Chapter 1 Organizational Behavior

Question 1

What is organizational behavior?

More simply, OB focuses on the ____ individuals and groups in organizations act the way they do.

Answer 1

a field of study devoted to understanding, explaining, and ultimately improving the attitudes and behaviors of individuals and groups in organizations.

Question 2

What are the main components of the integrative model of OB?

Answer 2

1. Individual outcomes (job perf. org. committment)
   
   1. Individual Mechanisms
      
      1. Organizational Mechanisms (job sat. stress, motivation)
      2. Group Mechanisms
      3. Individual Characteristics

Question 3

What are the 2 primary outcomes of OB?

Answer 3

Job performance

Organizational commitment

Question 4

Most employees have two primary goals for their working lives: to _____ their jobs well and to ____ a member of an organization that they respect.

Likewise, most managers have two primary goals for their employees: to ____ their job performance and to ensure that they ____ with the firm for a significant length of time.

Answer 4

perform

remain

________________________

maximize

stay

Question 5

What factors affect the two primary OB outcomes of job perf. and org. committment?

Answer 5

1. Individual mechanisms (job satisfaction; stress; motivation; trust, justice, and ethics; learning and decision making)
   
   • organizational mechanisms (organizational structure; organizational culture).
   • Group mechanisms (team characteristics and diversity; team processes and communication; leader power and negotiation; leader styles and behaviors)
   • Individual characteristics (personality and cultural values; ability)

Question 6

Why might firms that are good at OB tend to be more profitable?

Answer 6

Because they have good people that are a valuable resource; they are:

• rare
• hard to imitate
• create a history that cannot be bought or copied
• make numerous small decisions that cannot be observed by competitors
• create socially complex resources such as culture, teamwork, trust, and reputation.

Question 7

How are correlations interpreted?

Answer 7

Shows the relationships between two variables.

f=1.00 is really good

In OB research, a .50 correlation is considered “strong,” a .30 correlation is considered “moderate,” and a .10 correlation is considered “weak.”