Individuals in Organizations Flashcards
What is the difference between an employee and a contractor?
Will determine entitlements and the legal responsibility to pay taxes.
What are the three criteria in determining employment status?
- Behavioral – does the company have the right to control what the worker does and how they do their job?
- Financial – Is business aspects and compensation controlled by the company? How worker is paid, expenses are reimbursed, who provides tools/supplies etc.
- Relationship – are there written contracts or employee type benefits?
Name and describe the six terms for types of employees.
Regular Employees - positions expected to continue year to year;
Temporary employees - employed for a specific period of time or for a project/season;
Full time employees – work 35-40+ hours/week on a regular basis and qualify for employee benefits;
Part time employees – work less than 35-40 hours/week on a regular basis and may not qualify for employee benefits;
Salaried employees – are not entitled to overtime compensation;
Hourly employees – entitled to overtime compensation for hours worked outside of regular schedule.
Describe and explain the nine personality dimensions.
Perfectionist – knows what they want and how to get it done;
Helper – main concern is to please others;
Producer – may be seen as ‘yes men’ and get the job done;
Connoisseur – brings creativity and positivity;
Sage – quiet and prefer to observe and listen;
Troubleshooter – often worries about what could go wrong and prepare for any possibility;
Visionary – optimists who spark innovative ideas;
Top Dog – known as the informal boss, leader or challenger;
Mediator – dealmakers and compromisers who are uncomfortable with confrontation.
What are the four generational influences found in the current workplace?
Silent generation, baby boomers, generation x and millennial.
What are the major influences on and best ways to motivate the Silent generation?
- Show how much you value their expertise and their contributions.
Characteristics: service excellence, due process, fair and open, civic minded, loyalty, conservative.
What are the major influences on and best ways to motivate Baby Boomers?
- Providing new opportunities to try new assignments built on their core skills by mixing old responsibilities with new.
Characteristics: Relationships count, experiment, play your dues, driver to excel, optimistic, take it personal.
What are the major influences on and best ways to motivate Gen X?
- Providing flexible hours. Many in this generation have growing families.
Characteristics: make it happen, committed, comfortable with diversity, feedback hungry, self-sufficient, entrepreneurial, flexible.
What are the major influences on and best ways to motivate Millennials?
- Ensuring they have challenging work that is meaningful. They will need to be oriented to the organization’s culture. Information on business protocol and unwritten rules are helpful.
Characteristics: high tech literacy, multi-tasking, civic minded, power of the pack, less gender and ethnicity issues, educated, manners.
Explain Szilagyi’s basic model of motivation.
Incorporates needs, directions and rewards.
Motivation results from wanting to satisfy an individual need.
Identify the six steps in Szilagyi’s model.
- The need to create tension within the individual that they will seek to reduce.
- Individual will search for behaviors and strategies to satisfy the need.
- Individual performs the behaviors.
- The performance is evaluated.
- Reward or punishment is given based on the performance.
- Individual evaluates if the need was satisfied.
What is the basis for the scientific management model of motivation?
Workers are motivated to produce through wage incentives.
How does the Human Relations Model differ from the scientific one?
They discovered that employees were not motivated solely by money but by a variety of different needs.
Describe the three broad areas of present-day motivation theory.
- Content theories focus on factors that energize motivated behavior.
- Process theories focus on how to motivate.
- Reinforcement theories focus on the ways behavior is learned.
Describe Maslow’s Theory of needs.
Classifies human motivation into a hierarchy of 5 needs.
Identify the different levels of needs in Maslow’s theory.
- Self-actualization
- Esteem needs
- Belongingness
- safety and security
- physiological needs.
Describe Herzberg’s theory and how needs could be separated.
Conducted a study of job attitudes. Separated responses by motivators (job satisfaction) and hygiene factors (job dissatisfaction). AKA the two factory theory.
What are the Herzberg’s two categories? What is contained in each?
- Dissatisfiers include salary, working conditions and company policy. Positive ratings in these factors didn’t lead to satisfactions, only absence of dissatisfaction.
- Satisfiers include achievement, recognition, responsibility and advancement.
What factors do these content theories fail to consider?
- Needs vary between individuals and change over time.
- The way needs translate into behavior is widely different
- People from different countries and cultures rank their needs differently.
What models fall into the process theory group?
- Expectancy theory
- equity theory
- goal setting theory.
What is Expectancy Theory?
Accounts for the differences between individuals and their behaviors.
Based on 4 assumptions:
1. Behavior is determined by a combination of factors in the individual
2. Individuals make conscious decisions about their behavior.
3. Individuals have different needs, desires and goals.
4. Individuals decide on their behavior based on their expected outcome of the situation.
What is equity Theory?
Based on an individual’s evaluation of the equity of the reward and how it plays a large part in their motivation, performance and satisfaction. Usually focuses on monetary compensation.
Describe goal Setting Theory.
- States that workers strive toward goals and focus on the goal setting process.
- Goals should be specific and challenging but reachable.
- Accurate feedback should be given to create satisfaction.
What are the problems with process theories and how can they be overcome?
They are only effective after a manager has gotten to know their employees. Can be overcome if managers set clear performance standards, give good feedback and reward satisfactorily.