Organizational Behavior

Nineteenth Edition, Global Edition

Chapter 1
What Is Organizational
Behavior?

Copyright © 2024 Pearson Education Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Shih-Ming Cheng (Sean, 鄭士銘 ) PhD, MSc

• PhD in Manufacturing Engineering and Operations and

Management, Nottingham University Business School.
• MSc in Manufacturing Management, University of Bradford
• National Sun Yat-sen University

• Swiss Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.

• Savior Lifetec Co., Ltd.
• Great Wall Enterprise Co., Ltd.
• COMSERVE NETWORK LTD UK
 Evaluation

1.Attendance and Class 1.Attendance ： 30%

participation ： 40%
2.Essay question ： 30%
2. Mid term exam ： 30%
3.Final report ： 40%
3. Final exam ： 30%
Learning Objectives

1.1 Define organizational behavior (O B).

1.2 Show the value of systematic study to O B.
1.3 Identify the major behavioral science disciplines that
contribute to O B.
1.4 Demonstrate why few absolutes apply to O B.
1.5 Identify managers’ challenges and opportunities in
applying O B concepts.
1.6 Compare the three levels of analysis in this text’s O B
model.
1.7 Describe the key employability skills gained from
studying O B that are applicable to other majors or
future careers.
Demonstrate the Importance of Interpersonal Skills
in the Workplace

O B skills are important because…

 “Good places to work” have better financial performance.

 Better interpersonal skills result in lower turnover of

quality employees and higher quality applications for

recruitment.
 There is a strong association between the quality of

workplace relationships and job satisfaction, stress, and

turnover.
 It fosters social responsibility awareness.
Describe the Manager’s Functions, Roles, and Skills
(1 of 4)

• Manager: Someone who gets things done through other

people in organizations.
• Organization: A consciously coordinated social unit composed
of two or more people that functions on a relatively
continuous basis to achieve a common goal or set of goals.
– Planning, organizing, leading, and controlling.
Describe the Manager’s Functions, Roles, and
Skills (2 of 4)
Exhibit 1.1 Mintzberg’s Managerial Roles

Role Description
Interpersonal
Figurehead Symbolic head; required to perform a number of routine duties of a legal
or social nature
Leader Responsible for the motivation and direction of employees
Liaison Maintains a network of outside contacts who provide favors and
information
Informational
Monitor Receives a wide variety of information; serves as nerve center of internal
and external information of the organization
Disseminator Transmits information received from outsiders or from other employees
to members of the organization
Spokesperson Transmits information to outsiders on organization’s plans, policies,
actions, and results; serves as expert on organization’s industry
Describe the Manager’s Functions, Roles, and
Skills (3 of 4)
Exhibit 1.1 Mintzberg’s Managerial Roles

Role Description
Decisional
Entrepreneur Searches organization and its environment for opportunities and
initiates projects to bring about change

Disturbance Responsible for corrective action when organization faces important,

handler unexpected disturbances

Resource Makes or approves significant organizational decisions

allocator

Negotiator Responsible for representing the organization at major negotiations

Source: H. Mintzberg, The Nature of Managerial Work, 1st ed., © 1973, pp. 92–93.
Reprinted and electronically reproduced by permission of Pearson Education, Inc., New
York, N Y.
Describe the Manager’s Functions, Roles, and Skills
(4 of 4)

• Management Skills- another way to consider what managers do

– Technical Skills – the ability to apply specialized knowledge or

expertise. All jobs require some specialized expertise, and
many people develop their technical skills on the job.
– Human Skills – the ability to work with, understand, and
motivate other people.
– Conceptual Skills – the mental ability to analyze and diagnose
complex situations.
Effective Versus Successful Managerial Activities (1 of
2)

• Luthans and his associates found that all managers

engage in four managerial activities:
• Traditional management
• Communication
• Human resource management
• Networking
Effective Versus Successful Managerial Activities (2 of
2)

Exhibit 1-2 Allocation of Activities by Time

Source: Based on F. Luthans, R. M. Hodgetts, and S. A. Rosenkrantz, Real Managers (Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1988).
Define Organizational Behavior

Organizational behavior (OB)

is a field of study that investigates the impact that
individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior
within organizations for the purpose of applying such
knowledge toward improving an organization’s
effectiveness.
Complementing Intuition with Systematic Study
• Systematic Study of Behavior
• Behavior generally is predictable if we know how the person
perceived the situation and what is important to him or her.
• Evidence-Based Management (EBM)
• Complements systematic study.
• Argues for managers to make decisions based on evidence.
• Intuition
• Systematic study and EBM add to intuition, or those “gut
feelings” about “why I do what I do” and “what makes others
tick.”
• If we make all decisions with intuition or gut instinct, we’re
likely working with incomplete information.
 Big Data
• Background:
– The use of Big Data for managerial practices is a relatively new area,
but one that holds convincing promise.
• Current Usage:
• The reasons for data analytics include predicting any event, detecting
how much risk is incurred at any time, and preventing catastrophes.
• New Trends:
• The use of Big Data for understanding, helping, and managing people
is relatively new but holds promise.
• Limitations: Privacy, offend your customer or employees.

Use evidence as much as possible to inform your

intuition and experience.
Identify the Major Behavioral Science Disciplines That
Contribute to OB (1 of 4)

• Organizational behavior is an applied behavioral

science that is built upon contributions from a
number of behavioral disciplines:
• Psychology
• Social psychology
• Sociology
• Anthropology
Identify the Major
Behavioral Science
Disciplines That
Contribute to OB (2
of 4)

Exhibit 1-3 Toward

an OB Discipline
Identify the Major Behavioral Science Disciplines
That Contribute to OB (3 of 4)

• Psychology
• seeks to measure, explain, and sometimes
change the behavior of humans and other
animals.
• Social psychology
• blends the concepts of psychology and
sociology.
• Focus on people’s influence on one another.
Identify the Major Behavioral Science Disciplines
That Contribute to OB (4 of 4)

• Sociology
• studies people in relation to their social
environment or culture.
• Anthropology
• is the study of societies to learn about human
beings and their activities.
Demonstrate Why Few Absolutes Apply to OB

• There are few, if any, simple and universal principles

that explain organizational behavior.
• Contingency variables situational factors are
variables that moderate the relationship between
the independent and dependent variables.
(XY, under the conditions specified in Z)
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of OB
Concepts (1 of 10)
OB POLL Percentage of Men and Women Working

Sources: Based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Women in the Labor Force: A Datebook,” 2014,
www.bls.gov/opub/reports/cps/women-in-the-labor-force-adatabook-2014.pdf; and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Economic
News Release,” 2013, http://www.bls.gov/news.release/ecopro.t02.htm.
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B
Concepts (2 of 10)

• Managing workforce diversity

• Workforce diversity – organizations are becoming
more heterogeneous in terms of gender identity,
age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and other
characteristics
• Workforce inclusion – creating and maintaining
workplaces that support and leverage their
members’ diversity.
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B Concepts
(3 of 10)

Responding to globalization

• Increased expatriate assignments.

• Expatriate – person who works outside
their native country.
• Working with people from different
cultures.
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B
Concepts (4 of 10)
• Using technology and social media at work
• Policies on accessing social media at work.
• When, where, and for what purpose.
• Impact of social media on employee well-
being.
• “Always-on” culture of the virtual workplace.
• Making virtual workers a part of the
team.
• Achieving work-life balance.
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B Concepts
(5 of 10)

• Improving ethical behavior

• Ethical dilemmas and ethical choices are
situations in which an individual is required to
define right and wrong conduct.
• Good ethical behavior is not so easily
defined.
• Managers need to create an ethically healthy
climate.
• Ethics training
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B Concepts
(6 of 10)

• Practicing corporate social responsibility

(C S R)
• Environmental sustainability initiatives
• Nonprofit work
• Volunteering
• Charitable giving
• Sustainability training and development
• Triple bottom line: people, planet, revenue
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B
Concepts (7 of 10)
• Creating a positive work environment
• Positive organizational scholarship is concerned
with how organizations develop human strength, foster
vitality and resilience, and unlock potential.
• This field of study focuses on employees’ strengths
versus their limitations, as employees share situations
in which they performed at their personal best.

(Target what’s good about them instead of what’s wrong

with them)
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B Concepts
(8 of 10)

• Responding to the Gig Economy

• Independent and autonomous work
• “a company of one”
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of OB
Concepts (9 of 10)
Exhibit 1-4 Employment Options
Identify the Challenges and Opportunities of O B
Concepts (10 of 10)

• Managing crises
• The differences between good and bad
management can be the differences between
profit and loss or survival or failure.
• How can we use our knowledge of workplace
behavior to inform decision making during
crises?
Three Levels of Analysis in This Text’s OB Model
(1 of 4)
Exhibit 1-5 A Basic OB Model
Three Levels of Analysis in This Book’s OB Model (2
of 4)

• Inputs
• Variables like personality, group
structure, and organizational
culture that lead to processes.
• Group structure, roles, and team
responsibilities are typically
assigned immediately before or
after a group is formed.
• Organizational structure and
culture change over time.
Three Levels of Analysis in This Book’s OB Model (3
of 4)

• Processes
• If inputs are like the nouns in
organizational behavior,
processes are like verbs.
• Defined as actions that
individuals, groups, and
organizations engage in as a
result of inputs, and that lead
to certain outcomes.
Three Levels of Analysis in This Book’s OB Model (4 of 4)

• Outcomes
• Key variables that
you want to explain
or predict, and that
are affected by
some other
variables.
Outcome Variables (1 of 5)

Attitudes and stress

• Employee attitudes are the evaluations
employees make, ranging from positive to
negative, about objects, people, or events.
• Stress is an unpleasant psychological process
that occurs in response to environmental
pressures.
Outcome Variables (2 of 5)

•
Job performance
• The total value of your contributions to an
organization through your behaviors reflects your
level of job performance.

Task performance
• The combination of effectiveness and efficiency at
doing your core job tasks is a reflection of your level
of task performance.
Outcome Variables (3 of 5)

Organizational citizenship behavior(OCB)

• The discretionary behavior that is not part of an
employee’s formal job requirements, and that
contributes to the psychological and social
environment of the workplace, is called
organizational citizenship behavior.
Outcome Variables (4 of 5)

Withdrawal behavior
• Withdrawal behavior is the set of actions that
employees take to separate themselves from the
organization.
Team performance
•

• Team performance is the quantity and

quality of a team’s work output.
Outcome Variables (5 of 5)
• Productivity
• An organization is productive if it achieves its goals
by transforming inputs into outputs at the lowest
cost.
• This requires both effectiveness and efficiency.

• Survival
• The final outcome is organizational survival, which is
simply evidence that the organization is able to exist
and grow over the long term.
The Plan of the Text
Exhibit 1-6 The Plan of the Text
Employability Skills

• Critical thinking and creativity

• Communication
• Collaboration
• Self-management
• Social responsibility
• Leadership
• Career management
 Implications for Managers (1 of 2)

• Resist the inclination to rely on generalizations; some

provide valid insights into human behavior, but many are
erroneous.
• A nuanced understanding of the situation is often needed
to reach the best solutions. Try to understand the people
involved and the context. From there, try and figure out
what works, what does not work, and any contingencies
that qualify these practices.
• Strive for evidence-based solutions to problems and
evaluate your hunches and intuition critically.
 Implications for Managers (2 of 2)

• Work on your people skills to better interact with peers, work

on teams more effectively, and both lead and manage your
followers to do great things.
• Improve your technical skills and conceptual skills through
training and staying current with O B trends like big data and
fast data.
• O B can improve your employees’ work quality and productivity
by showing you how to empower your employees, design and
implement change programs, improve customer service, and
help your employees balance work–life conflicts.