal employment opportunity.

The consistency, bias suppression, representativeness, and accuracy rules help ensure that procedures are neutral and objective, as opposed to biased and discriminatory.

Social Support

The degree of _____ is another individual factor that affects the way people manage stress. It refers to the help that people receive when they're confronted with stressful demands, and there are at least two major types.

Meaning of Money

The degree to which people view money as having symbolic, not just economic, value.

Stressors

The demands that cause people to experience stress

Performance Orientation

The demonstration of competence is deemed more important than the building of competence

A study showed that positive interactions were more common than negative interactions, but:

The effects of negative interactions on mood were five times stronger than the effects of positive interactions.

Burnout

The emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion that results from having to cope with stressful demands on an ongoing basis.

Ability

The first dimension of trustworthiness, which is the skills, competencies, and areas of expertise that enable an authority to be successful in some specific area.

Coping can involve many different types of activities, and these activities can be grouped into four broad categories based on two dimensions.

The first dimension refers to the method of coping (behavioral vs. cognitive), and the second dimension refers to the focus of coping (problem solving vs. regulation of emotions)

Although reducing stressors may reduce the overall level of stress that a person experiences, this approach is likely to be most beneficial when:

The focus of the effort is on hindrance stressors rather than challenge stressors.

Lump-sum bonuses and gainsharing provide a forum for assigning difficult and specific goals;

The former does so at the individual level and the latter at the unit level. Partly for this reason, both types of plans have been credited with improvements in employee productivity.

The equity norm is typically judged to be the fairest choice in situations in which:

The goal is to maximize the productivity of individual employees.

As goals move from moderate to difficult:

The intensity and persistence of effort become maximized. At some point, however, the limits of a person's ability get reached, and self-efficacy begins to diminish.

Self-set Goals

The internalized goals that people use to monitor their own task progress. As a self-set goal becomes more difficult, the intensity of effort increases, and the persistence of effort gets extended.

Informational justice is fostered when authorities adhere to two particular rules

The justification rule mandates that authorities explain decision-making procedures and outcomes in a comprehensive and reasonable manner. The truthfulness rule requires that those communications be honest and candid.

Explicit Knowledge

The kind of information you're likely to think about when you picture someone sitting down at a desk to learn. It is information that is relatively easily communicated and a large part of what companies teach during training sessions.

The legal component of corporate social responsibility argues that:

The law represents society's codification of right and wrong and must therefore be followed. -Fulfilling this component speaks to the integrity of the organization and suggests that it has reached the conventional level of moral development.

In general, the effects of specific and difficult goals are almost twice as strong on simple tasks as on complex tasks,

Though the effects of goals remain beneficial even in complex cases.

In general, positive reinforcement and extinction should be:

The most common forms of reinforcement used by managers to create learning among their employees. -Both of these contingencies deliver their intended results, but perhaps more importantly, they do so without creating feelings of animosity and conflict

What determines how people develop a sense of control?

The nature of the stressful demand itself. In particular, people are likely to feel less control over a stressor when they appraise it as a hindrance rather than a challenge.

Existence

The need for the food, shelter, safety, and protection required for human existence.

Control

The need to be able to predict and control one's future.

Relatedness

The need to create and maintain lasting, positive, interpersonal relationships.

Esteem

The need to hold a high evaluation of oneself and to feel effective and respected by others.

Meaning

The need to perform tasks that one cares about and that appeal to one's ideals and sense of purpose.

Strains

The negative consequences that occur when demands tax or exceed a person's capacity or resources.

Bounded Rationality

The notion that decision makers simply do not have the ability or resources to process all available information and alternatives to make an optimal decision

Goals

The objective or aim of an action and typically refer to attaining a specific standard of proficiency, often within a specified time limit.

Goal Setting Theory

This views goals as the primary drivers of the intensity and persistence of effort. More specifically, the theory argues that assigning employees specific and difficult goals will result in higher levels of performance than assigning no goals, easy goals, or "do-your-best" goals.

Perception

The process of selecting, organizing, storing, and retrieving information about the environment. -Can often become distorted versions of reality

Interpersonal justice is fostered when authorities adhere to two particular rules

The respect rule pertains to whether authorities treat employees in a dignified and sincere manner. The propriety rule reflects whether authorities refrain from making improper or offensive remarks.

Employees who feel a sense of equity on the job are more likely to engage in citizenship behaviors, particularly when those behaviors aid the organization.

The same employees are less likely to engage in counterproductive behaviors, because such behaviors often serve as a retaliation against perceived inequities.

Benevolence

The second dimension of trustworthiness, which is the belief that the authority wants to do good for the trustor, apart from any selfish or profit-centered motives. -Means they care for employees.

Availability Bias

The tendency for people to base their judgments on information that is easier to recall

Selective Perception

The tendency for people to see their environment only as it affects them and as it is consistent with their expectations. -Affects our ability to identify problems, generate and evaluate alternatives, and judge outcomes

Representativeness Bias

The tendency to assess the likelihood of an event by comparing it to a similar event and assuming it will be similar

Ratio Bias Effect

The tendency to judge the same probability of an unlikely event as lower when the probability is presented in the form of a ratio of smaller rather than of larger numbers

Contrast Bias

The tendency to judge things erroneously based on a reference that is near to them.

Framing Bias

The tendency to make different decisions based on how a question or situation is phrased.

Anchoring Bias

The tendency to rely too heavily on one trait or piece of information when making decisions

Integrity

The third dimension of trustworthiness, which is the perception that the authority adheres to a set of values and principles that the trustor finds acceptable. -When authorities have integrity, they are of sound character-- they have good intentions and strong moral discipline. Integrity also conveys an alignment between words and deeds-- a sense that authorities keep their promises.

Moderators

The three variables that specify when assigned goals will have stronger or weaker effects on task performance. Rather than directly affecting other variables in the diagram (Page 173), moderators affect the strength of the relationships between variables.

Most research on social support focuses on:

The ways that social support buffers the relationship between stressors and strains. -In essence, this perspective casts social support as a "moderator" of the relationship between stressors and strains (recall that moderators are variables that affect the strength of the relationship between two other variables) -In this particular case, the relationship between stressors and strain tends to be weaker at higher levels of social support and stronger at lower levels of social support.

Trust

The willingness to be vulnerable to a trustee based on positive expectations about the trustee's actions and intentions. -This reflects the willingness to take that risk. "Trust is what drives profit margin and share price"

An external attribution, such as bad traffic or a power outage, will occur if:

There is HIGH Consensus (Others arrived late), HIGH Distinctiveness (He is responsible with other commitments), and LOW Consistency (He has never come late to work before)

An internal attribution, such as laziness or low motivation, will occur if:

There is LOW Consensus (e.g. others arrived on time), LOW Distinctiveness (He is irresponsible with other commitments as well), and HIGH Consistency (He has arrived late before)

Positive Life Events

These could be sources of non-work challenge stressors

In general, outcomes are deemed more attractive when:

They help satisfy needs.

SMART Goals

This acronym summarizes many beneficial goal characteristics, standing for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Result-based, and Time-sensitive

Cognitive Distortion

This allows you to restore balance mentally, without altering your behavior in any way.

Moral Intensity

This concept captures the degree to which an issue has ethical urgency.

Moral Attentiveness

This concept captures the degree to which people chronically perceive and consider issues of morality during their experiences.

Job Sharing

This doesn't mean splitting one job into two but rather indicates that two people share the responsibilities of one job, as if the two people were a single performing unit. -This is being used even at the highest levels in organizations

Behavioral Coping

This involves the set of physical activities that are used to deal with a stressful situation.

Continuous Reinforcement Schedule

This is the simplest schedule and happens when a specific consequence follows each and every occurrence of a desired behavior. -New learning is acquired most rapidly under this. -For most jobs, this is impractical. -Might be considered the least long lasting, because as soon as the consequence stops, the desired behavior stops along with it. -Ex. Praise

Learning Orientation

This is where building competence is deemed more important than demonstrating competence. -Learning oriented persons enjoy working on new kinds of tasks, even if they fail during their early experiences. Such people view failure in positive terms-- as a means of increasing knowledge and skills in the long run.

Cognitive Moral Development

This theory argues that as people age and mature, they move through various stages of moral development-- each more mature and sophisticated than the prior one.

Transactional Theory of Stress

This theory explains how stressors are perceived and appraised, as well as how people respond to those perceptions and appraisals.

People who are high in trust propensity may be fooled into trusting others who are not worthy of it.

Those who are low in trust propensity may be penalized by not trusting someone who is actually deserving of it.

Rewards strategy for fostering goal commitment:

Tie goal achievement to the receipt of monetary or non-monetary rewards.

First, Type A Behavior Pattern may have a direct influence on the level of stressors that a person confronts.

To understand why this might be true, consider that Type A persons tend to be hard-driving and have a strong desire to achieve. In addition, because Type A people tend to be aggressive and competitive, they may be more prone to interpersonal conflict.

One way that organizations provide resources to employees is through training interventions aimed at increasing job-related competencies and skills.

Training that increases employee competencies and skills is also beneficial to the extent that it promotes a sense that the demands are more controllable, and a sense of control promotes problem-focused coping strategies.

Although challenge stressors result in strains, which detract from performance and commitment, they also tend to:

Trigger the type of positive emotions and problem-focused coping strategies that are characteristic of employees who are highly engaged in their jobs.

True or False: Research suggests that most adults find themselves at the conventional stage.

True

Type A Behavior Pattern

Type A people have a strong sense of time urgency and tend to be impatient, hard-driving, competitive, controlling, aggressive, and even hostile. This pattern is important because it can influence stressors, stress, and strains.

Behavioral Strains

Unhealthy behaviors such as grinding one's teeth at night, being overly critical and bossy, excessive smoking, compulsive gum chewing, overuse of alcohol, and compulsive eating.

Gainsharing

Unit-focused compensation plan element. A bonus is received for meeting unit goals for criteria controllable by employees (labor costs, use of materials). No change is made to base salary.

Equity Theory

Unlike the first two theories, this acknowledges that motivation doesn't just depend on your own beliefs and circumstances but also on what happens to other people. More specifically, it suggests that employees create a "mental ledger" of the outcomes (or rewards) they get from their job duties. It further suggests that employees create a mental ledger of the inputs (or contributions and investments) they put into their job duties.

As trust increases, social exchange relationships develop that are based on:

Vaguely defined obligations that are open-ended and long term in their repayment schedule. -Social exchanges are characterized by mutual investment, such that employees agree to go above and beyond their duties in exchange for fair and proper treatment by authorities

Research suggests that people with strong moral identities:

Volunteer more for charitable work and donate more to charity drives. Research also suggests that moral identity "moderates" the effects of moral judgment on ethical behavior.

Tacit Knowledge

What employees can typically learn only through experience. It's not easily communicated but could very well be the most important aspect of what we learn in organizations. -Intuition, skills, insight, beliefs, mental models, and practical intelligence.

Non-programmed Decision

When a situation arises that is new, complex, and not recognized, it calls for this on the part of the employee. -In these instances, employees have to make sense of their environment, understand the problems they're faced with, and come up with solutions to overcome them.

Heuristics

When confronted with situations of uncertainty that require a decision on our part, we often use THIS-- simple, efficient, rules of thumb that allow us to make decisions more easily.

Past Accomplishments

When employees consider efficacy levels for a given task, they first consider this, which is the degree to which they have succeeded or failed in similar sorts or tasks in the past.

Behavioral Modeling

When employees observe the actions of others, learn from what they observe, and then repeat the observed behavior.

Primary Appraisal

When people first encounter stressors, this process is triggered. This occurs as people evaluate the significance and the meaning of the stressor they're confronting.

One model of attribution processes suggests that:

When people have a level of familiarity with the person being judged, they'll use a more detailed decision framework

Projection Bias

When people project their own thoughts, attitudes, and motives onto other people. This causes problems in decision making because it limits our ability to develop appropriate criteria for a decision and evaluate decisions carefully.

Engagement

You can think of this as a contemporary synonym, more or less, for high levels of intensity and persistence in work effort. -Inwardly, engaged employees focus a great deal of attention and concentration on their work, sometimes becoming so absorbed, involved, and interested in their tasks that they lose track of time.

Disposition-based Trust

Your personality traits include a general propensity to trust others. This has less to do with a particular authority and more to do with the trustor.

In either case, performance oriented people tend to:

Work mainly on tasks at which they're already good, preventing them from failing in front of others. Such individuals view failure in negative terms-- as an indictment of their ability and competence.