Midterm Exam 2 Flashcards
Group properties
- Roles: set of expected behavior patterns attributed to someone occupying a given position in a social unit.
- Norms
- Status: socially defined position given to groups or memebers by others.
- Size: number of people in a group
- Cohesiveness: degree to which members are attracted to each other and motivated to stay in the group.
- Diversity: degree to which members are similar/different to one another
Norms
Acceptable standards of behavior that are shared by the group’s members concerning what kind of behavior is right or wrong.
Social loafing
- The tendency for individuals to expend less effort when working collectively than alone.
- More prevalent in individualistic cultures than collectivistic cultures.
- Causes:
- -Matching others who seem lazy
- -Dispersion of responsibily
Groupthink
Situation in which group pressures for conformity deter the group from critically appraising unusual, minority, or unpopular views.
More likely with:
-Cohesive, Homogenous groups;
-groups that want to protect their positive image;
-time pressure;
-highly consequential decision
Leadership
- The ability to influence a group towards the achievement of a vision or set of goals.
- The ability to lead or guide individuals to accomplish common tasks/goals.
Trait approach:
What attributes make someone a good leader?
- Some of Big 5 traits and emotional intelligence are important for leadership.
- Physical characteristics also matter: Height, face, gender, race, etc
- Traits predict emergence better than effectiveness.
- Contra: Can’t train someone to be leader if we assume they need certain traits
Behavioral approach:
What behaviors make a good leader?
Two categories of behavior:
1. Task-oriented: focuses on getting things done. Production oriented (step by step solutions) and Autocratic (all decision-making made by leader)
- People-oriented: focuses on building and maintaining relationships.
- > The behaviors can predict leader effectiveness and can be learned
Contingency theories:
What type of leader is best for a given situation?
- Traits and behaviors are not equally effective in all situations.
- Ex: authoritarian leadership is good for crisis, but fails with winning “hearts and minds”.
- The match between the leadership style and work context is important.
Transformational leadership
- Those leaders inspire followers to transcend their self interests for the good of the organization.
- Better than just transactional leadership:
- -Management by exception
- -Contingent reward
Charismatic Leadership
- Involves attribution of heroic or extraordinary leadership abilities when followers observe certain behaviors.
- -Vision and articulation
- -Personal risk
- -Sensitivity to follower needs
- -Unconventional behavior
Power
- The extend to which an individual can control other’s outcomes by granting or withholding ressources.
- Low-power party is dependent on the high power party to obtain rewards or avoid punishments.
Definition of Conflict
A process that begins when one party perceives that another party has negatively affected (or is about to) something that the first party cares about.
View of Conflict
- Traditional view: conflicts are harmful and must be avoided.
- Human relation view: Conflict is a natural and inevitable outcome in any group
- Interactional view:
- -Functional conflict supports goals and improve performance in groups.
- -Dysfunctional/ destructive conflict hinders group performance.
Conflict resolution strategies
- Forcing: Imposing one’s will
- Problem solving: trying to reach an agreement that satisfies both parties
- Avoiding: avoid a conflict
- Yielding: accepting and integrating the will of other party
- Compromising: each party is willing to give up something.
Conflict resolution strategies: Assertiveness (agressiveness) vs Cooperativeness
- Forcing: High Assertiveness, low cooperativeness
- Avoiding: Low A, High C.
- Compromising: midpoint
- Problem solving: High A, Low C.
- Yielding: Low A, High C.
What is negotiation?
- A process that occurs when two or more parties decide how to allocate scarce resources.
- Discussion between two or more parties intended to reach a beneficial agreement over one or more issues where a conflict exists.
Bargaining strategies
- Distributive bargaining
- Negotiating over who gets what share of a fiex pie
- Target point: What the party would like to achieve.
- Resistance/Reservation point: lowest acceptable outcome - Integrative bargaining
- Negotiation that seeks one or more settlements creating a win win solution.
Negotiation term
- Target point or target price: your ideal price
- Resistance point or reservation price (RP): your bottom line or minimum acceptable agreement.
- Bargaining zone: zone of possible agreement (ZOPA)
- Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement (BATNA)
Bargaining Zone
- Bargaining Zone/ Settlement range is the space between two RPs=ZOPA
- Aspiration range: space outside of bargaining zone for each party.
Organizational Structure:
6 Dimensions
- Work specialization: degree to which activities in the org are divided into separate jobs.
- Departmentalization: basis by which jobs are grouped together and coordinate common tasks
- Centralization/ Decentralization: degree to which decision making is concentrated at a single point in the org.
- Chain of command: Unbroken line of authority. Who reports to whom.
- Span of control: number of subordinates that a manager directs.
- Formalization: degree to which jobs are standardized and there are rules and regulations
Bureaucracy
Characteristics of organizational design
A typical organizational design devoted to efficiency:
- High work specialization
- Functional departmentalization
- Clear chain of command
- Narrow span of control
- High centralization
- High formalization
Bureaucracy
It is a way of administratively organizing large numbers of people who need to work together in its ideal form.
-Bureaucracy is impersonal and rational and based on rules rather than ties of kinship, friendship, or patrimonial or charismatic authority.
what is organizational Cultural
A system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations.
Culture is a set of shared values that define what is important and norms that define appropriate attitudes and behaviors for organizational members
Types of cultures
- Strong culture: core values are crystallized and are both intensely held and widely shared throughout the organization.
- Weak culture: Fuzzy norms and values that are not widely held and shared.
- Dominant culture: expresses the core values a majority of members share.
- Subcultures: develop in large organization to reflect common problems or experiences of subgroups of members.
Creating sustainable culture
Philosophy of organization’s founders
- > Selection criteria
- > Top management & Socialization
- > Organization culture
Other factors that sustain culture
- Structures eg. flat hierarchy
- Systems/procedures
- Physical space eg. offices
- Ritual
- Stories
- Language
- Symbols eg. an animal
Why do organizations need to change?
Internal forces:
- Growth of company
- Personnel change (eg. demographic change like inmigration)
External forces:
- Technology
- Economy shocks (recession, crisis)
- Competition
- Social trends (more green)
- World politics (conflict with Japan)
Resistance to change
Our egos are fragile and we often see change as threating:
- Organizational sources
- Individual sources:
- -Habit
- -Security
- -Economy factors
- -Fear of the uncertainty
- -Selective info processing
Resistance to change:
Organizational Sources
- Structural inertia: focus more on stability, control, set methodologies or routine.
- Limited focus of change: ignoring all the interconnected factors which require change.
- Group inertia: groups can resist change because they follow set behavioral patterns, norms or culture.
- Threat to expertise
- Threat to established power relationship and resource allocations
Managing resistance to Change: Step 1
Step 1: Diagnose the situation
- How much and what kind of resistance you expect?
- What is your position towards resisters in terms of power and level of trust?
- Who has the info about what changes are needed?
- How urgent is the situation?
Managing resistance to Change: Step 2
Step 2: Decide on the speed of change (fast/ slow?)
- Slow change is preferred when:
- -Resistance will be intense and extensive.
- -You need info and commitment from others to design and implement change
- -You have less organizational power than potential resisters.
Managing resistance to Change: Step 3
Step 3: Select specific tactics
- Education and communication
- Participation: let them participate in the decicion process
- Build support and commitment: Counseling, trainings to reduce anxiety
- Develop positive relationships: people accept change when they trust managers
- Implement changes fairly
- Coercion: force upon the resisters (eg. negative evaluation)
- Select people who accept change
