Organizational Behavior Essentials

Organizational Behavior Essentials

McShane & Von Glinow

Ch 1 Introduction to Organizational Behavior

Organizational behavior is the study of what people think, feel, and do in and around organizations. Organizations are groups of people who work interdependently toward some purpose. OB concepts help us to predict and understand organizational events, adopt more accurate theories of reality, and influence organizational events. This field of knowledge also improves the organization's financial health.

There are several trends in organizational behavior, including

 globalization,

 the changing workforce,

 evolving employment relationships,

 virtual work, and

 workplace values and ethics.

Organizational behavior scholars rely on five anchors to understand and study organizations:

1) OB knowledge should be multidisciplinary;

2) it should be based on systematic research;

3) organizational events usually have contingencies;

4) organizational behavior can be viewed from three levels of analysis (individual, team, and organization); and

5) organizations are open systems.

The open systems anchor suggests that organizations acquire resources from the environment, transform them through technology, and return outputs to the environment. The external environment consists of the natural and social conditions outside the organization.

Knowledge management is any structured activity that improves an organization's capacity to acquire, share, and use knowledge in ways that improve its survival and success. Intellectual capital is knowledge that resides in an organization, including its human capital, structural capital, and relationship capital. Organizations acquire knowledge through hiring, individual learning, and experimentation. Knowledge sharing occurs through various forms of communication, ranging from computer intranets to informal face-to-face gatherings. Knowledge use occurs when employees realize that the knowledge is available and that they have enough freedom to apply it. Organizational memory refers to the storage and preservation of intellectual capital.

Ch 2 Individual Behavior, Values, and Personality

Individual behavior is influenced by motivation, ability, role perceptions, and situational factors (MARS).

 Motivation