Psychology is the scientific study of behaviour and mental processes.

- The science of behaviour and mental processes that seeks to describe and
explain aspects of human thoughts , feelings , perceptions and actions.

Industrial/organisation /work psychology

The scientific study of human behaviour and cognitive processes in relation to the working
environment .

The application of psychological principles and techniques to business and industrial

problems.

An organisation is an entity compromising of multiple people , can take various shapes and
forms such an institution or a volunteer association , that has a collective goal and is linked
to an external environment .

Our main interest is organisational behaviour which is the study of the behaviour of people
within an organisational setting.

A common definition is the study and understanding of individual and group behaviour , and
patterns of structure in order to help improve organisational performance and
effectiveness.

‘Organisations can achieve nothing without the efforts of their individual members.
Whatever the nature of an organisations producers or services , relationships at work and
interactions among its members ate at least equally important.

It is the task of management to integrate the individual and the organisation and to provide
a working environment that permits the satisfaction of individual needs as well as the
attainment of organisational goals.

Managers are required to be competent at selecting the individuals who will be valuable to
the organisation.

They need to be observant about the individuals who are performing well and have the
potential to develop within the organisation.

They also need to be able to value individual difference and be sensitive to contrasting
needs.

Finally managers need to know themselves and understand their uniqueness and the impact
their personality has on others.
Work Analysis

Descriptive vs Prescriptive Theories or Models

- Descriptive theories explain how existing organisations work. A good descriptive

theory will provide an accurate picture of how organisations are structured and how
they operate.

- Whilst, Prescriptive theories indicate how organisations should operate. Proper

application of a good prescriptive theory will lead to an effective and efficient
organisation.

The distinction between descriptive and prescriptive theories may not be totally
clear. Elements of both may appear in a given theory.

Two Distinct Models

1. The Job Characteristics Model (JCM)

Job Characteristics Model is a theory of work design and provides “a set of implementing
principles for enriching jobs in organisational settings”

Hackman and Oldham’s (1976) developed this model against a backdrop in the 1960s and
1970s of stable employment and mass manufacture in developed economies.
The JCM is, mainly, concerned with developing jobs that are motivating, satisfying and
performed well.

This model concentrates on five key features or characteristics of work:

- Skill variety (SV)

Jobs with more skill variety require workers to use a wide range of skills. For
example, a carpenter who designs and produces his own furniture using a range of
tools and carpentry techniques has more skill variety than a warehouse worker who
simply has to load boxes or goods onto lorries

- Task identity (TI)

 Jobs with task identity allow the worker to produce or deliver an identifiable,
complete outcome. For example, a surgeon has more task identity than an auditing
team who final outcome may not be his or her responsibility.

- Task significance (TS)

More significant jobs have an impact on other people, both inside and outside the
organization. For example, jobs related to medical care or education have more task
significance than jobs in retail and food outlets.

- Autonomy (AU)

Jobs with more autonomy allow the worker to make decisions concerning how to
perform tasks, when and where to perform tasks, and even how success in
performing work tasks is evaluated. For example, architects and construction
engineers will usually have a great deal of autonomy than the construction workers.
The latter are constrained by the design and project management schedules decided
by architects and construction engineers.

- Feedback from the job (FB)

Jobs that provide feedback give an indication of how well the worker is performing.
For example, a computer programmer who compiles her own code gets feedback
from the job when the program compiles or fails to compile even whilst on testing.
In contrast, a car mechanic gets lower feedback direct from the job and the feedback
does not occur close to task completion

This tendency for high levels of job characteristics which lead to positive outcomes can be
formulated by the Motivating Potential Score (MPS).

Motivating Potential Score

When a job has a high score on the five core characteristics, it is likely to generate three
psychological states.

1. Experienced meaningfulness of work.

2. Experienced responsibility for the outcomes of work.
3. Gain confidence: Knowledge of the results of work activities.

These three psychological states can lead to positive work outcomes, such as: ▪ High internal
work motivation, ▪ High satisfaction with the work, ▪ High quality work performance, ▪ Low
absenteeism and turnover.

2. The Vitamin model

An organisation is just like a living organisms. It needs to be nourished with the right
sustenance. Just like any organism, it needs different vitamins to support its growth and
well-being.

Motivated by mass unemployment in the 1980s, Peter Warr, an organisational psychologist

developed a model termed as the Vitamin Model.

It is very useful to describe the most common job characteristics that impact employee well-
being and development.

Characteristics of the Vitamin Model

• Supportive supervision
• Opportunity for personal control (autonomy)
• Opportunity for interpersonal contact
• Externally generated goals ( job demand, task demands, role responsibility)
• Availability of financial reward
• Variety (task/job variety)
• Opportunity for skill use
• Environmental clarity (the use of policy and consistent procedures)
• Valued social position (task significance, meaningfulness of job)
• Physical security

You can think the job characteristics as ‘psychological work vitamins’. They are like different
kinds of vitamins for nourishment, that employees need to be fully productive at work.

One basic assumption is that all these characteristics are all positive so should be
encouraged. Right?

Yet Warr’s findings indicates that some job characteristics can be harmful if present at levels
that are too high or too low. Why?

Warr’s findings indicates that some job characteristics can be harmful if present at levels
that are too high or too low.

For example, vitamin D is essential to growth and normal bodily functions. Yet in excess or in
depletion it can be quite harmful.

In the same way, job characteristics that influence wellbeing at work, such as hands-on
supervision may be important in the early stages of a project but can also be harmful if it
limits personal autonomy.

Another example is an opportunity for task variety. When taken to extremes it can
contribute to work overload and increased stress.
The Nature & Context of Organisations
Organisational theories describe how organisations work. Some focus on the structure of
organisations, including the various components and how they interrelate.

Others are concerned with the interpersonal aspects of organisations, including

communication and how people relate to one another.

Finally, some focus on the interaction of the interpersonal and technical sides of
organisations.

Another consideration is how people affect the technology of the organisation, and how
does the technology affect people

Frederick W. Taylor
The first notions of formulating modern ‘Management theory' can probably be attributed to
Frederick W. Taylor (1911).

Taylor identified the inefficiencies of workers because of the widely differing methods that
they employed to perform their various tasks.
In Taylor’s days there were no work standards and no identified responsibilities for workers
or managers. Managers made decisions ad hoc and workers performed deliberately at a
slow pace. There was continual conflict between workers and managers.

Taylor’s work or Taylorism sought to change things by defining clear guidelines for improved
production efficiency.

He defined four principles of management, arguing that following them would lead to
prosperity for both managers and workers. The principles were as follows:

1. Define a science for each element of an individual's work to replace the old 'rule of
thumb' method. (Practice and experience)

2. Scientifically select, train, teach and develop the worker (previously the worker tended
to select their own work and train themselves as best they could)
3. Heartily co-operate with the workers so as to ensure that all work is done in accordance
with the principles of the science that he was developing.

4. Divide work and responsibilities almost equally between management and workers,
with management taking over the work for which it was better fitted (previously most of
the work and responsibilities were thrown on the workers).

Taylor affirmed:

• The role of managers to plan and control and workers to perform as they were instructed.
• Taylor also favoured incentive wage plans.

Bureaucratic Management
Another useful approach is Bureaucratic management. It is a theory set forth by Max
Weber. It contained two essential elements:

A. Structuring an organisation into a hierarchy.

B. Having clearly defined rules to help govern an organisation and its members.

Key elements of the Max Weber’s management theory include:

• Clearly defined job roles

• A hierarchy of authority
• Standardised procedures
• Meticulous record-keeping
• Hiring employees only if they meet the specific qualifications for a job
These two approaches are
part of the classical
theories.

As a reaction the
Neoclassical group of
theories was born.

It was a bold attempt at

incorporating the behavioural
sciences into management
thought in order to solve
the problems caused by
classical theory practice

Neo Classical Theories

Their basic premise is the idea that the role of management is to use employees to get
things done in organisations.

Neoclassical theorists concentrated on answering questions related to the best way to

motivate, structure, and support employees within the organisation.
So rather than focus on production, structures, or technology, the neoclassical theory was
concerned with the employee.

Hawthorne Studies
An important study during this time is the popular Hawthorne studies.

Almost a century ago, researchers at a manufacturing plant in Illinois observed a principle of

employee behaviour that is as true and applicable today as it was then.

In the late 1920s, managers at Hawthorne Works - a large manufacturer operating in Illinois
- asked themselves this question:

Are our employees more productive in a well-lit environment than they are in a poorly-lit
environment?

This was the beginning of the quality revolution in American business, and questions that
now seem simple to us now had to be answered then.

To answer their question, managers at Hawthorne Works hired some consultants and
commissioned a study. Their findings are probably what you would expect.

Well-lit lighting increased productivity, as did a few other variable such as :

▪ Having a clean work station

▪ Allowing employees to build and work in teams
▪ Having regular breaks

While these were the direct findings from the Hawthorne study, none of them were ground-
breaking.

But the researchers made another key observation - one that led to an idea taught in nearly
every business textbook used in the last 80 years.

The study also revealed that social factors, such as employee relationships, were an
important factor for managers to consider.

It was believed that any manager who failed to account for the social needs of his or her
employees could expect to deal with resistance and lower performance.

Employees needed to find some intrinsic value in their jobs, which they certainly were not
getting from the job that was highly standardised.

Rather than placing employees into job roles, where they completed one specific task all day
with little to no interaction with co-workers, employees could be structured in such a way
that they would frequently share tasks, information, and knowledge with one another.
The belief was that once employees were placed into this alternate structure, their needs
for socialisation would be fulfilled, and thus they would be more productive.

This social element is the core idea of the human relations movement (Elton Mayo and Fritz
J. Roethlisberger)

An approach to management based on the idea that employees are motivated not only by
financial reward but also by a range of social factors.

This can include:

• Appraisals
• Instil a sense of belonging
• Feelings of achievement and pride in one's work.

In his works Elton Mayo completely contradicts the traditional views of Taylorism and
stressed the following:

1. The power of natural groups, in which social aspects take precedence over functional
organisational structures.

2. The need for reciprocal communication, in which communication is two way, from worker
to chief executive, as well as vice versa.

3. The development of high quality leadership to communicate goals and to ensure effective
and coherent decision making

Today it has become a concern of many organisations to improve the job-oriented

interpersonal skills of employees.

The teaching of these skills to employees is referred to as "soft and skills" training.

Seven soft skills you need to be successful!

• Leadership Skills. Companies want employees who can supervise and direct other
workers. ...

• Teamwork. ...

• Communication Skills. ...

• Problem Solving Skills. ...

 • Work Ethic. ...

• Flexibility/Adaptability. ...

• Interpersonal Skills.

Organisations need their employees to be able to successfully :

• Communicate and convey information

• Interpret others' emotions and be open to others' feelings
• Solve conflicts and arrive at resolutions.

By acquiring these skills, the employees, those in management positions, and the customer
can maintain more compatible relationship

The systems approach

More recently, attention has been focused on the analysis of organisations as ‘systems’ with
a number of interrelated sub-systems.

Systems theory is not new and has been used in the natural and physical sciences for a
number of years.

NB This is NOT a theory of management – but rather another way of conceptualizing and
studying organisations

One of the founders of this approach was the biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy.

The classical approach emphasised the technical requirements of the organisation and its
needs – ‘organisations without people’.

The human relations approaches emphasised the psychological and social aspects, and the
consideration of human needs – ‘people without organisations’.

The systems approach seeks to reconcile these two earlier approaches and the work of the
formal and the informal writers.

Organisational management systems consist of many internal subsystems that need to be

continually aligned with each other.

As the organisation grow, they develop more and more complex subsystems that must
coordinate with each other in the process of transforming inputs to outputs.

Attention is focused on the total work organisation and the interrelationships of structure
and behaviour, and the range of variables within the organisation.
These interdependencies can easily become so complex that a minor event in one
subsystem may amplify into serious unintended consequences elsewhere in the
organisation.

The systems approach encourages managers to view the organisation both as a whole and
as part of a larger environment.

NB The main idea is that any part of an organisation’s activities affects all other parts.

The contingency approach

The classical approach suggested one best form of structure and placed emphasis on
general sets of principles while the human relations approach gave little attention at all to
structure.

In contrast the contingency approach showed renewed concern with the importance of
structure as a significant influence on organisational performance.

It highlights possible means of differentiating among alternative forms of organisation

structures and systems of management. There is not one optimum state. One size does not
fit all.

For example, the structure of the organisation and its ‘success’ are dependent, that is
contingent upon the nature of tasks with which it is designed to deal and the nature of
environmental influences.

So, the most appropriate structure and system of management is therefore dependent upon
the contingencies of the situation for each particular organisation.

NB The contingency approach implies that organisation theory should not seek to suggest
one best way to structure or manage organisations

but should provide insights into the situational and contextual factors which influence
management decisions.