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Human Behavior in Organization (HBO)
MODULE No. 1
Understanding Organizational Behavior
Organizations are social systems. If one wishes
to work in them or to manage them, it is
necessary to understand how they operate.
Organizations combine science and people –
technology and humanity.
Technology is difficult enough by itself, but when
you add people you get an immensely complex
system that almost defies understanding.
However, society must understand organizations
and use them well because they are necessary
to achieve the benefits of civilization. Modern
society depends on organizations for its survival.
Human behavior in organizations is rather
unpredictable as we now see it. It is
unpredictable because it arises from people’s
deep-seated needs and value systems.
However, it can be partially understood in terms
of the frameworks of behavioral science,
management, and other disciplines.
There are no simple cookbook formula for
working with people. There is no perfect
solution to organizational problems. All that can
be done is to increase our understanding and
skills so that human relationships at work can be
upgraded. The goals are challenging and
worthwhile.
Definition
Organizational behavior is the study and
application of knowledge about how people act
within organizations. It applies broadly to the
behavior of people in all types of organizations,
such as business, government, schools, and
service organizations. Wherever organizations
are, there is a need to understand organizational
behavior.
The key elements in organizational behavior
are people, structure, technology and the
environment in which the organization operates.
When people join together in an organization to
accomplish an objective, some kind of structure
is required. People also use technology to help
get the job done, so there is an interaction of
people, structure and technology.
People make up the internal social system of
the organization. They consist of individuals and
groups. Groups are dynamic. They form,
change and disband. People are the living,
thinking, feeling beings who created the
organization to achieve their objectives.
Organizations exist to serve people, rather than
people exist to serve organizations.
Structure defines the official relationships of
people in organizations. There are managers
and employees, accountants and assemblers.
These people have to be related in some
structural way so that their work can be
effective. These relationships create complex
problems of cooperation, negotiation and
decision making.
Technology provides the resources with which
people work and affects the tasks that they
perform. They cannot accomplish much with
their bare hands, so they build buildings, design
machines, create work processes, and
assemble resources. The great benefit of
technology is that it allows people to do more
and better work, but it also restricts people in
various ways. It has costs as well as benefits.
Environment. All organizations operate within
an external environment. A single organization
does not exist alone. It is a part of a larger
system that contains many other elements, such
as government, the family and other
organizations. All of these mutually influence
each other in a complex system that becomes
the lifestyle of a group of people.
Historical Development of Organizational
Behavior
Robert Owen, a young Welsh factory owner,
about the year 1800, was one of the first to
emphasize human needs of employees. He
refused to employ young children. He taught his
workers cleanliness and temperance and
improved their working conditions. He was
called the “the real father” of personnel
administration by an early writer.
Andrew Ure incorporated human factors into his
The Philisophy of Manufactures, published in
1835. He recognized the mechanical and
commercial parts of manufacturing, but he also
added a third factor, which was the human
factor. He provided workers with hot tea,
medical treatment, “a fan apparatus” for
ventilation, and sickness payments.
Interest in people at work was awakened by
Frederick W. Taylor in the United States in the
early 1900s. He is often called “the father of
scientific management,” and the changes he
brought to management paved the way for later
development of organizational behavior.
His work eventually led to improved recognition
and productivity for industrial workers. He
pointed out that just as there was a best
machine for a job, so were there best ways for
people to do their jobs.
In the 1920s and 1930s Elton Mayo and F. J.
Roethlisberger at Harvard University gave
academic stature to the study of human
behavior at work. They applied keen insight,
straight thinking, and sociological backgrounds
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to industrial experiments at the Western Electric
Company, Hawthorne Plant.
The result was the concept that an organization
is a social system and the worker is indeed the
most important element in it. Their experiments
showed that the worker is not a simple tool but a
complex personality interacting in a group
situation that often is difficult to understand.
Fundamental Concepts
Every field of social science has a philosophical
foundation of basic concepts that guide its
development.
In accounting, for example, a fundamental
concept is that “for every debit there will be a
credit.” In physics, a basic philosophy is that
elements of nature are uniform.
Organizational behavior deals with a set of
fundamental concepts revolving around the
nature of people and organization.
The Nature of People
There are four (4) basic assumptions ;
Individual differences. The idea of individual
differences comes originally from psychology.
Form the day of birth, each person is unique,
and individual differences after birth tend to
make people even more different.
Individual differences mean that management
can get the greatest motivation among
employees by treating them differently.
A whole person. When management practices
organizational behavior, it is trying to develop a
better employee, but also it wants to develop a
better person in terms of growth and fulfillment.
Research suggests that jobs do shape people
somewhat as they perform them, so
management needs to be concerned about its
effect on the whole person.
Motivated behavior. From psychology we
learn that normal behavior has certain causes.
These may relate to a person’s needs and/or the
consequences that result from acts. In the case
of needs, people are motivated not by what we
think they ought to have but by what they
themselves want.
This fact leaves management with two basic
ways to motivate people. (1) It can show them
how certain actions will increase their need
fulfillment, (2) or it can threaten decreased need
fulfillment if they follow an undesirable course of
action.
Motivation is essential to the operation of
organization. No matter how much machinery
and equipment an organization has, these
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things cannot be put to use until they are
released and guided by people who have been
motivated.
Value of the person (human dignity). This
concept is of a different order from the other
three because it is more an ethical philosophy
than a scientific conclusion. It recognizes that
because people are of a higher order, they want
to be treated with respect and dignity – and
should be treated this way. Every job, however,
simple, entitles the people who do it to proper
respect and recognition of their unique
aspirations and abilities.
The Nature of Organization
Social Systems. From sociology we learn that
organizations are social systems; consequently,
activities therein are governed by social laws as
well as psychological laws. Just as people have
psychological needs, they also have social roles
and status. Their behavior is influenced by their
group as well as by their individual drives. In
fact, two types of social systems exist side by
side in organizations. One is the formal (official)
social system, and the other is the informal
social system.
Mutual Interest. Mutual interest is represented
by the statement “Organizations need people,
and people also need organizations.”
Organizations have a human purpose. They are
formed and maintained on the basis of some
mutuality of interest among their participants.
People see organizations as a means to help
them reach their goals, while organizations need
people to help reach organizational objectives.
If mutuality is lacking, it makes no sense to try to
assemble a group and develop cooperation.
Holistic Organizational Behavior
When the six fundamental concepts of
organizational behavior are considered together,
they provide a holistic concept of the subject,
Holistic organizational behavior interprets
people-organization relationship in terms of the
whole person, whole group, whole organization,
and whole social system. Issues are analyzed
in terms of the total situation affecting them
rather than in terms of an isolated event or
problem.
Basic Approaches
An Interdisciplinary Approach- an integration
of many disciplines
Organizational behavior is interdisciplinary. It
integrates social sciences and other disciplines
that can contribute to the subject. It applies from
these disciplines any ideas that will improve the
relationships between people and organizations.
Its interdisciplinary nature is similar to that of
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medicine, which applies physical, biological and
social sciences into a workable medical practice.
A Human Resources (supportive) Approach
– support of employee growth and development
for effectiveness
The human resources approach is
developmental. It is concerned with the growth
and development of people toward higher levels
of competency, creativity and fulfillment,
because people are the central resource in any
organization and society.
The human resources approach is supportive. It
helps employees become better, more
responsible persons, and then it tries to create a
climate in which they may contribute to the limits
of their improved abilities.
A Contingency Approach – allowance for
different behaviors required by different
environments for effectiveness
No longer is there a one best way. Each
situation must be analyzed carefully to
determine the significant variables that exist in
order to establish the kinds of practices that will
be more effective. The strength of the
contingency approach is that it encourages
analysis of each situation prior to action while at
the same time discouraging habitual practice
based on universal assumptions about people.
The contingency approach also is more
interdisciplinary, more system-oriented, and
more research-oriented than the traditional
approach. Thus it helps to use in the most
appropriate manner all the current knowledge
about organizations. It also is called the
situational approach, because appropriate action
depends on situational variables.
A Productivity Approach – a ratio that
compares units of output with units of input
Productivity often is measured in terms of
economic inputs and outputs, but human and
social inputs and outputs are important. For
example, if better organizational behavior can
improve job satisfaction, a human output or
benefit occurs. In the same manner, when
employee development programs leads to a by-
product of better citizens in a community, a
valuable social output occurs.
A Systems Approach – interaction of all parts
of an organization in a complex relationship
Conceptually a system implies that there are
multitude of variables in organizations and that
each of them affects all the others in a complex
relationship. An event that appears to affect one
individual or one department actually may have
significant influences elsewhere in the
organization. Thjs means that managers in
taking actions must look beyond the immediate
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situation in order to determine effects on the
larger system.
Reading :
John Perkins, age about fifty, worked as
assistant manager of a branch bank in a large
banking system. He had been an assistant
manager for eleven years. His work was so
mediocre that no branch manager wanted him.
Usually his current manager would arrange to
move him out of the way by transferring him to a
new branch that was opening; so John worked
in eight branches in eleven years. When he
became assistant manager at his ninth branch,
his manager soon learned of his record.
Although tempted to transfer John, the manager
decided to try to motivate him. The manager
learned that John has no economic needs
because he had a comfortable inheritance and
owned several apartment houses. His wife
managed the apartments. His two children were
college graduates and had good incomes. John
was contented.
The manager made little headway with John and
twice considered discharging him. Occasionally
John developed a drive for a few weeks, but
then he lapsed into his old ways again.
After a careful analysis of John’s situation, the
manager concluded that although John’s need
for tangible goods were satisfied, he might
respond to more recognition; so the manager
started working in that direction. For example,
on the branch’s first birthday the manager held a
party for all employees before the bank opened.
He had a caterer prepare a large cake and write
on top an important financial ratio that was
under John’s jurisdiction and was favorable at
the moment. John was emotionally inspired by
the recognition and the “kidding” that his
associates gave him about the ratio.
His behavior substantially changed thereafter,
and with further recognition he improved to
become a successful manager of another
branch within two years. In this instance John’s
performance was improved because his
manager carefully analyzed the situation and
used behavioral skills, such as recognition, to
achieve a result beneficial to both parties. That
is the essence of organizational behavior.
Assignment :
1. Comment on the statement
“Organizations need people, and people
also need organizations.”
2. Select one of your friends and discuss
the qualities that make that person
individually different from you.