Management of People at Work

What are situational factors that affect House's path-goal theory?

- different types of employees need/prefer different forms of leadership - effectiveness of leadership behaviour depends on particular work environments.

What are some conflict dynamics?

1. "winning" the conflict becomes more important than developing a good solution to the problem at hand. 2. Parties begin to conceal information from each other. 3. Contact with the opposite party is discouraged expect under formalised restricted conditions. 4. From both sides, the more aggressive people skilled at engaging in conflict may emerge as leaders.

What are the stages of socialisation?

1. Anticipatory socialisation: before a person becomes a member of a particular organisation such as through skill acquisition. 2. Encounter: formal might include orientation and rotation through various parts of the organisation whilst informal includes getting to know and understanding the style and personality of one's bosses and workers. 3. Role Management: fine-tuning and active management of his/her role in the organisation.

What are the managerial implications of the need theory?

1. Appreciate diversity: managers must be adept at evaluating needs of individual employees and offering incentives/goals that correspond to their needs. 2. Appreciate intrinsic motivation: alert managers to the existence of higher-order needs.For instance, this can be done by enabling interested workers to progress through a series of jobs that continue to challenge higher order needs.

What are the modes of managing conflict?

1. Avoiding: low assertiveness of one's own interests and low cooperation with the other party. 2. Accommodating: cooperating with the other party's interests while not asserting one's own interests. 3. Competing: maximising the assertiveness of your own position while minimising the cooperative response. 4. Compromise: combines intermediate levels of assertiveness and cooperation.This is not particularly useful when there is power asymmetry as the weaker party may have little to offer the stronger party. 5. Collaborating: both assertiveness and cooperation is maximised which results in integrative agreement that occurs which fully satisfies the interest of both parties.

What are some ways to prevent the escalation of commitment to a failing course of action?

1. Be alert of excessive optimism/extremely positive media attention early in the project cycle which can blind the decision-maker to subsequent signals of impending failure. 2. Encourage continuous experimentation to avoid the decision trap of feeling more resources have to be invested. 3. Set specific goals for projects in advance that must be met if more resources are to be invested. 4. Place more emphasis when evaluating managers on how they make decisions and less on decision outcomes. 5. Separate initial and subsequent decision making: Individuals who made the initial decision are to embark on the course of action assisted or replaced by others.

What are the managerial implications of the expectancy theory?

1. Boost expectancies: ensure employees expect to be able to achieve first-level outcomes of interest to the organisation. 2. Clarify reward contingencies: employees should be convinced that first level outcomes desired by the organisation are clearly instrumental in obtaining positive second level outcomes and avoiding negative outcomes. 3. Appreciate diverse needs: analyse the diverse preferences of particular employees and attempt to design individualized "motivational packages" to meet their needs. A key thing to note is that all those concerned must perceive the rewards to be fair.

How do job enrichment schemes work?

1. Combining tasks: assigning tasks that might be performed by different workers to a single individual. 2. Establishing external client relationships: Put employees in touch with people who depend on their product and services to use interpersonal skills, increase identity and significance of job and increase feedback. 3. Establishing internal client relationships: putting people in touch with people who depend on their products and services within the organisation 4. Forming work teams: alternatives to assembly lines formal and informal development of variety of skills and increase identity of job. 5. Making feedback more direct: permit workers to be identified with their "own" product/service

What are some situations that cause people to acquire insufficient information for their decision-making processes?

1. Confirmation bias: the tendency to seek out information that conforms to one's own definitions of/solutions to a problem. 2. Not-invented-here bias: the tendency to ignore/harbour negative attitudes towards ideas from outside one's own organisation/project team. 3. Information overload: the reception of more information than necessary to make effective decisions which results in errors, omissions, delays and cutting corners.

What are some integrative negotiation tactics>

1. Copious information exchange: the free flow of information to find an integrative solution. The trust must be built slowly, giving some non-critical information to the other party to get the party before eventually leading to the revelation of true interests. 2. Framing differences as opportunities: These difference contain information that can telegraph each party's real interest. If during the course of discussion they realise they can divide labour, both parties can be satisfied fully. 3. Cutting costs: integrative solutions are especially attractive when it can reduce costs for all parties. 4. Increasing resources: two parties working together might have access to twice as many resources as one party. 5. Introducing superordinate goals: attractive outcomes which can only be achieved by collaboration.

What are the kinds of leader behaviour that House's Path-Goal Theory is concerned with?

1. Directive behaviour: schedule work, maintain performance standards and let employees know what is expected. 2. Supportive behaviour: being friendly, approachable and concerned with pleasant interpersonal relationships. 3. Participative behaviour: consult with employees about work-related issues and consider their opinions. 4. Achievement-oriented behaviour: encourage employees to exert high effort and strive for high level of goal accomplishment.

What are the contemporary approaches to improving decision making?

1. Evidence-based management: making decisions through conscientious, explicit and judicious use of the best available evidence from multiple sources. 2. Crowdsourcing: "outsourcing" aspects of decision process to a large collection of people which tends to result in a single superior solution or an average of the masses decision.

What are the right things to do to gain power?

1. Extraordinary activitiesL one needs excellent performance in unusual or non-routine activities. This includes occupying new positions, managing substantial changes and taking great risks. 2. Visible activities: people who have an interest in power are especially good at identifying visible activities and publicising them. 3. Relevant activities: If nobody sees their work as relevant to solutions of important organisational problems, it will not add to their influence.

What are the reasons group risk shifts occur?

1. Group discussions generate ideas and arguments that individual members have not considered before and this information tends to favour members' initial tendency. 2. Group members try to present themselves as basically similar to other members but "even better" which causes them to adopt a slight more extreme version of the group's initial stance.

What are the causes of organisational conflict?

1. Group identification and intergroup bias: People tend to develop a more positive view of the "in-group" and less positive view of the "out group". People tend to identify with the success of their own group and dissociate from out-group failures which boosts their self-esteem and provides comforting feelings of social solidarity. 2. Interdependence: Problems can occur when stereotyping and name-calling between groups occur. This is made worse when one party has some influence over another which makes it relatively easy for that side to abuse power and create antagonism. 3. Difference in power, status and culture.

What are aspects of McClelland theory of needs:?

1. High need for achievement: the preference for situations in which personal responsibility can be taken for outcomes. 2. High need for affiliation: the strong tendency to establish and maintain friendly, compatible interpersonal relationships. 3. High need for power: the strong desire to have influence over others and the wish to make significant impact/impression over them.

What are the benefits of group decision making?

1. Improved decision quality as groups are more vigilant and tend to generate more ideas or evaluate ideas better. 2. Decision acceptance and commitment:People wish to be involved in decisions that involve them, people will better understand decisions in which they participated in and people will be more committed to decisions they have invested their time and energy in. 3. The diffusion of responsibility: each member will share the burden of negative consequences so no one has to be singled out for punishment.

What are the different types of variables?

1. Independent: the predictor/cause of variation in a dependent variable. 2. Dependent: a variable that will vary as a result of changes in the independent variable. 3. Moderating variable: the variable that affects the nature of relationships between independent and dependent variables such that relationships depend on the level of the moderating variable.

What are the key dimensions of transformational leader behaviour?

1. Intellectual stimulation: the leader challenges assumptions, takes risks and solicits follower's ideas. 2. Individualised consideration: the leader treats employees as distinct individuals' indicating concerns for their needs and personal developing and serving as a mentor and coach when appropriate. 3. Inspirational motivation: the communication of visions that are inspiring and appealing to stimulate enthusiasm and communicate optimism about future goal attainment. 4. Charisma: Followers trust and identify with charismatic leaders and internalise the values and goals they hold.

What are the potential advantages of participative leadership?

1. It can increase motivation to meet goals they set. 2. It can result in higher-quality decisions than the leader can make alone. 3. It can increase employees' acceptance of decisions.

What are possible goal orientations?

1. Learning goal orientation: most concerned about learning something new and developing competence in activity by acquiring new skills and mastering new situations. 2. Performance-prove goal orientation: concern about demonstrating competence in performing a task by seeking favourable judgements about outcome of their performance. 3. Performance-avoid goal orientation: avoiding negative judgements about outcome of performance.

What are the bases of individual power?

1. Legitimate power: power that derives from a person's position or job in the organisation and constitutes of the organisation's judgement. 2. Reward power: the ability of the holder to exert influence by providing positive outcomes or preventing negative outcomes. This is often backed up by legitimate power as members are given the chance to recommend raises, do performance evaluations and assign preferred tasks to employees. 3. Coercive power: the power of the holder to exert influence using punishment or threat. 4. Referent power: when the power holder is well-liked by others, others will be prone to consider their points of view, ignore their failures, seek their approval and use them as role models. 5. Expert power: the power holder has special information or expertise which the organisation values. Employees tend to perceive women managers to me more likely than male managers to be high in expert power.

What are the potential problems with merit pay plans.

1. Low discrimination: managers are unable/unwilling to discriminate between good and poor performances. 2. Small increases: even if rewards are carefully tied to performance and managers do a good job discriminating, the intended motivational effects may not be realised. 3. Pay secrecy: even if merit pay is administered fairly, contingent on performance and generous employees are ignorant as they have no way of comparison.

How do interactions under management by objectives occur?

1. Manager meets employees: develop and agree on objectives for coming months- objectives must be made as specific as possible and quantified, if feasible, to assist in subsequent evaluation of accomplishments. 2. Periodic meetings to monitor employee progress in achieving objectives: can be modified if any needs/ problems encountered. 3. Appraisal meeting: evaluate the extent that agreed upon objectives are achieved, with special emphasis on diagnosing reasons for success/failure. 4. The MBO cycle is repeated.

Who are the right people for leaders to cultivate?

1. Outsiders: establishing good relationships with key people outside one's organisation which can lead to increased power within an organisation. 2. Subordinates: an individual can gain influence if closely identified with up and coming subordinates. For a manager, it would also demonstrate that they are backed by a cohesive team. 3. Peers: cultivating good relationship with peers can ensure that nothing gets in the way of future acquisition of power. 4. Superiors: mentors/sponsors have a special interest in promising subordinates and can provide special information and useful introductions.

How can goal commitment be enhanced?

1. Participation: participation provides information that assists establishment of fair and realistic goals to facilitate performance. 2. Rewards: goal setting that has lead to performance increases without monetary incentives. 3. Management support: assist employees in goal accomplishment and behave supportively if failure occurs, even adjusting goal downwards.

What is the four branch model of emotional intelligence?

1. Perceiving emotions accurately in one self and others: the ability to perceive emotions and accurately identify one's own emotions and emotions of others. 2. Using emotions to facilitate thinking: The ability to use and assimilate emotions and emotional experience to guide and facilitate one's thinking and reasoning to use emotions in a functional way. 3. Understanding emotions according to emotional language and the signals conveyed by emotions to understand emotional information, determinants and consequences of emotion and how emotions change over time. 4. Managing emotions to attain certain goals: The ability to manage one's own and others feelings, emotions and emotional relationships, the individual is able to regulate, adjust and change his/her own emotions and other's emotions to suit the situation.

What are some situations which result in bounded rationality?

1. Perceptual defence may act to defend the perceiver against unpleasant perceptions. 2. Problem is defined in terms of functional specialty where selective perception can cause decision makers to view problems as a domain of their own specialty even when some other perspective may be warranted. 3. Problem defined in terms of solution: The tendency to jump to conclusions which short-circuits the rational decision-making process. 4. Problem is diagnosed in terms of symptoms: concentration on surface symptoms will provide the decision maker with few clues about the adequate solution.

What fits are important for socialisation?

1. Person-job fit: match between employee's knowledge, skills, abilities and the requirements of the job. 2. Person-organisation fit: match between employee's personal values and values of the organisation. 3. Person-group fit: match/comparability between employee's values and beliefs and values and beliefs of his/her work group/

What are the implications of the interactionist approach on organisational behaviour?

1. Personnel selection: measure personality related to relevant work situations. 2. Job search: create a fit between personality and work environment. 3. Personal development: enhance behavioural flexibility. 4. Overall mindset: Be aware of and appreciate the strengths of different personality characteristics.

What is Maslow's hierarchy of needs?

1. Physiological needs: needs that must be satisfied for people to survive. 2. Safety and Security needs: needs for security, stability, freedom from anxiety and structured and ordered environment. 3. Love and Belonging Needs:needs for social interaction, affection, love, companionship and friendship. 4. Self esteem: needs for feelings of adequacy, competence, strength and competence. 5. self actualisation: desire to develop one's true potential to the fullest extent and express one's skills, talents and emotions in a manner that is most personally fulfilling.

What are the potential problems with job enrichment?

1. Poor diagnosis: some are half-hearted exercises which do not increase the motivating potential of jobs adequately. - Job enlargement: giving employees more tasks to perform at the same level while leaving other crucial core characteristics unchanged. - Job engorgement: attempt to enrich jobs already perceived too rich by incumbents. 2. Lack of desire or skill: enrichment places greater demand on workers and some might not relish this extra responsibility. 3. Demand for rewards: some may ask for greater extrinsic rewards to accompany their redesigned jobs. 4. Union resistance: unions tend to equate narrow division of labour with preserving jobs for workers. 5. Supervisory resistance: increased autonomy of employees might "dis-enrich the boss's job".

What are some newcomer proactive socialisation behaviours?

1. Proactive socialisation: process in which newcomers play an active role in socialisation through the use of proactive behaviours. 2. Feedback seeking: request feedback about one's work and job performance. 3. Information seeking: seek information about one's work task/roles/work group/ organisation. 4. General socialisation: participating in social office events and attending social gatherings. 5. Relationship building: initiating social interactions and building relationships with other's in one's area/department. 6. Positive framing: perceiving/ framing a new work situation in a positive manner. 7. Boss-relationship building: initiating social interactions to get to know and form relationships with one's boss. 8. Networking: socialising with and getting to know members of organisations from various departments and functions. 9. Job change negotiation: attempts to change one's job duties and manners and means one performs a job.

How can pay be used to motivate teamwork?

1. Profit sharing: for years the firm makes a profit, some of it is returned to employees as bonus/cash/deferred retirement funds. 2. Employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs): allow employees to own set amount of company's shares they are allowed to purchase at set price. 3. Gainsharing plans: group incentive plans based on improved productivity and performance over which workforce has some control. 4. Skill-based pay: motivate employees to learn wide variety of work tasks, irrespective of job they might be doing at given time.

What are some methods of organisational socialisation?

1. Realistic job previews: provide a balanced, realistic picture of positive and negative aspects of job applicants. This has been proven to be effective in reducing inflated expectations and turnover and improving job performance, allowed for self-selection and lowers unrealistic expectations effectively. 2. Employee orientation programs designed to introduce new employees to their job, people they will be working with and the organisation. The main content could include health and safety issues as well as terms and conditions of employment. 3. Mentoring: where an experienced/more senior person in an organisation provides a junior with guidance and special attention allowing for functions such as sponsorship where the mentor might nominate the newcomer for advantageous transfers and promotions.

What are the types of organisational conflict?

1. Relationship conflict: tensions related to the relationship and not the task at hand. 2. Task conflict: disagreements about the nature of work to be done. 3. Process conflict: disagreements about how work should be organised and accomplished.

How are variables measured?

1. Reliability: the index of the consistency of a research subject's responses. 2. Validity: index of the extent to which a measure truly reflects what it is supposed to measure. 3. Convergent validity: exists when there is a weak relationship between measures of different variables.

What are some issues and concerns in organisational behaviour research?

1. Sampling: with random sampling, the researcher needs to ensure that all relevant individuals/groups/organisations have an equal probability of being studied and give confidence in generalisation of findings to ensure external validity. 2. Hawthorne effectL the favourable response of participants in an organisational experiment to a factor other than the independent variable formally being manipulated. For instance, experiment participants are grateful for being selected for special training and resolve to work harder. 3. Ethics: ethical researchers avoid unnecessary deception, inform participants about general purpose of the research and protect anonymity of participants.

What are conditions subunits can use to control strategic contingencies?

1. Scarcity: subunits acquire power when they are able to secure scarce resources which are important to the organisation as a whole. 2. Uncertainty: the changes in sources of uncertainty can result in a shift in subunit power. For instance, units which are dealing with business ethics can gain/lose power in response to the latest scandal or legislations. 3. Centrality: subunits which have a more central impact on the quantity or quality of an organisation's key product or service tend to have more power. 4. Substitutability: Subunits have relatively little power when others inside and outside the organisation can perform their activities.

What are some factors that threaten the internal validity of experiments?

1. Selection of participants: the participants of the experimental group differ from the control group in a way that affects the experiment. 2. Testing: the process of completing a survey and answering questions before an experiment. This may sensitise participants to the study and influence how they respond to the same questions after an experiment. 3. Instrumentation: different measures are used at different times which may affect the changes. 4. Statistical regression: tendency of scores to shift towards the mean. 5. History: event/factors that occur during an experiment which can explain the change in a dependent variable. 6. Maturation: natural changes in participants due to the passage of time can affect changes in the dependent variable. 7. Mortality: certain participants can drop out and those who remain and complete may differ from those who dropped out.

What are the core job characteristics?

1. Skill variety: the opportunity to do a variety of job activities using various skills and talents. 2. Autonomy>: freedom to schedule one's own work activities and decide work procedures. 3. Task significance: impact that a job has on others. 4. Task identity: the extent to which a job involves doing a complete piece of work from beginning to end. 5. Feedback; information about one's performance effectiveness which is also essential for high intrinsic motivation.

How to not be part of the resistance to evidence-based management?

1. Stop treating old ideas as if they were brand new. 2. Be suspicious of "breakthrough" ideas and studies. 3. Celebrate and develop collective brilliance. 4. Emphasise drawbacks as well as virtues. 5. Use success and failure stories to illustrate sound practices but not in place of a valid research method. 6. Adopt a neutral stance towards ideologies and theories.

How can job design be used as a motivator?

1. Stretch assignments: employees can be given opportunities to broaden their skills by working on a variety of challenging assignments and projects. 2. Job rotation: rotating employees to different tasks and jobs in the organisation.

What is the data derived from the use of correlational techniques?

1. Surveys: use of questionnaires to gather data from participants to answer questions on relevant variables. 2. Interview: the researcher asks the respondents a series of questions to gather data on variables of interest. 3. Existing data: data taken from organisational records that includes productivity, absence and demographic information.

What are observational techniques?

1. Systematic framework: the researcher has extensive training concerning human behaviour and a particular set of questions that the observation is designed to answer. 2. Ensuring objectivity: the researcher keeps a careful ongoing record of the events he/she observes to avoid excessive reliance on memory. 3. Participant observation: the researcher becomes a functioning member of the organisational unit he/she is studying. 4. Direct observationL the researcher observes organisational behaviour without participation in the activity being observed.

What makes it hard to be evidence based?

1. There's too much evidence 2. There's not enough good evidence 3. The evidence doesn't quite apply 4. People are trying to mislead you 5. You are trying to mislead you 6. The side effects outweigh the cure 7. Stories are more persuasive anyway

What are some distributive negotiation tactics?

1. Threats: implying that you will punish the other party if he/she does not concede to your position. 2. Promises: pledges that concessions will lead to rewards in the future. 3. Intransigence: sticking to your target positions, offering few concessions and waiting for the other party to give in. 4. Persuasion: usually consists of two-prongs where one prong asserts the technical merits of the party's position and the other prong asserts the fairness of target position.

What are disadvantages of group decision making?

1. Time: time is spent on discussion, debate and coordination and this problem increases with group size. 2. Conflict: Decision quality may take a backseat to political wrangling and infighting. 3. Domination: One person dominating discussions is not likely to lead to group acceptance and commitment this is especially if the dominant person is particularly misinformed. 4. Groupthink can occur which is where group pressures lead to reduced mental efficiency, poor testing of reality and lax moral judgement. Situation such as the pressure for conformity can occur where members pressure each other to fall in line and conform with the group's views.

What are the potential problems of participative leadership?

1. With the larger amounts of time and energy needed, participating may not be appropriate where quick decisions are concerned. 2. Some leaders feel that a participative style will reduce their power and influence. 3. Some leaders resent "having to do management's work" 4. Some employees' lack the knowledge to contribute effectively in participative situations.

What are the moderators to achieving the outcomes of having core job characteristics and the critical psychological states?

1. Workers who have weak job relevant knowledge and skills would not respond favourably to jobs which are high in motivating potential as it would be too demanding. 2. Workers with high growth need strength would be more responsive to challenging work. 3. Workers who are dissatisfied with context factors surrounding the job would be less responsive to challenging work.

What is a hypothesis?

A formal statement of the expected relationship(s) between two or more variables in a specified population.

What is authentic leadership?

A positive form of leadership that involves being true to oneself. Authentic leaders known and act upon their true values, beliefs and strengths and help others do the same. This helps them to earn the respect and trust of followers.

What is a proximal goal?

A proximal goal is when short-term goals for achieving a distal goal. In other words breaking down distal goals into smaller, more attainable sub goals.

What is social cognitive theory?

A theory that emphasises the role of cognitive processes in regulating people's behaviour. According to social cognitive theory, human behaviour can best be explained through a system of triadic reciprocal causation in which personal factors and environmental factors work together and interact to influence people's behaviour. In addition, people's behaviour also influences personal factors and the environment. Social cognitive theory involves modelling, self-efficacy and self-regulation.

What is a well-structured problem?

A well-structure problem is one where the existing and desired state is clear and how to get from one state to another is fairly obvious.

Suzie Desouza, the Manager of Industrial Relations at Zeta Manufacturing, has just come from a ten hour marathon meeting with the union negotiators who represent the workers in the assembly plant. The union leaders have tabled their final offer and are threatening to call a strike if management does not accept it. Suzie now has to meet with her boss, Gordon Wong, and brief him on the union's final offer. Suzie is hopeful that Gordon will accept the union's terms, but she is not sure how to frame the cost arguments in order to achieve this objective. In her meeting with Gordon the next morning she summarizes the impact of the union's offer as follows: "If we accept their offer, it will cost us an extra $10 million over the next three years. However, if we reject their offer, there's a 50 percent chance that it will cost us more than $10 million perhaps as much as $20 million; but also a 50 percent chance that it will cost us less perhaps much less." Do you think Gordon will accept or reject the union's offer? Use your knowledge of framing bias to explain why.

According to the findings of Kahneman and Tversky cited in the text, Gordon will most likely reject the union offer because it has been framed as a choice between two losses. To improve her chances of getting Gordon's approval, she might try framing the union's offer in terms of gains e.g. if we accept this offer, it could save as much as $10 million over three years; if we reject this offer and engage in protracted negotiations, there is a 50 percent chance that we will save more than $10 million.

Discuss the assets and liabilities associated with strong organizational cultures.

Advantages include improved coordination, conflict resolution and financial success. Disadvantages include resistance to change, and the potential for pathology and culture clash.

What are the consequences of organisational commitment?

All forms of commitment reduces turnover intention and actual turnover. However high continuance due to a lack of alternatives can result in dissatisfaction and stress.

Give an example of escalating commitment and discuss four ways to prevent the tendency to escalate commitment to a failing course of action.

An example is the executive who authorizes the purchase of several new machines to improve plant productivity. The machines turn out to be very unreliable, and they are frequently out of commission for repairs. Perfect rationality suggests admitting to a mistake. However, the executive might authorize an order for more machines from the same manufacturer to "prove" that he was right all along, hoping to recoup sunk costs with improved productivity from an even greater number of machines. Four ways to prevent escalation include: encourage continuous experimentation with reframing the problem to avoid the decision trap of feeling more resources have to be invested; set specific goals for the project in advance that must be met if more resources are to be invested; place more emphasis in evaluating managers on how they made decisions and less on decision outcomes; separate initial and subsequent decision making so that individuals who make the initial decision to embark on a course of action are assisted or replaced by others who decide if a course of action should be continued.

What is an organisation? Apply your definition to a nonprofit organisation as an example.

An organisation is a social invention for accomplishing common goals through group effort. Nonprofit organisations may include hospitals, schools, churches and charities. The goal of a charity may be to help the needy through the group effort of many volunteers.

Richard Thackeray has just been hired as a management trainee in the marketing department at Kapster Enterprises. He is hoping to quickly move up the corporate hierarchy and eventually become the Vice President of Marketing. However, Richard realizes that there are several powerful managers above him in the hierarchy who undoubtedly have aspirations about becoming a vice president as well. What advice might you give to Richard about how to obtain power?

Applying the concepts of Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Richard should pursue activities which are extraordinary, visible and relevant. He should also try to cultivate relationships with the right people including outsiders, peers, and superiors.

Gordon Wong, VP of Human Resources at Zeta Manufacturing, has just reviewed last month's disappointing productivity figures from the assembly plant where an empowerment program was launched six months ago. Not only was performance down, but employee expenses and related costs had doubled over the same period last year. Gordon could not understand why the empowerment program had not achieved better productivity results especially since the assembly workers now had virtually complete control over their jobs. As he reviewed the report he pondered, "Perhaps our empowerment initiatives did not go far enough? Maybe we need to give them even more power?" Using your knowledge of empowerment, what advice might you give to Gordon?

As Exhibit 12.2 (page 416) in the text illustrates, the key to improving performance through empowerment is to give workers sufficient power · not excessive power. Gordon should consider reducing power levels first (e.g. perhaps by introducing some productivity quotas and expense controls) instead of increasing them.

Gordon Wong, the VP of Human Resources at Zeta Manufacturing, is concerned about the apparent lack of motivation among Zeta's employees. At a meeting with company executives, he proposes that workers' wages be immediately increased by 20% in order to improve motivation levels. Julia Franco, the VP of Operations disagrees. "If you throw more money at them, they will become even less motivated!" she exclaims. Who is correct? Explain your answer.

As discussed in the text, there is considerable debate about the relationship between extrinsic and intrinsic motivators. In support of Julia's position, there is research evidence which suggests that the proposed increase in pay (an extrinsic reward) may lead to reduced levels of intrinsic motivation stemming from the workers' tasks. Other studies suggest that intrinsic motivation is only negatively affected by extrinsic rewards in certain circumstances, and therefore, Julia's argument may not be relevant at Zeta. Either way, pay is only one type of reward and Zeta's management would be well advised to develop a strategy which includes both intrinsic and extrinsic motivators.

How to nurture an evidence-based approach?

Ask for evidence of efficacy every time change is proposed, parse the logic behind that evidence and encourage trial programs, pilot studies and experimentation.

Harjit Dhaliwal is a new sales representative for Kapster Enterprises. He enjoys making sales calls and meeting with clients, but dislikes the weekly paperwork that he has to prepare for head office. He initially feels that weekly activity reports are a bureaucratic waste of time, but he dutifully completes them to avoid any trouble with head office. After several months, Harjit attends his first national sales meeting at which the VP of Marketing stresses the importance of accurate information from the field. Harjit begins to appreciate the importance of the reports and now understands why head office needs them on a timely basis each week. After the meeting, Harjit is asked by his boss to train a new sales rep who has just been hired in a nearby territory. In showing the new worker the ropes, Harjit is heard to say, "These weekly reports are very importantyou won't understand now, but you will later." Explain Harjit's metamorphosis in terms of compliance, identification, and internalization.

At first, Harjit's motive for completing the reports is compliance. At the sales meeting, he begins to see things from a head office perspective, and identification becomes the dominant motive. Finally, when he is asked to train a new worker, Harjit's comments suggest that internalization has occurred; he now supports the values of head office and truly believes that the weekly paperwork is important.

What is attitude?

Attitude is the fairly stable evaluative tendency to respond consistently to some specific object/situation/person/category of people.

What are work design characteristics?

Attributes of tasks, jobs, social and organisational environments and consist of motivational characteristics, social characteristics and work context characteristics.

What is behaviour modelling training and what are the steps involved?

BMT is a training method based on the modelling component of social cognitive theory. It involves the following steps: describe to trainees a set of well-defined behaviours to be learned; provide a model or models displaying the effective use of those behaviours; provide feedback and social reinforcement to trainees following practice and take steps to maximise the transfer of those behaviours to the job.

What are behaviours necessary for survival and adaptation of organisations?

Be motivated to join and remain in the organisation, carry out basic work reliably, be willing to continuously learn and upgrade new skills and be flexible and innovative.

What is the psychological contract?

Beliefs held by employees regarding reciprocal obligations and promises between them and their organisations.

Discuss the benefits and potential problems of telecommuting.

Benefits include greater flexibility in work schedules; distant staffing; lower costs; can increase employee productivity; stress reduction when grinding commutes are eliminated; greater work-life balance. Problems can include damage to informal communication; decreased visibility when promotions are considered; problems handling rush projects; workload spillover for nontelecommuters; distractions at home; feelings of isolation; overwork.

Compare and contrast the motivation theories of Maslow and Alderfer. What advice would you have for a Canadian manager with respect to applying these theories in their workplace?

Both theories are based on need hierarchies; Alderfer's ERG theory (existence, relatedness, and growth) is a compressed version of Maslow's five-category need system (physiological, safety, belongingness, esteem, and self-actualization). Alderfer's theory is more flexible than Maslow's in that it does not assume that a lower level must be gratified before a higher level need becomes operative. It also suggests that frustration of a higher level need will lead a worker to regress to a lower, more concrete need category. Good advice for Canadian managers might be to focus relatively more attention to workers' higher level needs (i.e. appreciate intrinsic motivation), and remember that these models to not apply evenly across all employees or cultures (i.e. appreciate diversity).

What is bounded rationality? How can it lead to difficulties in identifying potential problems?

Bounded rationality is a decision strategy that relies on limited information and reflects time constraints and political considerations. It can lead to the following difficulties in problem identification: perceptual defence, problems being defined in terms of either functional specialties or solutions, and problems being diagnosed in terms of symptoms.

Describe how changes in the workplace are having an impact on organizational commitment.

Changes in the workplace on employees' commitment to their organization can be seen in three main areas: changes in the nature of employees' commitment to the organization; changes in the focus of employees' commitment; and the multiplicity of employer-employee relationships within organization.

Explain why "diversity" has become an important management issue in the modern workplace.

Changing demographics and the globalisation of business are resulting in increasingly diverse labor forces and customer markets.

Describe several job enrichment strategies which a manager might try to implement, depending on the organizational context.

Combining tasks, establishing internal and external client relationships, reducing supervision, forming work teams, and making feedback more direct.

What is conflict?

Conflict is the process that occurs when one person, group or organisational subunit frustrates the goal attainment of another.

Describe three common errors made my managers involving reinforcement.

Confusing rewards with reinforcers, neglecting diversity in preferences for reinforcers and neglecting important sources of reinforcement.

What is controlled motivation?

Controlled motivation is when people are motivated to obtain desired consequences or extrinsic rewards.

What is corporate social responsibility?

Corporate social responsibility is when an organisation takes responsibility for the impact of its decisions and actions on its stakeholders.

What is correlational research?

Correlational research is the attempts to measure variables precisely and examine relationships among these variables without changing the setting.

What is cultural intelligence?

Cultural intelligence is the capability to function and manage well in culturally diverse environments. People with high cultural intelligence tend to have high intercultural adjustment, global leadership and performance in intercultural settings.

David Lucero is the Regional Sales Manager for Western Canada at Kapster Enterprises. He enjoys his job and earns a good enough salary to comfortably support his wife and two children in an upscale area of Calgary. He was recently offered a promotion to General Sales Manager for Canada based in Toronto. The promotion would have increased his salary by $10,000 per year and placed him a notch higher on the organization chart. However, the move to Toronto would have resulted in much higher housing expenses, and David's wife would have had to go back to work if they wanted to maintain the same overall living standards. David knew that he would make an excellent GM, but after some consideration, he declined the offer. Use expectancy theory to explain why David may have turned down the promotion.

David's expectancy is high (i.e. he is certain that he can do the job) but the combination of both attractive and unattractive second level outcomes has resulted in low valence, overall.

What is distributive fairness?

Distributive fairness is how people perceive the outcomes they think they deserve from their jobs.

What is distributive negotiation?

Distributive negotiation is the zero-sum, win-lose situation where the fixed pie is divided up between parties.

What are the basic characteristics of motivation?

Effort, persistence, direction and goals

What is emotional regulation and its consequences. Given an example of an employee who is regulating his or her emotions.

Emotional regulation is the requirement for people to conform to certain "display rules" in their job behavior in spite of their true mood or emotions. There is growing evidence that the frequent need to suppress negative emotions takes a toll on job satisfaction and increases stress. An example is when an employee must remain calm and civil even when being harassed and insulted by customers. Flight attendants who must be calm and pleasant when interacting with rude and drunk passengers is an example.

What are emotions?

Emotions are intense, often short-lived and caused by particular events such as bad performance appraisal.

What is self-regulation?

Employees can use learning principles to manage their own behaviour, making external control less necessary.

What do employees learn?

Employees learn practical, intrapersonal, interpersonal skills and cultural awareness.

Describe the managerial decisional roles identified by Mintzberg and give an example of each.

Entrepreneur, disturbance handler, resource allocator and negotiator. Examples will vary.

What is equity theory? Use it to explain why a doctor who earns $100,000 per year might be more dissatisfied with her job than a plumber who earns $50,000.

Equity theory suggests that job satisfaction stems from a comparison of the inputs one invests in a job and the outcomes one receives in comparison with the inputs and outcomes of another person or group. In the example, the doctor may perceive that her inputs years of education, long hours, dedication to her field, etc. are disproportionately greater than those of the plumber in comparison to the outcomes higher pay which may, in fact, not be all that great after taxes!

What is escalation of commitment and what are the reasons for why it occurs?

Escalation of commitment refers to the tendency to invest additional resources to an apparently failing course of action. There are a number of reasons for why it occurs including: dissonance reduction; a social norm that favors consistent behavior by managers; decision makers might be motivated to not appear wasteful; the way that decision makers frame the problem once some resources have been sunk; personality, moods , and emotions can also affect escalation. People high on neuroticism and negative affectivity are less likely to escalate.

What is evidence-based management?

Evidence-based management refers to translating principles based on best scientific management into organisational practices.

Explain how organizational politics may lead to behaviors which are potentially functional and dysfunctional to an organization. Give an example of each.

Exhibit 12.4 (page 421) in the text nicely summarizes the potential for functional and dysfunctional behaviors along the basic dimensions of organizational politics. Political behavior involving sanctioned ends but nonsanctioned means may result in functional consequences to the organization (e.g. bribing a foreign official to help win a large export contract for your company). Political behavior involving either sanctioned means and nonsanctioned ends, or nonsanctioned means and nonsanctioned ends, both result dysfunctional consequences to the organization. An example of the former might involve a manager who agrees to promote an employee in exchange for the employee's cooperation in concealing some fraudulent expense reports he submitted. Examples of the latter might involve any manager who violates rules or squanders organizational resources in order to enhance his or her own personal power.

What is Alderfer's ERG theory?

Existence needs; the needs satisfied by some material substance/condition. Relatedness needs: needs satisfied by open communication and exchange of thoughts and feelings with other organisational members. Growth needs: needs fulfilled by strong personal involvement in a work setting.

What is experimental research?

Experimental research involves manipulating the independent variable to determine how it affects the dependent variable. This involves a control group which is a group of research participants who have not been exposed to the experimental treatment.

What are the implications of cultural variation?

Exporting organisational behaviour theories may not translate well in other societies, a need to understand cultural value differences and a need to appreciate global customers.

What are the "Big Five" dimensions of personality? Give two examples of research from our text, which link these dimensions to workplace behaviours.

Extraversion, emotion stability, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience. There are several examples of research which link these dimensions to workplace behaviours. One study suggests that extraversion was important for managers and salespeople, while another one found that extraversion was positively correlated with absenteeism.

What is extrinsic motivation?

Extrinsic motivation is from the work environment external to the task and is usually applied by someone other than being motivated. This is more strongly related to to quality of performance and most beneficial for performance on complex tasks.

What are variables?

Factors that can take on two or more variables.

Explain how job satisfaction contributes to organizational citizenship behavior.

Fairness is key. Although distributive fairness (especially in terms of pay) is important, procedural and interactional fairness from a supportive manager seem especially critical. If the manager strays from the prescriptions for procedural fairness, OCB can suffer. If one feels unfairly treated, it might be difficult to lower formal performance for fear of dire consequences. It might be much easier to withdraw the less visible, informal activities that make up OCB. On the other hand, fair treatment and its resulting satisfaction might be reciprocated with OCB.

What is flex-time?

Flex time provides flexibility in terms of when employees work such as what time employees report for work.

Describe four programs which utilize alternative work schedules as motivators. Give examples of jobs which might apply to each program.

Flex-time, compressed workweeks, job sharing, and telecommuting. There are several examples of jobs cited in the text on pages 188-192. Generally, examples for compressed workweeks and job sharing can be blue or white-collar jobs from almost any industry, while flex-time and telecommuting programs tend to apply more toward white collar jobs.

What is general self-efficacy?

General self-efficacy is the general trait which refers to an individual's belief in his or her to perform successfully in a variety of challenging situations. Those with higher general self-efficacy tend to be better able to adapt to novel, uncertain and adverse situations, leading to higher job satisfaction and performance.

What is global leadership?

Global leadership refers to having leadership capabilities to function effectively in different cultures and being able to cross language, social, economic and political borders. To succeed, global leaders need to have global mindsets, tolerate high levels of ambiguity and exhibit cultural adaptability and flexibility.

What is goal orientation?

Goal orientation is individual's goal preferences in achievement situations.

What are the basic characteristics of highly motivating goals?

Goals are most motivational when they are specific, challenging, and organizational members are committed to them. In addition, feedback about progress toward goal attainment should be provided.

What kinds of goals are motivational?

Goals that are specific, challenging and have the commitment of organisational members committed combined with feedback systems.

What is groupthink? What are its symptoms? How can it be prevented?

Groupthink is the capacity for group pressure to damage the mental efficiency, reality testing and moral judgment of decision-making groups. Symptoms include the illusion of invulnerability, rationalization, the illusion of morality, stereotyping of outsiders, pressure to conform, self- censorship, the illusion of unanimity, and mindguards. Leaders can prevent it by not exerting undue pressure for a particular decision outcome and by encouraging dissent (e.g. appointing a devil's advocate).

What are the forms that organisational citizenship behaviour might take?

Helping behaviour, conscientiousness to details of work, being a good sport when inevitable frustrations of organisational life crop up and courtesy and cooperation.

Describe three personality characteristics which you would expect to be associated with success as a manager. Defend your answer.

High internal locus of control, high self-monitor and high self-esteem would all be considered desirable personality characteristics for managerial success.

What is hindsight?

Hindsight is the tendency to review the decision-making process to find out what was done right/wrong and reflects a cognitive bias. The knew-it-all-along effect is the tendency to assume that we knew all along what the outcome of a decision would be. The tendency for people to take responsibility for a successful decision outcome while avoiding responsibility for unsuccessful outcomes.

What is a rational decision making process?

Identify the problem-> search for relevant information-> develop alternative solutions to the problem -> explore alternative solutions -> choose the best solutions -> implement the chosen solution -> monitor and evaluate the chosen solution.

What are ill-structured problems?

Ill-structured problems are problems where the existing and desired states are unclear and the method of getting to the desired state is unknown.In these cases, the decision maker must resort to non-programmed decision making to gather more information and be more self-consciously analytical.

Explain the difference between negative reinforcement and punishment. Give an example of each.

In negative reinforcement, an unpleasant stimulus is removed following some desired behaviour, increasing the probability of that behaviour. In punishment, an unpleasant stimulus is applied after some undesired behaviour. Examples include cleaning up a desk to avoid a supervisor's nagging and docking a worker's one hour pay for being late.

What are the consequences of the lack of job satisfaction?

Increased absence from work, increased turnover rates, decreased performance.

What is integrative negotiation?

Integrative negotiation assumes that mutual problem solving can result in a win-win situation, the pie is enlarge before distribution.

What is interactional fairness?

Interactional fairness is when people feel they have received respectful and informative communication about some outcome.

What are the new requirements for international managers?

International managers must be able to adapt to cross-cultural differences, have the technical requirements for accomplishing goals and be able to adopt various leadership styles, motivation techniques and communication methods depending on location.

What is intrinsic motivation.

Intrinsic motivation is from direct relationship between the work and task and is usually self applied. This is more strongly related to the quality of performance and is the most beneficial for performance on complex tasks.

What is restriction of productivity and why does it occur?

It is the artificial limitation of work output that can occur under wage incentive plans. Workers come to an informal agreement about what constitutes a fair day's work and limit their output accordingly. It can occur for a number of reasons: sometimes workers feel that increased productivity due to the incentive will lead to reductions in the workforce or they fear that if they produce at an especially high level, the organization will reduce the rate of payment to cut labor costs (rate-cutting).

What is the expectancy theory?

It is the basic belief that motivation is determined by outcomes people expect to occur as a result of their actions on the job. Instrumentality is the probability that a particular first level outcome will be followed by a second level outcome. Valence is the expected value of the outcomes, in terms of whether they are attractive or unattractive to the individual. People will be motivated to perform in the activities they find attractive and feel they can accomplish.

What is organisational citizenship behaviour?(OCB)

It is voluntary informal behaviour that contributes to organisational effectiveness. The defining characteristics are that the behaviour is voluntary, spontaneous, contributes to organisational effectiveness and is unlikely to be explicitly picked up and rewarded by performance evaluation system.

What does Vroom and Jago's situational model of participation reveal?

It recognises that there are varying degrees of participation. For instance in autocractic group: the leader will obtain the necessary information from employees before deciding on a solution themselves.

What does the process theories of motivation refer to?

It refers to how motivation occurs.

What are the two main factors which determine job scope? Give examples of jobs which have low job scope and high job scope.

Job breadth and job depth. A traditional assembly line job would have low job scope; a manager or professor would generally have high job scope.

What does job design refer to?

Job design refers to the structure, content and configuration of people's work tasks and roles.

What is job enrichment?

Job enrichment is the design of job to enhance intrinsic motivation, quality of working life and job motivation.

Two organizations are considering job redesign in order to improve employee motivation. One organization is planning on job enrichment and the other is going to use job enlargement. Each organization has asked you to explain how they should proceed and the likely outcomes of their job redesign programs. What will you tell them?

Job enrichment is the design of jobs to enhance intrinsic motivation, quality of working life, and job involvement. Job enrichment procedures can include combining tasks, establishing client relationships (internal and external), reducing supervision, forming teams, and making feedback more direct. The organization can expect an improvement in employees' intrinsic motivation and job involvement. Job enlargement involves increasing job breadth by giving employees more tasks at the same level to perform but leaves the other core job characteristics unchanged. As a result, it is unlikely to improve intrinsic motivation especially if employees are just given more boring, fragmented, routine tasks to do.

What is job involvement?

Job involvement is the cognitive state of psychological identification with one's job and importance of work to one's total self image. All core job characteristics have been proven to be positively related to job involvement.

What is job satisfaction?

Job satisfaction is the collection of attitudes people have about their jobs.

What is leadership?

Leadership is where particular individuals exert influence on the goal achievement of others in an organisational context.

What are leadership traits?

Leadership traits are personal characteristics of leaders such as physical characteristics, intellectual ability and personality. However, even if we know the traits commonly associated with leaders, it is difficult to determine which traits make the leader/ what results in the development of those traits.

When does learning occur?

Learning occurs when experience leads to relatively permanent change in behaviour potential.

What are the five bases of individual power? Which one do you think is most powerful overall? Provide an example to illustrate your rationale.

Legitimate, reward, coercive, referent, and expert. Student opinions will vary somewhat on which power base they consider to be the most powerful. Some students will correctly point out that the most powerful base depends on the situational context and nature of the organization. Generally, the three most common responses will be referent, expert, and legitimate each of which could be supported with valid arguments. For example, referent power can be exercised by an individual regardless of their organizational status or the situational context. Expert power accruing to managers has been most consistently associated with employee effectiveness. Referent and expert power together are most likely to generate true commitment and enthusiasm for the manager's agenda. However, legitimate power is often accompanied by reward and coercive power, and studies across various cultures cite legitimate power as the major reason for complying with the boss's wishes. Finally, in workplace "showdowns" between legitimate power (e.g. the boss) and expert power (e.g. a highly competent employee), legitimate power almost always prevails.

Discuss some of the potential problems with merit pay plans.

Low discrimination; small increases; and pay secrecy.

What are the potential problems with wage incentives?

Lowered quality, differential opportunity, reduce cooperation, incompatible job design and restriction of productivity.

Discuss some of the potential problems with wage incentive plans.

Lowered quality; differential opportunity; reduced cooperation; incompatible job design; and restriction of productivity.

What is Management by Objectives (MBO)? What advice would you give to a manager who is considering MBO for her workplace?

MBO is an elaborate, systematic ongoing program designed to facilitate goal establishment, goal accomplishment and employee development. MBO is a time- consuming process which must have the full commitment of top management. Goals must be as specific and measurable as possible, and periodic appraisal meetings should be held to diagnose the reasons for success or failure.

Your organization is considering implementing a management by objectives (MBO) program in the hopes of increasing employee motivation and productivity. However, you are concerned about this because a number of factors can cause MBO programs to fail. You have arranged to meet with management to discuss this with them. What will you tell them about the effectiveness of MBO programs and the reasons they sometimes fail?

MBO programs can result in clear productivity gains, however, a number of factors can cause them to fail. For example, it is an elaborate, difficult, and time- consuming process and its implementation requires the full commitment of top management - programs without such commitment are much less effective than those with it. Without such commitment, managers at lower levels simply go through the motions of practicing MBO. This can also lead to the haphazard specification of objectives and thus subvert the very core of MBO - goal setting. A frequent symptom of this degeneration is the complaint that MBO is "just a bunch of paperwork." Setting specific, quantifiable objectives can be a difficult process that results in an overemphasis on measurable objectives at the expense of more qualitative objectives. As well, an excessive short-term orientation can be a problem. A final reason for failure can occur if the performance review becomes an exercise in punishing employees for failing to achieve objectives.

What is management by exception?

Management by exception is the degree which the leader takes corrective action on the basis of results of leader-follower transactions. Specifically, the leader will monitor follower behaviour, anticipate problems and take corrective action before the behaviour creates serious problems.

What are managerial minds?

Managerial minds have good intuition to engage in problem identification and solving based on a long history of systematic and extensive education and experience.

What is the managerial implication of the self-determination theory?

Managers should provide autonomy support, providing them with choice and encouragement for personal initiative.

Which facets contribute the most to feelings of job satisfaction for the average Canadian worker?

Mentally challenging work, adequate compensation, career opportunities, and people.

What are the key contributors to job satisfaction?

Mentally challenging work, meaningful work, adequate compensation, career opportunities and people.

Your organization is considering implementing a merit pay plan. However, you are concerned about this because many such systems are in fact ineffective. You have arranged to meet with management to discuss this and you need to provide them with some evidence of why merit pay plans are often ineffective and what can be done to make them more effective. What will you tell them?

Merit pay plans are often ineffective because workers do not see a link between their job performance and their pay and in many cases, pay is, in fact, not related to performance. Evidence for this includes findings that show that pay increases in a given year are often uncorrelated with pay increases in adjacent years which seems unlikely if organizations are truly tying pay to performance. Furthermore, in most organizations, seniority, the number of employees, and job level account for more variation in pay than performance does. Thus, to make the program effective, you need to emphasize the importance of ensuring that performance is linked to pay and that the best performers do in fact receive the most or highest merit pay rewards.

How do you link pay to performance on white-collar jobs?

Merit-pay plans: periodically, managers are required to evaluate employee performance on some rating scale/by written description of performance.

Name and briefly define the main components of the social cognitive theory.

Modelling, self-efficacy and self-regulation.

Describe the managerial informational roles identified by Mintzberg and give an example of each.

Monitor, disseminator and spokesperson. Examples will vary, but note that the example for disseminator should relate to internal communication while that for spokesperson should be external.

Discuss the effect of mood on decision-making. What kind of decisions most likely to be affected by mood, and what does research reveal about moods and decision making?

Mood affects what and how people think when making decisions. Mood has its greatest impact on uncertain and ambiguous decisions. Research on mood and decisions making reveals the following: people in a positive mood remember positive information; people in a positive mood evaluate objects, people, and events more positively; people in a good mood overestimate the likelihood that good events will occur and underestimate the occurrence of bad events; people in a good mood adopt simplified, short-cut decision-making strategies, more likely violating the rational model; positive mood promotes more creative, intuitive decision making.

Discuss the extent to which each of the theories of motivation translates across cultures.

Most theories that revolve around human needs will come up against cultural limitations to their generality; Equity theory will depend on how rewards are allocated in a particular culture; because of its flexibility, expectancy theory is very effective when applied cross-culturally; goal setting has been found to translate in numerous countries and cultures, however, the goal setting process must be adjusted in each culture.

Is it unethical for managers to use reinforcement strategies to control the behaviour of workers? Define your answer.

Most would agree that managers control the behaviour of workers anyway, so it may be beneficial for them to learn about the effective use of reinforcement strategies. For example, a manger who learns to use positive reinforcement techniques instead of punishment may also be helping his workers achieve higher levels of job satisfaction.

Define motivation and explain how it is related to performance. Is it possible to have high motivation and low performance? Low motivation and high performance? Explain your rationale and provide examples for each situation.

Motivation is the extent to which persistent effort is directed toward a goal. Motivation contributes to performance, but so do a number of other intervening factors like personality, general cognitive ability, emotional intelligence, and task understanding and luck. As a result, it is possible to have both situations described above. For example, a worker might be highly motivated, but perform poorly due to a lack of cognitive ability. On the other hand, a worker with low motivation might appear to excel at some task because they complete it with such minimal effort that they are perceived to be highly efficient. Understanding of a task, luck, certain personality characteristics, general cognitive ability, and emotional intelligence are all factors that might explain why somebody with low motivation is a good performer.

What is motivation?

Motivation is the organisation's perspective that the person works "hard", "keeps at" his/her work and directs his/her behaviour toward appropriate outcomes. The need for increased productivity for organisations to be globally competitive and rapid changes that contemporary organisations are undergoing makes motivation even more important.

What is the main difference between the need theories and process theories of work motivation?

Need theories are concerned with what motivates workers (e.g. needs and their associated goals); process theories are concerned with how various factors motivate people.

What are need theories of work motivation?

Need theories is the attempt to specify kinds of needs people have and the conditions under which they will be motivated to satisfy those needs in a way that contributes to performance.

What is Mclelland's theory of needs:

Needs reflect the relatively stable personality characteristics that one acquires through early life experiences and exposure to selected aspects of one's society.

What is negotiation?

Negotiation is the decision-making process among interdependent parties who do not share identical preferences.

Is all conflict bad?

No, conflict can be constructive to promote good decisions and positive organisational change.

What is normative commitment?

Normative commitment is commitment based on ideology or feeling of obligation to an organisation who stay because they think they should do so. Contributed to tuition reimbursements/ special training that enhances one's skills' strong identification with an organisation's product or service / socialisation practices that emphasise loyalty.

What is observation in research?

Observation straightforward way to find out behaviour in an organisation. The researcher examines the natural activities of people in an organisation setting by listening to what they say wand watching what they do.

What is observational learning?

Observational learning refers to the proves of observing and imitating the behaviour of others.

Why study organisational behaviour?

Organisational behaviour is interesting, important and makes a difference.

What does organisational behaviour refer to?

Organisational behaviour refers to the attitudes and behaviours of individuals and groups in organisations.

What is organisational commitment?

Organisational commitment is the attitude that reflects strength of linkage between employee and organisation.

Explain why employee recruitment and retention has become an important management concern.

Organisations are facing severe shortages of labour in the coming years due to a number of factors such as the retirement of the baby boomers, fewer entering skilled trades and the willingness of knowledge workers to relocate anywhere in the world.

What is the definition of organisations?

Organisations are social inventions for accomplishing common goals through group effort.

What can organisations do to bolster self-esteem?

Organisations can provide opportunity for participation in decision-making, autonomy and interesting work and avoid creating a culture with excessive and petty work rules which signal to employees that they are incompetent and untrustworthy.

What should organizations do to ensure that employees have perceptions of fairness? What are the kinds of fairness that organizations should focus on and how are they related?

Organizations should be aware of three kinds of fairness: distributive fairness, procedural fairness, and interactional fairness. Distributive fairness has to do with the outcomes employees receive; procedural fairness has to do with the process that led to those outcomes; and interactional fairness concerns how these matters are communicated to employees. Organizations need to ensure that employees receive what they deserve from their jobs. In this regard, it is important to consider employees' inputs, outcomes, and comparison others or how equity theory operates to influence distributive fairness. Organizations should also ensure that the process used to determine work outcomes is reasonable, and that employees receive respectful and informative communication about the outcomes they receive. The three types of fairness are related in several respects. First, procedural fairness is especially likely to provoke dissatisfaction when people also see distributive fairness as being low. Second, it is possible for absolutely fair outcomes or procedures to be perceived as unfair when they are inadequately or uncaringly explained. And third, both procedural and interactional fairness can to some extent offset the negative effects of distributive unfairness.

What is participative leadership?

Participative leadership refers to involving employees in making work-related decisions. At the minimal level, obtaining employees opinions before making decisions and at the maximal level allowing employees to make decisions within agreed-upon limits.

Does money actually work as a motivator?

Pay is especially motivational to people who have strong lower level needs as it can be exchanged for food, shelter and other necessities and might also give prestige among friends and family, signal your competence and demonstrate your boss cares about you. In fact, pay may be the most important and effective motivator of performance.

Your organization is considering implementing a merit pay plan in the hopes of increasing employee's and manager's motivation and satisfaction. However, you are concerned about this because they want to maintain pay secrecy. You have arranged to meet with management to discuss this with them. What will you tell them about pay secrecy and how it might impact the effectiveness of the merit pay plan?

Pay secrecy can threaten the effectiveness of merit pay plans. The problem is that even if merit pay is administered fairly, is contingent on performance, and is generous, employees might remain ignorant of these facts because they have no way of comparing their own merit pay with that of others. As a consequence, such secrecy might severely damage the motivational potential impact of a well- designed merit plan. To make matters worse, in the absence of better information, employees are inclined to "invent" salaries for other members and this can reduce both satisfaction and motivation. Several studies have found that managers have a tendency to overestimate the pay of their employees and their peers and to underestimate the pay of their superiors. This can reduce satisfaction with pay, damage perceptions of the linkage between performance and rewards, and reduce the valence of promotion to a higher level of management.

How do emotions and mood affect decision making?

People do not like to be wrong and often become emotionally attached to a failing course of action. However, an emotionless decision making would also be poor decision making as they are unable to evaluate the impact of these decisions on themselves and others. People in a good mood tend to overestimate the likelihood good events will occur and underestimate bad events, leading to simplified, shortcut decision making strategies that most likely violate the rational model.

What is vicarious learning?

People learn the behaviour of others by observing behaviour and its consequences.

What is operant learning?

People learn to operate on the environment to achieve certain consequences. This can be used to increase the probability of desired behaviours and reduce the probability of undesirable behaviours.

According to McClelland's theory, what are the main characteristics of individuals who are high in need of achievement? What types of jobs would likely motivate them?

People who are high in need for achievement prefer situations in which they can take personal responsibility, tend to set moderately difficult goals, and have a desire for performance feedback. They should be strongly motivated by sales jobs or entrepreneurial positions.

What is the effective of people having proactive personalities?

People with proactive personalities tend to be relatively unconstrained by situational forces and act to change and influence the environment. This aids them in searching for and identifying opportunities, showing initiative, taking action and persevering until there is meaningful change.

From bottom to top, what are the levels in Salovey and Mayer's model of emotional intelligence?

Perception of emotions, integration and assimilation of emotions, knowledge and understanding of emotions, and management of emotions.

What is perfect rationality and what usually occurs instead?

Perfect rationality means that the decision maker can gather information about problems and solutions without cost, is perfectly logical and has only one criterion for decision making: economic gain. However, bounded rationality is normally the reality where decision-makers try to act rationally but are limited in their ability to acquire and process information such as by time constraints and political considerations.

If a manager wants to reinforce organisational behaviour but is unable to use formal means such as pay and promotions, describe what he/she might use instead?

Performance feedback and social recognition. Performance feedback involves providing quantitative or qualitative information on past performance for the purpose of changing or maintaining performance in specific ways. Social recognition involved informal acknowledgement, attention, praise, approval or genuine appreciation for work well done from one individual or group to another.

What is personality? Is it possible for an individual to have "no personality"? Explain.

Personality is the relatively stable set of psychological characteristics that influences the way an individual interacts with his or her environment. As a result, everyone must have a personality. The expression "no personality" is often directed towards individuals who are low on some personality dimensions such as extraversion and agreeableness.

How do you link pay to performance on production jobs?

Piece rate: individuals are paid certain sum of money for each unit of production they complete. Wage incentive plans: these are schemes to link pay to performance on production jobs.

What does it mean to have political skill and what are the four facets to political skill?

Political skills is the ability to understand others at work and to use that knowledge to influence others to act in ways that enhance one's personal or organizational objectives. The four facets to political skill are: social astuteness, interpersonal influence, apparent sincerity, and networking ability.

Discuss some of the potential problems with job enrichment.

Poor diagnosis; lack of desire or skill; demand for rewards; union resistance; and supervisory resistance.

What is positive leadership?

Positive leadership is one which focus on leader behaviours and interpersonal relationships to increase follower confidence and result in positive outcomes.

What is positive organisational behaviour?

Positive organisational behaviour is the study and application of positive oriented human resource strength and capabilities and can be measured, developed and effectively managed.

What are some of the main causes of unethical behavior in organizations?

Potential for individual gain, role conflict, too much or too little competition, organizational and industry culture, and certain personality traits such as high economic values or a need for personal power.

Hofstede identified four basic dimensions along which work-related values differ across cultures. Describe all four dimensions and indicate how Canada ranks on each.

Power distance Canada ranks relatively low, uncertainty avoidance Canada is low, masculinity/femininity Canada ranks in the middle of the countries studied by Hofstede and individualism/collectivism Canada is highly individualistic.

What were the factors studied under Hofstede's study of cultural differences in values?

Power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity/femininity, individualism/collectivism, long-term/short-term orientation, culture distance and culture tightness versus looseness.

What is power?

Power is the capacity to influence others who are in a state of dependence. The fact that the target of power is dependent on the power holder does not imply that a poor relationship exists between the two.

What is procedural fairness?

Procedural fairness is when individuals see the process used to determine outcomes as reasonable. In other words concern with how these outcomes decided and allocated.

What is psychological capital?

Psychological capital is an individual's positive psychological state of development characterised by self-efficacy, optimism, hope and resilience.

What advice would you give to a manager about the effective use of punishment in the workplace?

Punishment can be an effective means for stopping undesirable behaviour but it must be applied very carefully. When using punishment, managers should provide correct alternative responses, limit the emotions involved, ensure that the punishment. is truly aversive, punish immediately when possible, avoid the rewarding of unwanted behaviours and try not to inadvertently punish desirable behaviours.

Comment on the following statement: "Good old-fashioned brainstorming is still the best way to achieve highly creative solutions because of the large number of ideas generated."

Research on brainstorming suggests that the statement is false; individuals working alone tend to generate more ideas than when in groups.

Gordon Wong, the VP of Human Resources at Zeta Manufacturing, recently tested the job satisfaction of all Zeta's employees using the Job Descriptive Index. Based on the disappointingly low levels of job satisfaction related by most employees, he is predicting dramatic increases in absenteeism and massive employee turnover. Do you agree with his prediction? Explain your reasons.

Research suggests that his prediction is probably wrong about absenteeism, but may be right with respect to turnover. The association between job satisfaction and absenteeism is generally small; work content is actually the best predictor of job satisfaction. The association between job satisfaction and turnover is moderately strong, but stated intentions to quit are actually a better predictor of turnover.

Robert Leung is the leader of a product development project at Kapster Enterprises. He has spent nearly two years on the project, which is now nine months behind schedule and approximately 50 percent over budget. In the meantime, a competitor has introduced a similar product, which is rapidly penetrating the market; thereby reducing the remaining market potential for Kapster. Yet, Robert feels that their product will be superior to the competitor's, and he is preparing a report for his boss to request additional funds in order to complete the development phase and debug the product prototype. He is hoping that his boss will approve the request, since he has supported the project this far. If you were Robert's boss what problems associated with bounded rationality might you be concerned about?

Robert's boss should be concerned with the possibility that this project should be written-off as a sunk cost, and that any further investment in it may constitute an irrational escalation of commitment

According to Luthans, Hodgetts and Rosenkrantz, what are the four main types of managerial activities? Provide a specific example for each activity.

Routine communication (e.g. memo and paperwork), traditional management (e.g. planning, decision making and controlling), networking (e.g. meetings and social events with people both inside and outside the organisation), and human resource management (e.g.motivating, disciplining and training staff)

What are the typical managerial activities?

Routine communications (formal sending and receiving of information etc.), traditional management (planning, decision making and controlling), networking (interacting with people outside of organisation), human resource management (e.g. motivating and disciplining) and emphasis on managerial activities correlated with success (e.g. people promoted quickly).

Why should evidence-based management be employed?

Seasoned practitioners tend to neglect seeking new evidence instead relying more on past experience. This can result in flawed judgements where managers tend to resist disconfirmation and persist in affecting judges and choices whether true. This can cause casual benchmarking where other firms simply mimic top-performer's moves without understanding why and works and whether it will work when applied to their own company.

Distinguish between self-esteem and self-efficacy. Is it possible for an individual to have high self-esteem but low self-efficacy? Explain your answer.

Self-esteem is the degree to which a person has an overall positive self-evaluation; self-efficacy refers to the beliefs which people have about their ability to successfully perform a specific task. It is clearly possible for an individual to have high self-esteem and also have low self-efficacy with respect to a specific task. For example, someone who has a favourable self-image may also acknowledge that they are not very good at playing golf.

What is job crafting?

Self-initiated changes employees make in their job demands and resources to improve the fit/match between characteristics of their jobs and personal abilities and needs.

What is self-monitoring?

Self-monitoring is the extent to which people observe and regulate how they appear and behave in social settings and relationships. In terms of organisational behaviours, high self-monitors tend to perform particularly well in occupations that call for flexibility and adaptiveness dealing with diverse constituencies whereas low self-monitors have less stress in ambiguous social settings and do better going against the grain.

What is servant leadership?

Servant leadership is a form of leadership that involves going beyond one's own self-interest and having genuine concern to serve others and motivation to lead. One aspect would be empowering and developing people to provide others with a sense of personal power and encourage personal development.

Describe four influence tactics and explain how each may be related to one of the individual power bases.

Six influence tactics are actually presented in the text: assertiveness, ingratiation, rationality, exchange, upward appeal, and coalition formation. Each tactic may be used to convert power into influence depending on the circumstances · e.g. someone with coercive power might use assertiveness; someone with referent power might use ingratiation; someone with reward power might use exchange; and someone with expert power might use rationality or upward appeal.

Define several defensive behaviors commonly used by organizational members to either reduce activity or avoid blame for the consequences of an activity.

Stalling, overconforming, buck-passing, buffing, and scapegoating.

What are managerial agendas?

Starting with agenda setting to have wide-ranging informal discussions with a variety of people, to networking and finally agenda implementation where one can go anywhere int he network for help.

Describe the step-by-step socialization process of organizations with strong cultures.

Step 1Selecting employees; Step 2 Debasement and hazing; Step 3Training "in the Trenches"; Step 4Reward and promotion; Step 5Exposure to core culture; Step 6 Organizational folklore; Step 7Role models.

What are strategic contingencies?

Strategic contingencies are critical factors that affect organisational effectiveness.

Why does the justification of faulty decisions occur?

Sunk costs: the permanent losses of resources which have incurred as a result of the decision should not enter future decisions but people often "throw good resources after bad", as if they can recoup sunk costs. This leads to the escalation of commitment where more and more resources are devoted to an already failing course of action.

Describe three mechanisms which serve to diagnose, teach, and reinforce organizational culture. Give an example of each.

Symbols (e.g. pink Cadillacs are the symbols of success at Mary Kay Cosmetics); rituals (e.g. Mary Kay's revival meetings); and stories (e.g. Ray Kroc canceling a McDonald's franchise deal after finding a fly in the restaurant).

Discuss the techniques that can be used to improve decision making in organizations.

Techniques to improve decision making in organizations include training discussion leaders, stimulating and managing controversy, traditional and electronic brainstorming, the nominal group technique, and the Delphi technique.

What is behavioural consistency?

That people exhibit relatively consistent behaviours over time but there is high variability of behaviour across situations.

What is the behavioural plasticity theory?

The behavioural plasticity theory is the theory that people with low self-esteem are more pliable and more susceptible to external and social influences because they are unsure of their own views and behaviour and look to others for information and confirmation.

What is the contingency approach to management?

The contingency approach recognises that there is no one best way to manage, and that an appropriate management style depends on the demands of the situation.

Explain the relationship between the core job characteristics and the critical psychological states in the Hackman and Oldham Job Characteristics Model.

The core job characteristics affect the meaningfulness, responsibility, and knowledge of results experienced by the worker. Specifically, skill variety, task identity, and task significance all affect the experienced meaningfulness; autonomy affects the level of responsibility; and feedback gives the worker knowledge of the results.

What is the initiating structure?

The degree to which a leader concentrates on group goal attainment.

What is prosocial motivation?

The desire to expand effort to benefit other people.

What is management by objectives?

The elaborate, systematic and ongoing management programme designed to facilitate goal establishment, goal accomplishment and employee development.

What is the psychological contract breach and its consequences?

The employee perceives his/her organisation failure to fulfil one.more promises/obligations in psychological contract. This results in feelings of anger and betrayal and has negative impacts on work attitudes and behaviour and decrease innovation-related behaviours and result in lower customer satisfaction. This highlights the importance that newcomers develop accurate perceptions in the formation of a psychological contract and hence organisations need to ensure truthful and accurate information about promises and obligations are communicated to new and existing members before and after they join the organisation.

What is the equity theory?

The equity theory asserts that workers compare inputs they invest in their jobs and outcomes they receive against inputs and outcomes of some other relevant person/group.

What is consideration by leaders?

The extent to which a leader is approachable and shows personal concern and respect for employees.

Describe the factors that an organization needs to consider when choosing to implement a motivational practice.

The general approach to this issue is one of "fit" and "balance" the motivational practices implemented by an organization should fit with its strategic goals and serve to reward employees for achieving their goals. More specifically, the choice of motivational practices should consider four key factors: the characteristics and needs of employees; the nature of the job; the characteristics of the organization; and the motivational outcomes that an organization desires. The most effective motivational system will depend on these factors.

What is the glass ceiling?

The glass-ceiling is the invisible barrier that prevents women from advancing to senior leadership positions.

Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of group decision making.

The main advantages of group decision making include higher quality decisions, higher levels of decision acceptance and commitment, and diffusion of responsibility. The main disadvantages include conflict, domination by one or a few members, and groupthink.

Describe the main goals of organisational behaviour. Under what conditions can behaviour be controlled?

The main goals are to predict, explain and manage organisational behaviour. Generally, if behaviour can be predicted and explained, it can be controlled and managed.

Why do people conform to social norms?

The main motives for conformity are compliance, identification and internalization.

What advice would you give to a manager about the effective use of expectancy theory as a model to improve motivation in their workplace?

The manager should utilize strategies which boost expectancies, clarify reward contingencies and address the diverse needs of the workers.

What are the mechanisms that explain the relationship between goals and performance?

The mechanisms of goal setting are: direction, effort, persistence, and task strategies.

Why do people have unrealistic expectations when entering organisations?

The media often communicates organisational stereotypes or overzealous recruiters paint rosy pictures to attract job candidates. When these unrealistic expectations are not met, this can lead to a "reality shock" and job dissatisfaction.

Work design characteristics acknowledges the both the job and the broader work environment. They include the attributes of the task, job, and social and organizational environment and consist of three categories. Identify and describe each of the three categories and give an example of each.

The motivational characteristics category includes task characteristics (similar to those of the Job Characteristics Model) as well as knowledge characteristics that refer to the kinds of knowledge, skill, and ability demands required to perform a job. Social characteristics are the interpersonal and social aspects of work and include social support, interdependence, interaction outside of the organization, and feedback from others. Work context characteristics refer to the context within which work is performed and consist of ergonomics, physical demands, work conditions, and equipment used.

What is talent management?

The organisation's process for attracting, developing, retaining and deploying people with required skills to meet current and future business needs.

How do you define decision-making?

The process of developing a commitment to some course or action. Decision-making involved making a choice among several action alternatives, is a process that involves more than a final choice among alternatives and involves a commitment of resources such as time, money and personnel.

What is the discrepancy theory?

The satisfaction function of discrepancy between job outcomes people want and outcomes they perceive they obtain.

What is a problem that often occurs when searching for alternatives?

The search is often very limited and firms invest very little money into exploring alternatives which results in tunnel vision where some hastily chosen options are viewed much too favourably.

What is the self-determination theory?

The self determination theory is the satisfaction of three basic needs to autonomous/controlled motivation. The three basic needs are competence, relatedness and autonomy. Competence is the feeling of a sense of mastery and being effective in one's environment. Relatedness means to feel connected to others. Finally, autonomy is having choice and feeling volitional in one's behaviour.

What is the relational architecture of jobs?

The structural properties of work that shape employee opportunities to connect and interact with other people.

What is organisational behaviour modification? Give an example of a reinforcement strategy which may be applied to improve worker safety.

The systematic use of learning principles to influence organisational behaviour. The slide show, feedback chart and supervisor praise of safe performance program discussed in the text is one strategy that has been successfully used to improve safe working practices.

What is emotional contagion?

The tendency for moods and emotions spread between people throughout groups

Just before Darrow graduated from university, he was told that once he begins work he should learn how to network because it can help him in his career. While Darrow understands what it means to network, he is not sure of the actual things he must do to network or how effective it will be. He has asked you to describe how to network and the effect that it will have on his career. What are the various networking behaviors you should describe to Darrow and which ones are most effective?

The text describes five aspects of networking: maintaining contacts, socializing, engaging in professional activities, participating in community activities, and increasing internal visibility. Engaging in professional activities and increasing internal visibility are associated with career success (compensation, promotions, perceived success) but only for men.

Discuss the major themes associated with the ethical issues faced by managers and provide examples of ethical behavior.

The themes and examples include: honest communication (advertise honestly); fair treatment (pay equitably); special consideration ("fair treatment" standard can be modified for special cases); fair competition (avoid bribes and kickbacks); responsibility to organization (avoid waste and inefficiency); corporate social responsibility (do not pollute); and respect for law (follow the letter and spirit of labor laws). as international companies in foreign countries.

What are core self-evaluations?

The theory that individuals hold evaluations about themselves and their self-worth/worthiness, competence and capability.

What is the affective emotional theory?

The theory that jobs consist of a series of events/happenings that have the potential to provoke emotions and influence moods, depending on how we appraise events/happenings.

What is the leadership categorisation theory?

The theory that people are more likely to view someone as a leader and evaluate him/her as a more effective leader when he/she possesses prototypical characteristics of leadership.

What is the goal setting theory?

The theory that some method of translating organisational goals into individual goals must be implemented.

What is Frederick Taylor's idea of bureaucracy?

The use of careful research to determine the optimum degree of specialisation and standardisation. He supported the development of written instructions and even extended specialisation to supervisor's jobs.

Describe three types of incentive plans which use pay to motivate teamwork. Which one do you think is probably the most effective, overall? Explain your reasons.

There are four types of plans described in the text: Profit sharing; ESOPs; Gainsharing (including the Scanlon Plan); and skill-based pay. The second part of the question requires students to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of each incentive plan and defend their position on one. In reality, there is evidence to support the merits of each. The key point is that each one has a different motivational focus and should support the strategic needs of an organization

How do groups handle risk?

There can be two directions in which groups handle risk: 1. Risky shift: groups adopt a riskier course of action than the average initially advocated by the members. 2. Conservative shift: groups come to decisions less risky than those of the individual members before decisions.

So smart people get victimised?

There is envy and shame from the less intelligent and the highest victimisation occurs when there is high cognitive ability and agency but low communion. We should care as losing these people would be damaging for the company as a whole.

Describe the connection between job satisfaction and performance. Which is the cause and which is the effect and how do rewards fit in?

There is evidence that "satisfaction causes performance" and "performance causes satisfaction." In terms of the performance causes job satisfaction connection, performance that is linked to rewards should lead to higher levels of job satisfaction.

Describe the relationship between employee job satisfaction and customer satisfaction and explain when they are or are not related.

There is growing evidence that employee job satisfaction is related to customer or client satisfaction as well as organizational profitability. Reasons for how employee job satisfaction translates into customer satisfaction include: reduced absenteeism and turnover; organizational citizenship behavior; a good mood among employees that is contagious for customers.

Do motivational theories translate across cultures?

There might be more group oriented goals in collective cultures. The concept of intrinsic motivation may be more relevant to wealthy than developing countries.

What is specific to high LMX relationships?

There will be a high degree of influence, obligation, trust, loyalty, open communication and respect between leader and employee. This may also enable leaders to receive greater acceptance when providing leaders with challenging tasks and opportunities.

What are employee recognition programs?

These are formal organisational programs that publicly recognise and reward employees for specific behaviours to be effective by specifying how a person will be recognised, the type of behaviour being encourage, the manner of public acknowledgement and the token of event for the recipient.

Do groups actually make higher quality decisions than individuals?

They do perform better but only when the following are true: 1. Group members differ in their relevant skills and abilities as long as it is not su much that conflict occurs. 2. Some division of labour can occur. 3. Individual judgements can be combined by weighing to reflect the expertise of various members.

What is leader punishment behaviour?

This involves the use of reprimands/ unfavourable task assignments and active withholding of tasks, rewards and promotions. The use of this often results in employee dissatisfaction.

What is laissez-faire leadership?

This is a passive form of leadership that involves avoidance/absence of leadership and is negatively related to leader effectiveness.

What is someone's emotional ability?

This is an individual's ability to understand and manage one's own feelings and emotions.

What is the locus of control?

This is an individual's belief about the location of factors that control their behaviour. Those with high internal locus of control believe that the opportunity to control their own behaviour resides within themselves and that their work behaviour will influence the rewards they achieve, allowing them to achieve more job satisfaction amongst other positive factors. On the other hand, those with high external believe external factors determine behaviour (fate, luck and powerful people).

What is continuance commitment?

This is commitment based on costs that would be incurred leaving an organisation / having a lack of suitable alternatives. Contributed by building up "side bets" in pension funds, obtaining rapid promotion or being well integrated into the community firm is located in.

What is affective commitment?

This is commitment based on personal identification and involvement with an organisation and people stay because they want to. Contributed by interesting or satisfying work, role clarity and having one's expectations met after being hired.

What is House's path-goal theory?

This is concerned with the situations under which various leader behaviour are most effective. An effective leader is able to form a connection between employee and organisational goals.

What is the leader-member exchange theory?

This is the basic idea that over time and through the course of interactions, different types of relationships will develop between leaders and employees. There will be variability in the quality of leader-member exchange relationships between members of the same workgroup.

What is the interactionist perspective of behaviour?

This is the belief that behaviour is influenced by personal and situational factors and their interaction.

What is shared leadership?

This is the emergent and dynamic team phenomenon where leadership roles and influence distributed among team members.

What does performance in an organisational context refer to?

This is the extent to which an organisational member contributes to achieving objectives of an organisation.

What is general cognitive ability?

This is the person's basic information processing capabilities and organisational resources.

What is the role congruity theory?

This is the prejudice against the female leaders that result in incongruity between the perceived characteristics of women and the perceived requirements of leadership roles.

What is organisational socialisation?

This is the process where people learn attitudes, knowledge and behaviours necessary to function in a group/ organisation.

What is emotional labour?

This is the requirement for people to conform to certain emotional "display rules" in job behaviour, in spite of our true mood/emotions.

What is autonomous motivation?

This is the self-motivation/intrinsic motivation and occurs when people feel they are in control of their motivation, performing a task because they chose to do it.

What is the implicit leadership theory?

This is the theory that individuals hold a set of beliefs about the kinds of attributes, personality characteristics, skills and behaviours that contribute to or impede outstanding leadership. For instance, the culturally endorsed implicit leadership theory indicates that belief systems are shared among individuals in common cultures.

What is the uncertainty reduction theory?

This is the theory where newcomers are motivated to reduce their uncertainty so that the work environment will become more predictable and understandable. This can be done by going through the socialisation process where there is a provision of information, resources and interaction by organisational members to reduce newcomers' uncertainty and facilitate adjustment and socialisation.

What is risky business?

This is when people view a problem as a choice between losses and hence tend to make risky decisions such as rolling the dice in face of sure loss.

What is the anchoring effect?

This is where decision makers do not adjust their estimates enough from their initial estimates that serve as an, often irrelevant, anchor.

What is telecommunicating?

This is where employees are able to work remotely and stay in touch through the use of information and communication technology.

What is effect dependence?

This is where individuals are dependent on the effects of their behaviour as determined by rewards and punishment provided by others. At the formal level, promotional, raises and assignments of more or less favourable tasks. At the informal level, praise, friendship and a lending hand.

What is the social exchange theory?

This is where individuals that are treated favourably by others will feel a sense of obligation to reciprocate by responding positively and returning that favourable treatment in some manner.

What is the trait theory of leadership?

This is where leadership depends on the personal qualities/traits of the leader.

What is work sharing?

This is where reducing the number of hours employees work to avoid layoffs when there is a reduction in normal business activity.

What is a the strong culture concept?

This is where the beliefs, values and assumptions that make up a culture are intense and pervasive across organisations. These are strongly supported by majority of organisational member, even cutting across subcultures that might exist.

What is maximisation?

This is where the decision maker choose the alternative which gives the greatest expected value.

What is satisficing?

This is where the decision maker establishes an adequate level of acceptability for a solution and screens solutions until one that exceeds this level is found.

What is compressed workweek?

This is where the hours tat workers work is compressed into fewer days?

What is leader reward behaviour?

This is where the leader provides employees with compliments, tangible benefits and deserved special treatment.

What is effective leadership?

This is where the leader takes advantage of motivating and satisfying aspects of jobs while offsetting/ compensating job aspects that demotivate/dissatisfy.

What is job-sharing?

This is where two part-time employees divide the work of a full-time job.

What does work centrality mean?

This means having more central interest in work and these people are more likely to continue working even if they win the lottery.

What does informational dependence mean?

This means that we give others the opportunity to influence our thoughts, feelings and actions via signals they send us.

What is the social informational processing theory?

This refers to how organisational members use information from others to interpret events and develop expectations about appropriate and acceptable attitudes and behaviours.

What is empowering leadership?

This refers to implementing conditions that enable power to be shared with employees. Empowering leaders tend to highlight the significance of employee's work, provide participation and autonomy in decision making , express confidence in employees' decision making and remove bureaucratic constraints/hindrances to performance.

What is ethical leadership?

This refers to the demonstration of normatively appropriate conduct through personal actions, interpersonal relationships and promotions of such conduct to followers through two-way communication, reinforcement and decision-making.

Describe the managerial interpersonal roles?

This refers to the expectations of managers to establish and maintain interpersonal relations. Their figurehead (serving as symbols for the organisation), leadership (selecting, mentoring, rewarding and discipling employees) and liason (maintaining horizontal contacts inside and outside organisation) roles.

What is organisational identification?

This refers to the individual's learning and acceptance of organisation's culture.

What is strategic leadership?

This refers to the leader's ability to anticipate, envision, maintain flexibility, think strategically and work with others to initiate changes that will create viable futures for organisations. This can provide organisations with sustainable competitive advantage and help them compete in turbulent and unpredictable environments.

What is the social influence process and conformity?

This refers to the tendency for group members to conform to social norms as established by a group. - compliance: the simplest, most direct motive for conformity to group norms where the member wishes to acquire rewards from the group and avoid punishment. - identificationL the motive for conformity shifts to imitation where established members serve as models for behaviour of others. - internalisation: individuals truly and wholly accept beliefs, values and attitudes that underlie norm.

What is Fiedler's Contingency Theory?

This shows that the association between leadership orientation and group effectiveness is contingent on the extent to which the situation is favourable for exertion of influence. For instance, the most favourable situation is where there is good relationship between the leader and group members, the leader is granted formal authority and the task is highly structured.

What does the situational theory of leadership refer to?

This theory explains how the effectiveness of a leadership style is contingent on setting like the characteristics of employees, nature of tasks they are performing and characteristics of the organisation.

What is transactional leadership?

Transactional leadership is leadership based on straightforward exchanges where the leader sets goals and provides directions and support.

What is transformational leadership?

Transformational leadership is where leaders change the beliefs and attitudes of followers to correspond to new vision and motivate them to achieve performance beyond expectations.

Explain the difference between values, beliefs and attitudes. How are they linked to behaviour? Give a hypothetical example of how a value, belief and attitude may lead an individual to quit their job.

Values are broad preferences towards certain outcomes over others. Beliefs are conclusions drawn about ideas which may or may not be accurate. Attitudes are evaluations directed toward specific preferences or targets. In our model of attitude formation, beliefs and values combine to form an attitude which influences behavior. For example, "having a good job is important" (a value) and "my job is not very good" (a belief) could create the attitude "I hate my job" and ultimately lead a worker to quit.

Describe Max Weber's ideal bureaucracy. Why does the term "bureaucracy" have a negative connotation today?

Weber's bureaucracy included a strict chain of command; objective criteria for selection and promotion, a detailed set of rules and regulations, highly specialised jobs and central power. Today, the term has become synonymous with too many rules and regulations, resulting in inflexible behavior.

How are well-structured problems resolved?

Well-structured problems tend to be solved via programs which are standardised ways of solving a problem to short-circuit the decision-making process to enable the decision maker to go directly from problem identification to solution.

How can controversy be maintained in a group and why should it be done?

While full blown conflict can result in personal or group goals taking precedence over developing a decision, a complete lack of controversy can be equally damaging. Hence, a devil's advocated can be appointed to challenge the weaknesses of a plan or strategy and state why it should not be adopted.The devil's advocate must be equipped to present views in an objective and unemotional manner.

What is work engagement?

Work engagement is the positive work-related state of mind characterised by vigour, dedication and absorption. Having engaged employees has a significant impact on productivity, customer satisfaction, productivity and innovation.

What are flexible work arrangements?

Work options that permit flexibility with regard to"when" or "when" work is completed.

What are the critical psychological states?

Work will be perceived to be intrinsically motivated when perceived as meaningful/ the individual feels responsible for the outcomes of the work/ the worker has knowledge about his or her work process. For instance, the individual would perceive the work as meaningful when they have the variety of skills to do the whole job which is perceived as significant to others. When the person has the autonomy to organise and perform the job as they see fit, the person will feel personally responsible for the outcome of the work. Receiving feedback on their job performance will give the worker knowledge of the results and the opportunity to exercise opportunity.

What are the outcomes of having both core job characteristics and the critical psychological states?

Worker would be able to draw motivation from the job itself resulting in high-quality productivity and be able to report higher satisfaction with higher order needs and the job itself resulting resulting in lower absenteeism and turnover.

Is it possible for a manager to have too much information when faced with an ill-structured problem? Explain.

Yes, and it is called information overload the reception of more information than is necessary to make effective decisions. Information overload can lead to errors, omissions, delays and cutting corners.

What determines job satisfaction?

discrepancy, fairness, disposition, mood and emotion

What is organisational culture?

organisational culture is the shared beliefs, values and assumptions that exist in an organisation. There can be even subcultures in an organisation which reflect departmental differences/ differences in occupation/training.