OBHR - Chapters 7, 9 To 13 Merged

Organizational Behaviour:
Understanding and Managing Life at Work

Eleventh Edition
Chapter 7
Groups and Teamwork
Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-1

What Is a Group?
• A group consists of two or more people interacting
interdependently to achieve a common goal.
• Interaction is the most basic aspect of a group.
• Interdependence means that group members rely
to some degree on each other to accomplish
goals.
• Formal Work Groups
• Informal Groups

Stages of Group Development

Group Structure and Its Consequences
• Group structure refers to the characteristics of the
stable social organization of a group - the way a
group is “put together.”
• The most basic structural characteristics along
which groups vary are size and member diversity.
• Other structural characteristics are group norms,
roles, status, and cohesiveness.

Group Size
• In practice, most work groups, including task
forces and committees, usually have between 3
and 20 members.
• Group Size and Satisfaction
• Group Size and Performance

Group Size and Performance
• Three types of group tasks:
– Additive tasks
– Disjunctive tasks
– Conjunctive tasks
• Process Losses

Diversity of Group Membership
• Surface level diversity vs Deep level diversity
• Group diversity and communication
• Diverse groups might take longer to do their
forming, storming, and norming.
• Diversity and Performance

Group Norms
• Social norms are collective expectations that
members of social units have regarding the
behaviour of each other.
• How do norms develop?

Norm Development
• Why do individuals comply with norms?
– The norm corresponds to privately held attitudes.
– They often save time and prevent social confusion.
– Groups have a range of rewards and punishments
available to induce conformity to norms.
• Some typical norms are:
– Dress norms
– Reward allocation norms (equity, equality, reciprocity,
social responsibility)
– Performance norms

Roles
• Positions in a group that have a set of expected
behaviours attached to them.
• Roles represent “packages” of norms that apply to
particular group members.
• There are two basic kinds of roles in
organizations:
– Assigned roles
– Emergent roles
Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 10

Role Ambiguity
• Role ambiguity exists when the goals of one’s job
or the methods of performing it are unclear.
• There are a variety of elements that can lead to
role ambiguity:
– Organizational factors
– The role sender
– The focal person
• What are the practical consequences of role ambiguity?

Role Conflict
• Role conflict exists when an individual is faced
with incompatible role expectations.
• There are four types of role conflict:
– Intrasender role conflict
– Intersender role conflict
– Interrole conflict
– Person-role conflict
• The most consistent consequences of role conflict are job
dissatisfaction, stress reactions, lowered organizational
commitment, and turnover intentions.

Status
• Status in the rank, social position, or prestige
accorded to group members in terms of
prominence, prestige, and respect.
• Formal status systems represents management’s
attempt to publicly identify those people who have
higher status than others.

Formal Status Systems
• Status symbols are tangible indicators of status
(e.g., titles, pay packages, work schedules).
• What are the criteria for achieving formal
organizational status?
• Why do organizations go to all the trouble to
differentiate status?

Informal Status Systems
• Such systems are not well advertised, and they
might lack the conspicuous symbols and
systematic support that people usually accord the
formal system.
• They can operate just as effectively as formal
status systems.
• Informal status is linked to job performance as
well as other factors such as gender or race.

Consequences of Status Differences
• Most people like to communicate with others at

their own status or higher, rather than with people
who are below them.
• If status differences are large, people can be
inhibited from communicating upward.
• Higher-status members do more talking and have
more influence.
• However, the highest-status person might not be
the most knowledgeable about the problem at
hand.
Reducing Status Barriers
• Because they inhibit the free flow of
communication, many organizations downplay
status differentiation by doing away with status
symbols.
• The goal is to foster a culture of teamwork and
cooperation across the ranks.
• Email and texting have leveled status barriers.

Group Cohesiveness
• Group cohesiveness is a critical emergent
property of groups.
• It refers to the degree to which a group is
especially attractive to its members.
• Members want to stay in the group and they
describe the group in favourable terms.
• Cohesiveness is a relative, rather than absolute,
property of groups.

Factors Influencing Cohesiveness
• What makes some groups more cohesive than
others?
• Important factors include:
– Threat and competition
– Success
– Member diversity
– Group size
– Toughness of initiation

Consequences of Cohesiveness
• There is more participation in cohesive groups in
terms of lower voluntary turnover and
absenteeism, and a high degree of
communication within the group.
• Highly cohesive groups are able to induce greater
conformity to group norms.
• Cohesiveness contributes to group success.
• Cohesive groups will become productive
depending on a number of factors.
Discussion Question
• You have been assigned to a class project with 5
other members none of whom you have met
before and some even come from different
countries. What actions would you recommend to
build team cohesion among the team members in
this situation?

Social Loafing
• The tendency to withhold physical or intellectual
effort when performing a group task.
• Social loafing has two different forms:
– The free rider effect
– The sucker effect

Counteracting Social Loafing
• Make individual performance more visible
• Make sure that the work is interesting
• Increase feelings of indispensability
• Increase performance feedback
• Reward group as well as individual performance

Self-Managed Work Teams
• Work groups that have the opportunity to do
challenging work under reduced supervision.
• Critical success factors of self-managed teams
include:
– The nature of the task.
– The composition of the group (Stability, size, expertise
and diversity)
– Support (Training, Rewards and Management)

Cross-Functional Teams
• Work groups that bring people with different
functional specialties together to better invent,
design, or deliver a product or service.
• Principles of effectiveness
– Composition
– Superordinate goals
– Physical proximity
– Autonomy
– Rules and procedures
– Leadership
Virtual Teams
• Virtual teams are work groups that use technology
to communicate and collaborate across time,
space, and organizational boundaries.
• Virtual teams have a number of advantages:
– Around-the-clock work
– Reduced travel time and cost
– Larger talent pool

Challenges of Virtual Teams
• Managers must recognize that virtual teams
present unique challenges and should not be
treated as regular teams that just happen to use
technology:
– Trust
– Miscommunication
– Isolation
– Management issues

Discussion Question
• Suppose that you are put in charge of a remote
team whose members are geographically
dispersed around the world. What tactics you
would use to build and maintain team trust and
performance?

Eleventh Edition
Chapter 9
Leadership

What Is Leadership?
• Effective leadership exerts influence in a way that
achieves organizational goals by enhancing the
productivity, innovation, satisfaction, and
commitment of the workforce.
• Leadership is about motivating people and gaining
their commitment.
• Leadership has a strong effect on an
organization’s strategy, success, and very
survival.

Are Leaders Born or Made? The Trait
Theory of Leadership
• Leadership depends on the personal qualities or
traits of the leader.
• Based on the assumption that those who become
leaders and do a good job of it possess a special
set of traits that distinguish them from the masses
of followers.

Traits Associated with Leadership
Effectiveness

Limitations of the Trait Approach
• It is difficult to determine whether traits make the
leader or whether the opportunity for leadership
produces the traits.
• Does not tell us what leaders do to influence
others successfully.
• It can lead to bias and discrimination when
evaluating a leader’s effectiveness and when
making decisions about promoting people to
leadership positions.

Discussion Question
• Think of a person whom you consider as your role
model (family member, politician, religious leader,
friend, football coach, actor etc.). What characteristics
and traits does he/she posses that tends to influence
you?

Behavioral Approach to Leadership
Ohio State University Leadership Study
• The most involved, systematic study of leadership
took place at Ohio State University in the 1940s.
• Employees described their superiors along a
number of behavioural dimensions.
• The results revealed two basic kinds of behaviour:
– Consideration
– Initiating structure

Situational Theories of Leadership
• The basic premise of situational theories of
leadership is that the effectiveness of a leadership
style is contingent on the setting.
• The setting includes the characteristics of the
employees, the nature of the task they are
performing, and characteristics of the
organization.

Fiedler’s Contingency Theory
• The association between leadership orientation
and group effectiveness is contingent on (depends
on) the extent to which the situation is favourable
for exerting influence.
• Some situations are more favourable than others,
and these situations require different orientations
on the part of the leader.

Predictions of Leader Effectiveness from
Fiedler’s Contingency Theory of Leadership

House’s Path-Goal Theory
• Robert House’s theory is concerned with the
situations under which various leader behaviours
are most effective.
• Path-Goal Theory is concerned with leader
behaviours.

Path-Goal Theory
Situational
Factors
Leadership Subordinate
Goal
Styles •Authoritarianism
•High need achievers Achievement
•Ability
Directive
Performance
Supportive
Satisfaction
Participative
Achievement-
oriented
Environment
•Task structure
•Work group
•Formal Authority
What is Participative Leadership?
• Participative leadership means involving
employees in making work-related decisions.
• Leaders can vary in the extent to which they
involve employees in decision making.
• Minimally, participation involves obtaining
employee opinions before making a decision.
• Maximally, it allows employees to make their own
decisions within agreed-on limits.

Potential Advantages of Participative
Leadership
• What are the potential advantages of participation
as a leadership technique?
– Motivation
– Quality
– Acceptance

Potential Problems of Participative
Leadership
• What are the potential problems of participation as
a leadership technique?
– Time and energy
– Loss of power
– Lack of receptivity or knowledge

Vroom and Jago’s Situational Model of
Participation
• For issues involving the entire work group, a
range of decision making strategies is plausible:
– A stands for autocratic
– C for consultative
– G for group

Autocratic Strategies
• AI: You solve the problem or make the decision
yourself.
• AII: You obtain the necessary information from
your employees, then decide the solution to the
problem yourself.

Consultative Strategies
• CI: You share the problem with the relevant
employees individually, getting their ideas and
suggestions, then you make the decision.
• CII: You share the problem with your employees
as a group, obtaining their collective ideas and
suggestions, then you make the decision.

Group Strategy
• GII: You share the problem with your employees
as a group and together you generate and
evaluate alternatives and attempt to reach
agreement (consensus) on a solution.
• Which of these strategies is most effective?

Vroom and Jago’s Situational Model of
Participation
• How important is the technical quality of this
decision? (quality requirement)
• How important is subordinate commitment to the
decision? (commitment requirement)
• Do you have sufficient information to make a high-
quality decision?
• Is the problem well-structured?

Vroom and Jago Decision Tree
Questions
• Is conflict among subordinates over preferred
solutions likely?
• Do subordinates have sufficient information to
make a high-quality decision?

Participative Leadership: Research
Evidence
• There is substantial evidence that employees who
have the opportunity to participate in work-related
decisions report more job satisfaction, higher task
performance, and organizational citizenship
behaviour toward the organization than those who
do not.
• These results are partly due to a positive effect on
employee empowerment and trust in one’s
supervisor.

Leader-Member Exchange (LMX)
Theory
• A theory of leadership that focuses on the relationship that
develops between a leader and an employee.
• High LMX involves a high degree of mutual influence and
obligation as well as trust, loyalty, open communication, and
respect between a leader and an employee.
• Low LMX is characterized by low trust, respect, obligation,
and mutual support.
• In low-quality relationships, the leader provides less
attention and latitude to employees.

Transactional Leadership
• Transactional leadership is leadership that is
based on a straightforward exchange relationship
between a leader and followers.
• Transactional leadership behaviour involves:
– Contingent reward behaviour (leader reward
behaviour)
– Management by exception

Transformational Leadership
• Transformational leadership is leadership that
provides followers with a new vision that instills
true commitment.
• Popular examples of transformational leaders:
Herb Kelleher, Michael Eisner, Steven Jobs, and
Jack Welsh.

Behaviours of Transformational
Leadership
• There are four key dimensions of transformational
leader behaviour:
– Intellectual stimulation
– Individualized consideration
– Inspirational motivation
– Charisma
• Video on a Transformational Leader

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojkOs8Gatsg&list=RDLV4TKsbcI2Rfc&index=2

Discussion Question
• What are transformational leaders skilled at doing
that gives them extraordinary influence over
others?

Empowering Leadership
• Empowering leadership involves implementing
conditions that enable power to be shared with
employees.
• Empowering leaders provide participation and
autonomy in decision making.
• Empowering leadership has been found to be
positively related to higher self-efficacy and
adaptability, job performance, and creativity-
relevant behaviours.

Ethical Leadership
• They model what is deemed to be normatively
appropriate behaviour (e.g., honesty).
• They make ethics salient in the workplace.
• They set ethical standards.
• They reward ethical behaviour.
• They discipline those who don’t follow ethical
standards and punish unethical behaviour.

Ethical Leadership
• Ethical leadership is positively related to more
favourable evaluations of leaders, more positive
job attitudes, and greater performance and work
engagement.
• It is negatively related to job stress and strains,
turnover intentions, and counterproductive work
behaviours.
• The relationship between ethical leadership and
positive work outcomes is due to trust in the
leader.
Authentic Leadership
• Authentic leadership is a positive form of
leadership that involves being true to oneself.
• Authentic leaders know and act upon their true
values, beliefs, and strengths, and they help
others do the same.
• Their conduct and behaviour is guided by their
internal values.

• Authentic leadership consists of four related but
distinct behaviours:
– Self-awareness
– Relational transparency
– Balanced processing
– Internalized moral perspective

• Followers of authentic leaders have higher:
– Trust in their leader
– Organizational commitment
– Job satisfaction
– Satisfaction with their supervisor
– Organizational citizenship behaviour
– Work engagement
– Ethical and pro-social behaviours

Servant Leadership
• Servant leadership is a form of leadership that
involves going beyond one’s own self-interests
and having a genuine concern to serve others and
a motivation to lead.
• The focus of servant leadership is a concern for
the needs of followers and their growth and
development.
• A servant leader is somebody who wants to serve
first and lead second.

Characteristics of Servant Leaders
• There are six characteristics of servant leaders:
– Empowering and developing people
– Humility
– Authenticity
– Interpersonal acceptance
– Providing direction
– Stewardship

Gender and Leadership
• Women have a tendency to be more participative
or democratic than men.
• Women leaders have been found to be more
transformational than men leaders, and to also
engage in more of the contingent reward
behaviours of transactional leadership.

• Men leaders engaged in more management by
exception and laissez-faire leadership which is a
passive form of leadership that involves avoidance
or absence of leadership and is negatively related
to leader effectiveness.
• These findings attest to the ability of women to be
highly effective leaders.
• So do men and women differ in leadership
effectiveness?

• A review of 95 studies found that there are some
differences in certain situations such as whether an
organization is male or female dominated.
• Women hold very few top leadership positions in Canadian
organizations.
• Among the top 500 companies in the world, only three
percent have female CEOs.

Women and Leadership
• Glass ceiling metaphor – the invisible barrier that
prevents women from advancing to senior
leadership positions in organizations.
• Role congruity theory-Prejudice against female
leaders is the result of an incongruity between the
perceived characteristics of women and the
perceived requirements of leadership roles.
• Men are perceived to have agentic traits whereas
women have more communal traits.

The Advancement of Women in
Organizations

Culture and Leadership
• Are leadership styles equally effective across
cultures?
• The Global Leadership and Organizational
Behaviour Effectiveness (GLOBE) research
project is the most extensive and ambitious study
ever undertaken on global leadership.

Cultural Dimensions from the GLOBE
Project
• Performance Orientation
• Assertiveness
• Future Orientation
• Humane Orientation
• Institutional Collectivism
• In-Group Collectivism
• Gender Egalitarianism
• Power Distance
• Uncertainty Avoidance
Eleventh Edition
Chapter 10
Communication

Basics of Organizational Communication
• Communication is the process by which

information is exchanged between a sender and a
receiver.
• The sender must encode his or her thoughts into
some form that can be transmitted to the receiver.
• Effective communication occurs when the right
people receive the right information in a timely
manner.
•
Communication by Strict Chain of
Command
• Under this system, there are three necessary
forms of communication:
– Downward communication
– Upward communication
– Horizontal communication

Deficiencies in the Chain of Command
• The formal chain of command is an incomplete
and sometimes ineffective path of communication.
• The chain of command is often ineffective due to:
– Informal communication
– Filtering
– Slowness

Voice, Silence, and the Mum Effect
• Voice refers to the constructive expression of
disagreement or concern about work unit or
organizational practices.
• Voice involves “speaking up” and it can be
contrasted with silence which means withholding
relevant information.
• More satisfied employees who identify more
strongly with their work unit or organization are
most likely to speak up as are those who are
conscientious and extraverted.
The Mum Effect
• The mum effect refers to the tendency to avoid
communicating unfavourable news to others.
• It is more likely when the sender is responsible for
the bad news.
• When managers are perceived as more open-
minded, employees are more likely to open up
about negative events.
• The mum effect applies to both subordinates and
managers.
Discussion Question
• Think of two to three reasons of why employees
might respond with silence rather than voice to an
organizational problem. For each of these
reasons, explain how the organization could act to
encourage voice.

The Grapevine
• The grapevine is an organization’s informal
communication network.
• The grapevine communicates information through
word of mouth, emails, social media etc.
• Organizations often have several grapevine
systems.
• It can transmit information relevant to the
performance of the organization as well as
personal gossip.
Who Participates in the Grapevine and
Why?
• Personality characteristics play a role in grapevine
participation (e.g., extraverts) and those low in self
esteem.
• The physical location of organizational members
is also related to the opportunity to both receive
and transmit information via the grapevine.
• What motivates people to gossip via the
grapevine?

Who Participates in the Grapevine and
Why?
• It can be a timely and inexpensive source of
information.
• It can provide an alternative source of power and
influence available to all.
• The exchange of delicate information builds a
bond of trust between senders and receivers.
• It provides social and intellectual stimulation.
• Some gossip can contribute to effective
communication.
Pros and Cons of the Grapevine
• It can keep employees informed about important
organizational matters.
• It can provide a test of employee reactions to
proposed changes without making formal
commitments.
• The grapevine can become a problem when it
becomes a constant pipeline for rumours.
• A rumour is an unverified belief that is in general
circulation.
The Verbal Language of Work
• Jargon refers to the specialized language used by
job holders or members of particular occupations
or organizations to communicate with each other.
• Jargon can be an efficient means of
communicating with peers and provides a touch of
status to those who have mastered it.
• Jargon can be a barrier to clear communication
between departments and also outsiders
• Difficult for new members
The Non-Verbal Language of Work
• Non-verbal communication refers to the
transmission of messages by some medium other
than speech or writing such as body language.
• Major forms of non-verbal communication include:
– Body language
– Props, artifacts, and costumes

Body Language
• Two important messages sent via body language:
– The extent to which the sender likes and is interested
in the receiver.
– The sender’s views concerning the relative status of
the sender and the receiver.
• Non-verbal behaviours (e.g., smiling, gesturing)
have a favourable impact on interviewers when
they are not overdone.

Props, Artifacts, and Costumes
• Non-verbal communication can also occur through
the use of various objects such as props, artifacts,
and costumes.
• Consider how the following can communicate
information about an individual:
– Office decor and arrangement
– Clothing

Gender Differences in Communication
• Men are most concerned about power dynamics

and use communication as a way to position
themselves in a one-up situation.
• Women are more concerned with rapport building,
and they communicate in ways that avoid putting
others down.
• As a result, women often find themselves in a
one-down position, which can have a negative
effect on their careers.

Gender Differences in Communication
• Getting Credit
• Confidence and Boasting
• Asking Questions
• Apologies
• Feedback
• Compliments
• Ritual Opposition
• Managing up and down
• Indirectness
Cross-Cultural Communication
• Many failures in business and management across
cultures are due to ineffective communication.
• Some important dimensions of cross-cultural
communication include:
– Language differences
– Non-verbal communication
– Etiquette and politeness
– Social conventions
– Cultural context
Video link on inter-cultural communication

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEqoCoMzjCE
Language Differences
• Communication is generally better between
individuals or groups who share similar cultural
values.
• Speaking the same language is no guarantee of
perfect communication.
• Learning a second language should facilitate
cross-cultural communication.

Non-Verbal Communication Across
Cultures
• There are many differences in non-verbal
communication across cultures:
– Facial expressions
– Gestures
– Gaze
– Touch

Etiquette and Politeness Across
Cultures
• Cultures differ in how etiquette and politeness are
expressed.
• This often involves saying things that one does
not literally mean.
• The form that this takes varies across cultures.
• Careful decoding is necessary to avoid confusion
and embarrassment.

Social Conventions Across Cultures
• North Americans favour directness and being
specific about the issue at hand.
• Greetings and how people say hello also vary
across cultures.
• What individuals consider a proper degree of
loudness for speech also varies across cultures.
• What people consider proper punctuality also
varies around the world as does the pace of life.
• What is considered proper professional behaviour
also varies across cultures.
Cultural Context
• Cultural context is the cultural information that
surrounds a communication episode.
• In high-context cultures, the message contained in
communication is strongly influenced by the
context in which the message is sent.
• In low-context cultures, messages can be
interpreted more literally because more meaning
resides in the message than in the context in
which the communication occurs.

Cultural Context (Contd.)
• People from high-context cultures want to know
about you and your company in great detail.
• Getting to the point quickly is not a style of
communication that people in high-context
cultures favour.
• Age and seniority are valued in high-context
cultures and the status of the communicator is an
important contextual factor that gives credibility to
a message.

Computer-Mediated Communication
and Social Media
• Information richness refers to the potential
information-carrying capacity of a communication
medium.
• There are two dimensions of information richness:
– The degree to which information is synchronous
between senders and receivers (two-way, in real time).
– The extent to which both parties can receive non-
verbal and para-verbal (e.g., tone of voice) cues.

and Social Media
• Face-to-face transmission of information is very
high in richness.
• A telephone conversation is also fairly rich but
limited to the audio channel.
• Memos, letters, and emails are essentially a
series of one-way messages, although email and
especially texting have the clear potential for
speedy response.

and Social Media
• Non-verbal and para-verbal cues are essentially
absent in text-based media.
• A continuum of communication media can range
from face-to-face, to digital, to socially digital.
• Web media are commonly classified as computer-
mediated communication (CMC) in that they rely
on computer technology to facilitate information
exchange.

Continuum of Communication Media

and Social Media
• When they meet for only a single session,
computer-mediated groups that are tasked with
making a decision generally take more time, make
less effective decisions, and have less-satisfied
members than face-to-face groups.
• Computer-mediated groups gradually develop
increased trust and cooperation over repeated
meeting sessions.

Social Media
• Social media pose both challenges and
opportunities for organizations and their members.
• Cyberloafing.
• Cyberbullying
• Blurred work and non-work boundaries
• Social media can play a positive role in
organizational communication, aiding in knowledge
sharing, collaboration, and innovation, and making
employees feel more connected and engaged
because such media facilitate voice.
Personal approaches to improve
communication
• There are a number of basic principles of effective
face-to-face communication:
– Take the time
– Be accepting of the other person
– Do not confuse the person with the problem
– Say what you feel
– Listen actively
– Give timely and specific feedback

Organizational Approaches to
Improving Communication
• Organizational techniques that can improve
communication:
– Employer Branding
– Provision of Explanations
– 360-Degree Feedback
– Employee Surveys and Survey Feedback
– Suggestion Systems
– Telephone Hotlines and Webcasts
– Management Training

Video Clip Discussion
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7agjXFFQJU
Do you think that the team meeting was successful?

What communication problems occurred during the
team meeting?

Eleventh Edition
Chapter 11
Decision Making

What Is Decision Making?
• Decision making is the process of developing a
commitment to some course of action.
• Three things are noteworthy about decision
making:
– It involves making a choice among several action
alternatives.
– It is a process.
– It involves a commitment of resources.
• Decision making can also be described as a process of
problem solving.

Well-Structured Problems
• A problem for which the existing state is clear, the
desired state is clear, and how to get from one
state to another is fairly obvious.
• These problems are simple, and their solutions
arouse little controversy.
• They are repetitive and familiar and they can be
programmed.
• A program is a standardized way of solving a
problem.
Ill-Structured Problems
• A problem for which the existing and desired
states are unclear and the method of getting to the
desired state is unknown.
• They are unique and unusual problems that have
not been encountered before.
• They tend to be complex and involve a high
degree of uncertainty.
• They frequently arouse controversy and conflict.

The Rational Decision-Making Process

Perfect Rationality
• Perfect rationality is a decision strategy that is
completely informed, perfectly logical, and
oriented toward economic gain.
• The prototype for perfect rationality is the
Economic Person who is the perfect, cool,
calculating decision maker.

Bounded Rationality
• Herbert Simon suggested that managers use
bounded rationality rather than perfect rationality.
• Bounded rationality is a decision strategy that
relies on limited information and that reflects time
constraints and political considerations that act as
bounds to rationality.
• Framing and cognitive biases illustrate the
operation of bounded rationality, as does the
impact of emotions and mood on decisions.

Framing
• Framing refers to the aspects of the presentation
of information about a problem that are assumed
by decision makers.
• How problems and decision alternatives are
framed can have a powerful impact on resulting
decisions.

Cognitive Biases
• Cognitive biases are tendencies to acquire and
process information in a particular way that is
prone to error.
• They constitute assumptions and shortcuts that
can improve decision-making efficiency, but they
frequently lead to serious errors in judgment.
• Intelligence does not counteract biases, and both
more and less smart people are equally prone to
them.

Problem Identification and Framing
• The perfectly rational decision maker should be a
great problem identifier.
• Bounded rationality, however, can lead to the
following difficulties in problem identification:
– Perceptual defence.
– Problem defined in terms of functional specialty.
– Problem defined in terms of solution.
– Problem diagnosed in terms of surface symptoms.

Information Search
• Once a problem is identified, a search for
information is instigated.
• The perfectly rational decision maker has free and
instantaneous access to all information necessary
to clarify the problem and develop alternative
solutions.
• Decision makers can have too little or too much
information.

Too Little Information
• Sometimes, decision makers do not acquire
enough information to make a good decision.
• Confirmation bias refers to the tendency to seek
out information that conforms to one’s own
definition of or solution to a problem.
• Not-invented-here bias, the tendency to ignore or
harbor negative attitudes toward ideas from
outside one’s own organization or project team.

Too Much Information
• Too much information can also damage the quality
of decisions.
• Information overload is the reception of more
information than is necessary to make effective
decisions.
• Information overload can lead to errors,
omissions, delays, and cutting corners.

Alternative Development, Evaluation,
and Choice
• The perfectly rational decision maker exhibits
maximization – the choice of the decision
alternative with the greatest expected value.
• For the decision maker working under bounded
rationality, all of the alternative solutions and the
probabilities of success are not known.
• The anchoring effect illustrates that decision
makers do not adjust their estimates enough from
some initial estimate that serves as an anchor.

Satisficing
• The decision maker working under bounded
rationality frequently “satisfices” rather than
maximizes.
• Satisficing means that the decision maker
establishes an adequate level of acceptability for a
solution to a problem and then screens solutions
until he or she finds one that exceeds this level.
• When this occurs, evaluation of alternatives
ceases, and the solution is chosen for
implementation.
Solution Implementation
• Decision makers are often dependent on others to
implement their decisions, and it might be difficult
to anticipate their ability or motivation to do so.
• Implementation problems often occur when those
who must implement a decision are not the ones
who made the decision.
• Cross-functional teams can help prevent these
kinds of implementation problems.

Solution Evaluation
• The perfectly rational decision maker should be
able to evaluate the effectiveness of a decision
with calm, objective detachment.
• The bounded decision maker might encounter
problems at this stage of the process:
– Justification
– Hindsight

Justification
• The justification of faulty decisions is best seen in
the irrational treatment of sunk costs.
• Sunk costs are permanent losses of resources
incurred as a result of a decision.
• Escalation of commitment refers to the tendency
to invest additional resources in an apparently
failing course of action.

Escalation of Commitment
• Reasons for escalation of commitment:
– Dissonance reduction.
– Social norm for consistent behaviour.
– Motivation to not appear wasteful.
– The way the problem is framed.
– Personality, moods, and emotions.

Hindsight
• The careful evaluation of decisions is also
inhibited by faulty hindsight.
• Hindsight refers to the tendency to review the
decision-making process that was used to find
what was done right or wrong.
• While it can prove useful, it often reflects a
cognitive bias.

How Emotions and Mood Affect
Decision Making
• Research on mood and decision making reveals
that:
– People in a positive (negative) mood tend to remember
positive (negative) information.
– People in a good mood tend to overestimate the
likelihood that good events will occur and underestimate
the occurrence of bad events.
– People in a good mood adopt simplified, shortcut
decision-making strategies, more likely violating the
rational model.
– Positive mood promotes more creative, intuitive decision
making.
Group Decision Making
• Why use groups for decision-making?
• There are a number of reasons for using groups to
make organizational decisions:
– Decision quality
– Decision acceptance and commitment
– Diffusion of responsibility

Disadvantages of Group Decision
Making
• There are a number of potential disadvantages to
group decision making:
– Time
– Conflict
– Domination
– Groupthink

Groupthink
• Factors that can cause groupthink include:
– High group cohesiveness.
– Strong identification with the group.
– Concern for approval from the group.
– Isolation of the group from other sources of
information.
– The promotion of a particular decision by the group
leader (this appears to be the strongest cause).

Strategies to Prevent Groupthink
• Leaders must avoid exerting undue pressure for a
particular decision outcome and concentrate on
good decision processes.
• Leaders should establish norms that encourage
and even reward responsible dissent.
• Outside experts should be brought in from time to
time to challenge the group’s views.

How Do Groups Handle Risk?
• A risky shift is the tendency for groups to make
riskier decisions than the average risk initially
advocated by their individual members.
• A conservative shift is the tendency for groups to
make less risky decisions than the average risk
initially advocated by their individual members.
• What determines which kind of shift occurs?

Discussion Question
• Can you think of examples that indicate how
groupthink and escalation of commitment might
promote unethical decision making (and its cover
up) in business

Eleventh Edition
Chapter 12
Power, Politics, and Ethics

What Is Power?
• Power is the capacity to influence others who are
in a state of dependence.
• It is not always perceived or exercised.
• It does not imply a poor relationship between the
power holder and the target of power.
• Power can flow in any direction in an organization.
• Power applies to both individuals and groups.

The Bases of Individual Power
• Power can be found in the position one occupies
in an organization and the resources that one is
able to command.
• There are five bases of individual power:
– Legitimate power
– Reward power
– Coercive power
– Referent power
– Expert power

Legitimate Power
• Power derived from a person’s position or job in
an organization.
• It is based on one’s formal authority and level in
an organization’s hierarchy.
• Legitimate power works because people have
been socialized to accept its influence.

Reward Power
• Power derived from the ability to provide positive
outcomes and prevent negative outcomes.
• It corresponds to the concept of positive
reinforcement.
• Any organizational member can attempt to exert
influence over others with praise, compliments,
and flattery.

Coercive Power
• Power derived from the use of punishment and
threat.
• Lower-level organizational members can also
apply their share of coercion.
• When managers use coercive power, it is
generally ineffective and can provoke
considerable employee resistance.

Referent Power
• Power derived from being well liked by others.
• It stems from identification with the power holder.
• Referent power is available to anyone in an
organization who is well liked.
• Friendly interpersonal relations often permit
influence to extend across the organization,
outside the usual channels of legitimate authority,
reward, and coercion.

Expert Power
• Power derived from having special information or
expertise that is valued by an organization.
• Expert power corresponds to difficulty of
replacement.
• Lower-level organizational members can have
expert power.

Employee Responses to Bases of
Power
• Employees are likely to have the following
responses to each base of managerial power:
– Coercive power → Resistance
– Reward power → Compliance
– Legitimate power → Compliance
– Expert power → Commitment
– Referent power → Commitment

Discussion Question
• Considering the five sources of power, think and then
provide real life examples from your personal or
professional experience indicating how, on whom and
when you used each of the power types? What were the
positive and negative consequences arising from each
of the power use on others?

How Do People Obtain Power?
Doing the Right Things
• Some activities are “righter” than others for
obtaining power.
• Activities lead to power when they are:
– Extraordinary activities
– Visible activities
– Relevant activities

Cultivating the Right People
• Developing informal relationships with the right
people can be a useful means of acquiring power.
• The right people can include:
– Outsiders
– Subordinates
– Peers
– Superiors

Empowerment: Putting Power Where It
Is Needed
• Empowerment means giving people the authority,
opportunity, and motivation to take initiative and
solve organizational problems.
• Key components:
– Authority
– Opportunity
– Motivation

Empowerment: Putting Power Where It
Is Needed
• People who are empowered have a strong sense
of self-efficacy.
• Empowering lower-level employees can be critical
in service organizations.
• Empowerment fosters job satisfaction,
organizational commitment, OCBs, and high
performance.
• Could organizational members have too much
power?
Relationship Between Power and
Performance

Influence Tactics – Putting Power to
Work
• How does power result in influence?
• Influence tactics convert power into actual
influence over others.
• They are specific behaviours that people use to
affect others and manage others’ impressions of
them.

Work
• Assertiveness
• Ingratiation
• Self-promotion
• Rationality
• Exchange
• Upward appeal
• Coalition formation

Work
• The use of an influence tactic is determined by
one’s base of power and who they are trying to
influence (subordinates, peers, or superiors).
• Subordinates are more likely to be the recipients
of assertiveness.
• Rationality and ingratiation is most likely to be
directed toward superiors.
• Self-promotion seems universally employed.

Discussion Question
• Consider a situation in which there is only one
female member in a team of six, and she is
generally excluded from informal gatherings of the
team. What kind of influence tactics can she use
to address the situation?

Who Wants Power?
• Some people have more n Pow than others.
• The most effective managers use their power for
the good of the organization. They are called
institutional managers.
• Institutional managers are more effective than
personal power managers (who use their power
for personal gain), and affiliative managers (who
are more concerned about being liked than with
exercising power).

Responses of Subordinates of Managers
with Different Motive Profiles

Controlling Strategic Contingencies -
How Subunits Obtain Power
• Subunits gain power by controlling strategic
contingencies.
• Strategic contingencies are critical factors
affecting organizational effectiveness that are
controlled by a key subunit.
• The work other subunits perform is contingent on
the activities and performance of a key subunit.

Controlling Strategic Contingencies -
How Subunits Obtain Power
• Conditions under which subunits can control
strategic contingencies:
– Scarcity
– Uncertainty
– Centrality
– Substitutability

The Basics of Organizational Politics
• Organizational politics refers to the pursuit of self-

interest in an organization, whether or not this
self-interest corresponds to organizational goals.
• Politics frequently involves using means of
influence that the organization does not sanction
or pursuing ends or goals that it does not
sanction.

• Political activity is self-conscious and intentional.

• It can be an individual or subunit activity.
• Political activity can have beneficial outcomes for
an organization even though the outcomes are
achieved by questionable tactics.

The Dimensions of Organizational
Politics

• Political activities are more likely to occur:

– At certain levels:
▪ Middle and upper management levels.
– In some subunits:
▪ Subunits with vague goals and complex tasks.
– Some issues:
▪ Budget allocation, reorganization, personnel changes.
– In general:
▪ Scarce resources, uncertainty, and important issues provoke
political behaviour.

The Facets of Political Skill
• Political skill refers to the ability to understand
others at work and to use that knowledge to
influence others to act in ways that enhance one’s
personal or organizational objectives.
• This definition refers to two aspects of political
skill:
– Comprehending others
– Translating this comprehension into influence

• There are four facets to political skill:
– Social astuteness
– Interpersonal influence
– Apparent sincerity
– Networking ability

• Political skill is positively related to job
performance, job satisfaction, and career success.
• Teams that have members with elevated political
skill tend to be more cohesive and perform better.
• Networking is a critical aspect of power acquisition
and political success.

Networking
• There are several aspects to networking:
– Maintaining contacts
– Socializing
– Engaging in professional activities
– Participating in community activities
– Increasing internal visibility

Machiavellianism-The Harder Sides of
Politics
• Machiavellianism refers to a set of cynical beliefs
about human nature, morality, and the
permissibility of using various tactics to achieve
one’s ends.
• It is a stable personality trait.
• High Machs are more likely to advocate the use of
lying and deceit to achieve desired goals.
• High Machs assume that the ends justify the
means.
Machiavellianism-The Harder Sides of
Politics
• High Machs are convincing liars and good at
“psyching out” competitors by creating diversions.
• They are enthusiastic organizational politicians.
• They are cool and calculating rather than
emotional.
• They insulate themselves from the negative social
consequences of their tactics.
• They are able to identify situations in which their
tactics will work.
Defensiveness – Reactive Politics
• Reactive politics concerns the defence or
protection of self-interest.
• The goal is to reduce threats to one’s own power
by avoiding actions that do not suit one’s own
political agenda or avoiding blame for events that
might threaten one’s political capital.
• This can involve no action at all or avoiding blame
for consequences.

Avoiding Actions
• Astute politicians are aware that sometimes the
best action to take is no action at all.
• A number of defensive behaviours can accomplish
this mission:
– Stalling
– Overconforming
– Buck passing

Avoiding Blame
• Another set of defensive behaviours is oriented
around the motto “If you can’t avoid action, avoid
blame for its consequences.”
• These behaviours include:
– Buffing
– Scapegoating

Discussion Question
• Successful companies depend on their employees
to seek out new information and share their
discoveries and ideas with others in the
organization. How does organizational politics
interfere with these beneficial activities?

Ethics in Organizations
• Ethics can be defined as systematic thinking
about the moral consequences of decisions.
• Moral consequences can be framed in terms of
the potential for harm to any stakeholders in the
decision.
• Stakeholders are people inside or outside of an
organization who have the potential to be affected
by organizational decisions.

Ethics in Organizations
• Top managers tend to see their organizations as
being more ethical than do those lower in the
hierarchy.
• Among business students, undergraduates have
been found to be more ethical than MBA students.
• Women are marginally more ethical than men.
• Older people are marginally more ethical than the
young.

Ethical Issues Observed by Employees
Exhibit 12.6

Ethical Issues Observed by Employees
Exhibit 12.6

The Nature of Ethical Misconduct
• Abusive behaviour, lying to employees, and
conflicts of interest top the list.
• Bribery, manipulating financial data, and falsifying
expenses are reported less commonly, perhaps in
part because they are easier to hide.

Common Themes of Ethical Issues
Facing Managers
• Honest communication
• Fair treatment
• Special consideration
• Fair competition
• Responsibility to organization
• Corporate social responsibility.
• Respect for law

Causes of Unethical Behaviour
• Sometimes strong and subtle situational factors
make basically good people do bad things or to
entrap people in unethical spirals of action.
• This can be understood by the concept of
bounded ethicality.

Bounded Ethicality
• Bounded ethicality is the psychological process by
which people come to engage in behaviour that
violates their own ethical standards.
• People operating under bounded ethicality would
probably act differently with more active reflection.
• Bounded ethicality means that people are prone to
ethical blind spots.

Causes of Unethical Behaviour
• Personality
• Gain
• Extreme performance pressure
• Role conflict
• Strong organizational identification
• Competition
• Organizational and industry culture

On-The Job Challenge Question (Page
462)
• What are the ethical dimensions of this case?
How serious were Neena’s actions? How ethical
was Air Canada’s response? How are issues of
power apparent in this case?

Whistle-Blowing
• Whistle-blowing occurs when a current or former
organizational member discloses illegitimate
practices to some person or organization that may
be able to take action to correct these practices.
• The whistle may be blown either inside or outside
of the offending organization.

Whistle-Blowing
• Most organizations rely on vague open door
policies rather than having specific channels and
procedures for whistle-blowers to follow.
• Whistle-blowers are often the victims of
considerable retaliation for their efforts because
they have challenged the status quo and
embarrassed those in power.

Sexual Harassment
• Sexual harassment is “behaviour that derogates,
demeans, or humiliates an individual based on
that individual’s sex.”
• It could include touching, sexual force, and sexist
jokes, comments, and materials.
• Sexual harassment is a form of unethical
behaviour that stems, in part, from the abuse of
power and the perpetuation of a gender power
imbalance.

Sexual Harassment
• The most severe forms of sexual harassment are
committed by supervisors.
• The most frequent perpetrators are co-workers.
• Sexual harassment is also prevalent in hostile
work environments and is most likely in male-
dominated industries and organizations in which
men attempt to maintain their dominance relative
to women.

Sexual Harassment
• Many organizations are slow to react to
complaints of sexual harassment.
• Nearly a third of Canadians reported sexual
harassment at work, but 78% of these
respondents did not report the behaviour.
• Organizations can effectively deal with allegations
of sexual harassment and increase their
responsiveness by taking a number of important
measures.

Measures to Effectively Deal with
Allegations of Sexual Harassment
• Examine the characteristics of deaf ear
organizations.
• Foster management support and education.
• Stay vigilant.
• Take immediate action.
• Create a state-of-the-art policy.
• Establish clear reporting procedures.

Case Incident-Yahoo’s Resume Scandal
(Page 463)
Q No 1) How serious of an ethical violation was
Scott Thompson’s misstatement of academic
qualifications in the Yahoo annual report? Who are
the relevant stakeholders here? What might have
motivated this misrepresentation?
Q No 2) What should have Thompson done to
resolve this? What should the board of directors
have done?

Eleventh Edition
Chapter 13
Conflict and Stress

What Is Conflict?
• Conflict is a process that occurs when one person,
group, or organizational subunit frustrates the goal
attainment of another.
• Conflict often involves antagonistic attitudes and
behaviours.

Causes of Organizational Conflict
• A number of factors contribute to organizational
conflict:
– Group identification and intergroup bias
– Interdependence
– Differences in power, status, and culture
– Ambiguity
– Scarce resources

Group Identification and Intergroup
Bias
• The identification with a particular group or class
of people.
• People develop a more positive view of their own
“in-group” and a less positive view of the “out-
group.”
• Self-esteem is a critical factor.
• Attributing positive behaviour to your own group
should contribute to your self-esteem.

Interdependence
• When individuals or subunits are mutually
dependent on each other to accomplish their own
goals.
• Interdependence necessitates interaction and
implies that each party has some power over the
other.
• Interdependence does not always lead to conflict
and it can be a good basis for collaboration
through mutual assistance.

Differences in Power, Status, and
Culture
• Power: If dependence is not mutual, but one way,
the potential for conflict increases.
• Status: Status differences provide little impetus for
conflict when people of lower status are
dependent on those of higher status.
• Culture: When two or more very different cultures
develop in an organization, the clash in beliefs
and values can result in overt conflict.

Ambiguity
• Ambiguous goals, jurisdictions, or performance
criteria can lead to conflict.
• The formal and informal rules that govern
interaction break down.
• Ambiguous performance criteria are a frequent
cause of conflict between managers and
employees.

Scarce Resources
• Conflict often surfaces in the process of power
jockeying.
• Limited budget money, administrative support, or
lab space can contribute to conflict.
• Scarcity can turn latent or disguised conflict into
overt conflict.

Types of Conflict
• It is helpful to distinguish among three types of
conflict:
– Relationship conflict
– Task conflict
– Process conflict

Conflict Dynamics
• When conflict begins, the following events often
transpire:
– “Winning” the conflict becomes more important than a
good solution.
– The parties conceal information from each other or
distort it.
– Contact with the opposite party is discouraged.
– The opposite party is negatively stereotyped, and the
image of one’s own position is boosted.
– More aggressive people who are skilled at engaging in
conflict may emerge as leaders.
Modes of Managing Conflict
• There are five styles for dealing with conflict:
– Avoiding
– Accommodating
– Competing
– Compromise
– Collaborating
• None of the five styles is inherently superior.
• Each style might have its place given the situation
in which the conflict episode occurs.

Approaches to Managing
Organizational Conflict

Video clip analysis on Conflict
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_nM3NBCo-M
• What did you learn from the video regarding the

sources and solutions to resolve conflict? Which
strategies do you think were most effective in
resolving conflicts?

Managing Conflict with Negotiation
• Negotiation is a decision-making process among
interdependent parties who do not share identical
preferences.
• Negotiation constitutes conflict management, in
that it is an attempt to either prevent conflict or
resolve existing conflict.
• It has become common to distinguish between
distributive and integrative negotiation tactics.

Distributive Negotiation Tactics
• Distributive negotiation is essentially single-issue
negotiation.
• Consider a situation in which you want to pay the
minimum reasonable price for a car while the
seller wants to get the maximum reasonable price.
• How do you reach an agreement?

• There are a number of tactics that can be used:
– Threats and promises
– Firmness versus concessions
– Persuasion

• Salary negotiation is a traditional example of
distributive bargaining.
• Men tend to negotiate better outcomes than
women, but this difference is narrowed when
women gain negotiation experience or are
negotiating for another party.
• Negotiation is worth doing, as a study showed that
new hires who negotiated received a $5000 salary
premium.

Integrative Negotiation Tactics
• Strives for collaborative problem solving that
advances the interests of both parties.
• It requires trust between the parties.
• People have a bias for fixed-pie thinking.
• It requires creativity.
• Attempts at integrative negotiation can be well
worth the effort.

Integrative Negotiation Tactics
• Integrative negotiation tactics include:
– Copious information exchange
– Framing differences as opportunities
– Cutting costs
– Increasing resources
– Introducing superordinate goals

Discussion Question
• Laura is about to renegotiate her job role with her
new manager. She has heard through the
grapevine that he is a tough negotiator, highly
competitive and unwilling to take other needs into
consideration. She has also heard that even if he
gives concessions in the negotiation, he often fails
to keep his word. If you were Laura, what
negotiation tactics you will use to make the
negotiations successful.

Is all Conflict?
• Constructive conflict is most likely to promote
good decisions and positive organizational
change.
• Conflict stimulation is a strategy of increasing
conflict to motivate change.

Model of a Stress Episode

Personality and Stress
• Personality can affect both the extent to which
potential stressors are perceived as stressful and
the types of stress reactions that occur.
• Three key personality traits:
– Locus of control
– Type A behaviour pattern
– Negative affectivity

Stressors in Organizational Life
• While some stressors are likely to affect almost
everyone in any organization, others are likely to
affect people who perform particular roles.

Stressors in Organizational Life
• Stressors can be found in particular roles:
– Executive and managerial stressors
– Operative-level stressors
– Boundary role stressors
– General stressors

Executive and Managerial Stressors
• Executives and managers make key
organizational decisions and direct the work of
others.
• They experience some special forms of stress:
– Role overload
– Heavy responsibility

Operative-Level Stressors
• Operatives are individuals who occupy non-
professional and non-managerial positions in
organizations.
• Occupants of operative positions are sometimes
exposed to a special set of stressors:
– Poor physical working conditions
– Poor job design

Boundary Role Stressors
• Boundary roles are positions in which
organizational members are required to interact
with members of other organizations or with the
public.
• People who straddle the imaginary boundary
between the organization and its environment are
especially likely to experience stress.
• This is another example of role conflict.

Burnout
• Burnout is a syndrome made up of emotional
exhaustion, cynicism, and low self-efficacy.
• It is most common among people who entered
their jobs with especially high ideals.
• Gender and personality are also related to
burnout.
• Those with high self-esteem, high
conscientiousness, and internal control report less
burnout.
The Job Demands-Resources Model
and Work Engagement
• Organizations should strive to foster high work
engagement.
• A recent survey indicated that 31 percent of the
workforce are highly engaged in their work, 48
percent are moderately engaged, and 21 percent
are disengaged

Work Engagement
• Work engagement can be defined as “a positive
work-related state of mind that is characterized by
vigor, dedication, and absorption.”
• Research shows more engaged people are better
performers and better organizational citizens.
• Companies with more engaged workforces have
better financial performance and customer
satisfaction.
• What determines whether employees tend toward
engagement versus burnout?
The Job Demands-Resources Model
• A central assumption of the model is that high job

resources foster work engagement, while high job
demands exhaust employees physically and
mentally and lead to burnout.
• Research has found that job demands are related
to burnout, disengagement, and health problems.

Some General Stressors
• Some stressors that are experienced equally by
occupants of all roles include:
– Interpersonal Conflict
– Work-family conflict
– Job insecurity and change
– Role ambiguity
– Techno-stressors
– Sexual harassment

Interpersonal Conflict
• Workplace bullying is the repeated teasing,
criticism, or undermining that signals bullying.
• Mobbing occurs when a number of individuals,
usually direct co-workers, “gang-up” on a particular
employee.
• The bullying of subordinates is known as abusive
supervision.
• Cyberbullying is a new form of bullying in which the
abuse occurs electronically via email, texting, social
network platforms, or blogs.
Work-Family Conflict
• Work-family conflict occurs when either work
duties interfere with family life or family life
interferes with work responsibilities.
• It results in burnout, decreased work performance,
and increased absenteeism
• Two facts of life have increased the stress
stemming from the inter-role conflict between
being a member of one’s family and the member
of an organization.

Work-Family Conflict (2 of 3)
• The increase in the number of households in
which both parents work and the increase in the
number of single-parent families has led to a
number of stressors centred around child care.
• Increased life spans have meant that many people
in the prime of their careers find themselves
providing support for elderly parents, some of
whom may be seriously ill.

Job Insecurity and Change
• Stress may be encountered when secure
employment is threatened.
• The trend toward mergers and acquisitions, along
with reengineering, restructuring, and downsizing,
has led to increasingly high levels of stress.
• Job insecurity is a threat to employees at the
operative level, among professionals, and
executives.

Role Ambiguity
• Role ambiguity exists when the goals of one’s job
or the methods of performing the job are unclear.
• Such a lack of direction can be stressful,
especially for people who are low in their
tolerance for such ambiguity.

Techno-stressors
• Stress emanating from the need for people to use
and to master a variety of workplace information
and communication technologies.
• There are five dimensions to techno-stress.
• Techno-overload
• Techno-invasion
• Techno-uncertainty
• Techno-complexity
• Techno-insecurity

Techno-stressors
• These facets of techno-stress are additional
sources of some of the previously mentioned
causes of stress.
• There are considerable differences in how people
mesh technologies with family life.
• “Integrators” use connectivity to enable them to
participate in family affairs (e.g. a short vacation).
• “Separators” are inclined to build a firewall
between work and family, preventing techno-
invasion by limiting such connectivity.
Sexual Harassment
• Sexual harassment is a major workplace stressor,
with serious consequences for employees and
organizations that are similar to or more negative
than those of other types of job stressors.
• Sexual harassment has also been found to have
serious effects on the psychological and physical
well-being of harassment victims.

Reactions to Organizational Stress
• The reactions that people who experience
organizational stress might exhibit can be divided
into three categories:
– Behavioural reactions
– Psychological reactions
– Physiological reactions

Behavioural Reactions to Stress
• Behavioural reactions to stress are overt activities
that the stressed individual uses in an attempt to
cope with the stress.
• Behavioural reactions to stress include:
– Problem solving
– Seeking social support
– Performance changes
– Withdrawal and presenteeism
– Use of addictive substances

Psychological Reactions to Stress
• Psychological reactions to stress primarily involve
emotions and thought processes rather than overt
behaviour.
• The most common psychological reaction to
stress is the use of defence mechanisms.

Common Defence Mechanisms
• Rationalization
• Projection
• Displacement
• Reaction formation
• Compensation

Physiological Reactions to Stress
• Work stress is associated with electrocardiogram
irregularities and elevated levels of blood
pressure, cholesterol, and pulse.
• Stress has also been associated with the onset of
various diseases due to its ill effects on the
immune system.
• The accumulation of stress into burnout has been
particularly implicated in cardiovascular problems.

Organizational Strategies for Managing
Stress
• What can organizations do to help employees
manage stress?
• Job redesign
• “Family-friendly” human resource policies
• Stress management programs
• Work-life balance, fitness, and wellness programs

Discussion Question
• Imagine that a person who greatly dislikes
bureaucracy assumes her first job as an
investigator in a very bureaucratic govt tax office.
Describe the stressors that she might encounter in
this situation. Give an example of a defensive
reaction to it.

OBHR - Chapters 7, 9 To 13 Merged

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

OBHR - Chapters 7, 9 To 13 Merged

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Organizational Behaviour:

Understanding and Managing Life at Work

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-1

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-2

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-3

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-4

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-5

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-6

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-7

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-8

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7-9

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 10

• What are the practical consequences of role ambiguity?

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 11

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 12

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 13

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 14

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 15

• Most people like to communicate with others at

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 17

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 18

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 19

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 21

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 22

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 23

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 24

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 26

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 27

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 28

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 29

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 30

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 31

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 32

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 33

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 34

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 35

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 36

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 37

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 38

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 39

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 41

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 42

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 43

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 44

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 45

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 46

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 47

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 48

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 49

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 50

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 51

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 52

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 53

• Video on a Transformational Leader

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 54

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 55

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 56

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 57

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 59

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 60

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 61

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 62

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Canada Inc. 7 - 63