Affect-Cognition-Behavior System and Internal Conflict Resolutions - Assignment Example

Organizational behavior Task Employee happiness and harmony are important aspects in an organization. They have a great impact in both individual productivity and the overall productivity of the organization. Therefore, the anatomical structure of the organization should be designed in such a way that employee happiness and harmony in the organization are promoted. Being the president of the company, I would create more emphasis on conflict reducing strategies in a bid to solve the problems facing the company. The initial step would be the formulation of company values. I would ensure that all the employees have known the values of the company. To ensure that all the employees are up to date with the company values, I would organize annual events whereby the employees will be reminded on the core company values. Internal conflict resolution has been found to be more effective as compared to external methods such as courts. To come up with a good conflict resolution strategy, I would seek the opinion of the employees on workplace conflict guidelines. Conflict resolution should begin at the departmental level so that small disputes are handled before they blow up (Taylor, Rebekah, and Pamela 24). Every department should have a conflict mediator who will be trained on conflict mediation. Although training would be expensive in the short-term as compared to hiring mediators, it will be worth the cost since no new wages will be incurred in the future. Department managers will be trained as conflict mediators. Integration of management skills and conflict mediation will help solve conflicts wisely. Ineffective communication problems are bound to cause havoc in a working environment. As the new manager, I will ensure that communication channels are effective so as to avoid misunderstanding. The structure of the organization will be altered so that communication will be easier. Every department head will communicate directly to a central manager whose main function will be coordinating the different departments. The central manager will pass information from department to department and hence no cases of departmental misunderstanding will arise. According to Taylor, improper communication in departments is the root cause of conflicts in organizations (Taylor, Rebekah, and Pamela 56). He argues that a central communication point helps solve communication problems. Task 2 Fair evaluation is defined as the process of determining an individual’s job-related actions without favoring or discriminating them. Fair evaluation also means that the employee’s performance is gauged on requirements and standards that are well known to him/her. Evaluation forms the basis of appraisals development which in turn dictates the people to promote. It is necessary to evaluate people fairly so that they can have equal chances of promotion or even salary increment. Unfair evaluation leads to a situation whereby the true picture of the employee is hidden and hence making people judge them incorrectly. Fair valuation is important to all parties in the industry. The current employers benefit since they get to know the ability and potential of their employee. Fair evaluation motivates the employee and helps them work hard and, therefore, improves their productivity. It creates a platform of fair competition among the employees. Fair competition promotes unity and cooperation among the employees. Psychological problems can hinder fair evaluation. Blaming others is one psychological problem that hinders fair evaluation. Blaming people leads to the reduction of their credibility. Such persons fail to be fairly evaluated since they are blamed for mistakes that might not belong to them. Bad attitudes and wrong moods may lead to unfair evaluation. Diffusion of responsibility also hinders fair evaluation. Some employees fail to perform their responsibilities since those responsibilities are shared. Egocentric biases between the employee and the evaluator may lead to unfair evaluation (Kirkpatrick 9). Every organization should ensure that their evaluation system is fair. The evaluation team should not be bias and most preferably should keep on changing. A frequent change on the team reduces chances of favoritism. The organization should not only rely on an internal system to evaluate their employees. External evaluations can be organized so that high accuracy of evaluation is attained. Task 3 In the modern day, people have adopted a culture of minding themselves more than others. A higher percentage of people in the society are more involved in their personal development. Lack of the will for group or community development has been extended to the workplaces. The main cultural cause of the current increase in Narcissistic supply is gender inequality (DuBrin 65). Some cultures value certain genders more than others. People of such genders tend to adopt Narcissistic behaviors. Competition for success has become a norm in the modern day. Everybody wants to feel superior to others, and thus they unwillingly become Narcissistic. An organization with a high number of Narcissistic people is bound to experience many challenges. With Narcissistic people, teamwork becomes a challenge. The employees fail to cooperate and thus the rate of goal attainment goes down. The management in an organization with many Narcissists is likely to experience frequent employee disputes. The caliber of customer service will go down since such people may not serve customers in the best way. Due to this, it is necessary that an organization should control the numbers of Narcissists. The recruitment and selection team should be trained on identification of people with such disorders. Alternatively, employees with the Narcissist disorder should be educated on how to control and live with the disorder. Canceling will help this kind of employees learn to cooperate with others by controlling their behavior. In cases whereby this group of people fails to be identified during hiring or fail to control their behaviors after cancelling, a new mode of action can be adopted. The management should ensure that their core values are against narcissistic characters. Penalties for Narcissistic behaviors should be hefty. The most effective punishment is firing since such characters will be eliminated if their behaviors violate the set company values (DuBrin 217). Task 4 In psychology, attitude is said to be feelings of like or dislike towards someone or something which can influence ones behavior. Attitude is a combination of feelings, behavior, and cognition to form an integrated affect-cognition-behavior system. The three components work hand in hand. Any alteration on one component influences the entire attitude structure. According to the tricomponent attitude model, attitude is made up of three components; cognitive component, affects component, and the conative component. They work together and have influence on the development of an attitude. The figure below shows the tricomponent attitude model (Batra & Kazmi 171).  The condition whereby a person experiences conflicting attitudes is referred to as cognitive dissonance. While experiencing cognitive dissonance, one is bound to have a lot of discomfort which leads to alteration of their behaviors in order to restore balance of the two conflicting attitudes. According to psychologists, all human being have an inner drive which always attempts to eliminate discomforts by restoring a balance in conflicting attitudes. A perfect example is when an alcoholic person takes alcohol while at the same time they are aware that their behavior is bound to cause cirrhosis. The theory of cognitive dissonance states that at every time, a human beings mind seeks cognitive consistency and thus their attitudes are bound to change when they experience cognitive dissonance. The individual under this situation ends up forcing themselves to change their behaviors, gaining more information or make new decisions. Every person has their own evaluation on attitude. Evaluation of an attitude depends on how a person’s consideration on evidence to a certain issue or situation. This phenomenon is referred to as attitude polarization (Hogg & Scott 268). It is caused by the tendency of people to selectively interpret evidence. Some people will have vague evidence while others will have accurate evidence. The evaluation of attitude by the two people will give different results. Therefore, the bias in the evaluation of evidence leads to disagreement in attitude evaluation. For example, when a murder case occurs, a person A might want the murderer to be heavily punished. A person B, on the other hand, might be looking at what would have caused the person to murder another person. Person B’s attitude towards the murderer will differ to person A’s attitude since they have different perspectives to the scenario. Attitude can be based on one’s past experiences. Previous interactions of a person with other people can make them have a certain perspective on certain behaviors. Influential people such as parents and close friends can also make someone evaluate things in a certain way. When a person says that a certain attitude is bad, this may be due to their interaction with another person who may have thought in a similar manner. In such a case, the person evaluating another person’s attitude is also talking about someone else. A son may evaluate behavior like their parents would. Their evaluation not only talks about the person in question but also tells something about the son’s parents. Task 5 A perfect employee is made up of many personal traits. The combination of all the traits makes them perfect. A single character or trait cannot make a person perfect. Although not a single person may possess all the traits, having more traits of an ideal employee makes them perfect (Pandey 4). A perfect employee should be action-oriented such that they are always ready to take chances. They must be intelligent and be in a position to think critically before making judgments and conclusions. A perfect employee is ambitious. Being ambitious promotes innovativeness and increases creativity. A perfect employee should have good leadership skills and at the same time be humble and ready to listen to others and follow instruction. They must be always ready to set higher targets and have the energy to beat the challenges that they face in reaching the new targets. A perfect employee should fit into different cultures and be able to work with diverse people. Honesty is of key importance to any employee. A perfect employee should be confident so that they can widen their chances of attaining success. Being hardworking and keen to detail is an unavoidable character in a perfect employee. Task 6 Stereotyping is defined as having rigid beliefs or generalized beliefs about certain people or groups. Stereotyping can also be defined as generalizing something based on a single element or character. From the picture, the antelope believes that all lionesses are dangerous. This is a form of stereotype since there is no proof that the lioness is dangerous. The antelope makes a judgment that the lioness is dangerous because other lionesses attack antelopes. Although it might be true, it is a stereotype since it is based on generalization. On normal occasions, lions and antelopes are enemies since the latter is the prey of the previous. It is expected that the antelopes will free on the sight of the lioness. However, one antelopes thinks that the other is stereotyping. This is unexpected and hence a case of irony. Stereotyping can be both advantageous and disadvantageous (Schneider 12). Stereotyping leads to incorrect judgment of individuals. It does not pay attention to individuality and hence have a high probability of being wrong. It is unfair to give the character of a person in a group based on another person’s character in the same group. Assuming individuality creates misconception. However, stereotyping may also be very good and advantageous. It helps a person to respond rapidly to situations. It increases cautiousness and thus reducing the probability of being caught by situations off-guard. It allows a person have preset expectations. It helps one simplify the surrounding by categorizing things in groups. Works Cited Batra, Satish K, and S H. H. Kazmi. Consumer Behavior: Text and Cases. New Delhi: Excel Books, 2008. Print. DuBrin, Andrew J. Narcissism in the Workplace: Research, Opinion and Practice. , 2012. Print. Hogg, Michael, and Scott Tindale. Blackwell Handbook of Social Psychology: Group Processes. Oxford: John Wiley & Sons, 2007. Internet resource. Kirkpatrick, Donald L. How to Improve Performance through Appraisal and Coaching. New York, N.Y: AMACOM, 2002. Print. Pandey, Niti. Examining the Impact of Demographic Characteristics on Employees Benefits Preferences: The Study of a U.S. Manufacturing Corporation. , 2008. Print. Schneider, David J. The Psychology of Stereotyping. New York: Guilford Press, 2005. Print. Taylor, Judith C, Rebekah Lashman, and Pamela Helling. Practical Problem-Solving Skills in the Workplace. New York: American Management Association, 2014. Print. Read More