Chapter 1 Flashcards
1
Q
Define Organisational Behaviour (OB)
A
- Organizational behaviour is the study of what people think, feel and do in and around organisations.
2
Q
Define and describe organisations
(3)
A
- Organisations are groups of people who work interdependently toward some purpose.
- They consist of human beings (possibly employees) who interact with each other in an organised way.
- Organisation members have a collected sense of purpose.
3
Q
List the 4 Contemporary Developments facing Organisations
A
- Technological change
- Globalisation
- Emerging employment relationships
- Increasing workforce diversity
4
Q
Describe how technological change affects organisations
(2)
A
- Technological changes may boost productivity but also render obsolete entire occupational groups.
- Technological changes may change workplace relationships and association and coordination processes. (Email, social media, IT)
5
Q
Define and describe how globalisation affects organisations
(3)
A
- Globalisation referst to economic, social, and cultural connectivity with pole in other parts of the world.
- Benefits: larger markets, lower costs, greater access to knowledge and innovation.
- Costs: May be responsible for increasing work intensification, reduced job security and poor work-life balance in developed counties.
6
Q
Define emerging employment relationships
A
- Changes in how, how long and where people work.
7
Q
[Emerging employment relationships]
Define work-life balance
A
- Work-life balance occurs when people are able to minimise confllict between their work and nonwork demands.
8
Q
[Emerging employment relationships]
Define and describe telecommuting
(4)
A
- An exmple of remote work.
- Telecommuting is when employees work from home one or more workdays per month using IT, rather than commute to the office.
- Benefits:
- Less travel time = higher productivity
- Autonomy = better work-life balance
- Favours employees with higher self-motivation, self-organisation and IT skills
- Costs:
- More social isolation, weaker relationships with coworkers, weaker organisational culture
- Less word of mouth = poorer chances of promotion
*
9
Q
[Increasing workforce diversity]
Define and describe surface-level and deep level diversity
(4)
A
- Surface-level diversity refers to observable demographic and other over differences among mombers of a group, such as race, ethniciity, gender, and physical capabilities.
- Deep-level diversity includes differences in personalities, beliefs, values and attitudes.
- Revealed when employees have different perceptions and attitudes about the same situation.
- May be associated with surface-level attributes.
- Benefits:
- Teams with members of different knowledge and skills (informational diversity) are more creatie and make better decisions in complex situations.
- More representative of most communites so companies can better recognise and address community needs.
- Costs:
- Take longer to perform effectively together due to communication issues and “faultlines” in informal group dynamics.
- Risk of dysfunctional conflict which reduces information sharing and satisfaction with coworkers.
10
Q
List, define and describe the 4 anchors of Organisational Behaviour knowledge
A
- Systematic research anchor:
- Study organisations using systematic research methods involving forming resarch questions, systamatic collection of data and hypothesis testing.
- Basis for evidence-based management -making decsions based on research evidence.
- Multidisciplinary anchor:
* Import knowledge from other disciplines, not just create its own knowledge - Contingency anchor:
- Recognise that the effectiveness of an action depends on the situation.
- Report effect of one variable on another within the specific context
- Multiple levels of analysis anchor:
- OB takes three levels of anaysis: individual, team, organisation
- We should analyse OB topics from all these levels
11
Q
A
