Changing Patterns of the Work and Employment and the Key Underlying Reasons for These Changes - Article Example

How a person acts in the workplace and his or her interactions with others can have a great influence on the work environment as a whole. If a manager does not have a positive demeanor, the entire company could fail. This is because employee moral is very important to running a successful business. Keeping things positive is very important for companies and one way to keep employees positive is to ensure that they are happy in their roles within the company. This is a large part of the decision making process within a company because it is what keeps things moving smoothly. An administrator must not listen to the gossip and rumors that are flying around and must also make sure that the employees are kept happy, so that they will not have any reason to make those rumors true. Employees must be comfortable within the workplace in order to perform to their greatest ability and it is the administrator’s job to make sure that these needs are met. Management must be very responsible for the actions of its employees, but this responsibility can come in a number of different ways. Firstly, making the working environment one in which the employee is comfortable and proud to be a part of is essential to keeping things in line. If this is done from the beginning, management will have fewer problems to deal with later on down the road and, therefore, keeping tabs on the employees becomes less of an issue. The less disciplinary issues that arise, the better the working environment, so creating an office where these issues never come up is ideal. This can be done by placing every employee in a position that he or she is suited for. This means that management must evaluate each employee and see if he or she is being utilized properly. An effective manager will know what role each employee belongs in because these employees will be happiest in a role that is suited for them. Management is greatly responsible for its employees’ behaviors and actions and, therefore, management must find the most effective ways to do so. The book First, Break All the Rules: What the Worlds Greatest Managers Do Differently, by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, is a new look at the business world and it gives new managerial techniques that have not been used in past generations. Perhaps most importantly, this book tells managers to focus on their employees’ strengths and attempt to get the most out of them, rather than placing them in situations where their weaknesses will be exploited. This is done in order to get the most out of every employee, which will make the work environment much more productive. This book is an excellent source for any manager who wishes to discover how to get the most out of his or her employees. This is especially important for small businesses, as they have far less room for error. This business book was written for managers of companies of any size in order for them to learn how an effective leader should run a business. The authors have quite a bit of experience in this field, as they have written many business books before, and they took their information from over 80,000 different interviews that were conducted by Gallup polls. This shows that they have thoroughly research this subject and, therefore, they are knowledgeable authorities on the subject. This knowledge on the subject helps create a situation where the material is presented in a fashion that is useable for business executives when dealing with employee management, behaviors, and actions on a day-to-day basis in the business world. This most important tip that is given in this book is to put people in a role where they are most likely to succeed, since “no ones perfect. No one possesses all of the talents needed to excel in a particular role” (Buckingham and Coffman 167). Since every brain is different, different people will thrive in different working environments and situations. Just because one person is able to complete a task with relative ease, does not mean that his or her replacement will be able to, and it is up to the manger to figure out who is capable of doing what. If a manager wants his or her employees to be productive, he or she should put them in a role where they are most likely to succeed, not just a role that has yet to be filled because “when someone leaves a company, he takes value with him - more often than not, straight to the competition“ (Buckingham and Coffman 23). Think of it as being similar to putting a famous quarterback like Joe Montana at a position like offensive tackle. If a coach had done this, there is not doubt that Joe Montana would not have been a successful football player and, therefore, his coach would not have been happy with him and his career would have been very short. If a worker is not put in a role that he or she can thrive in, then he or she will not perform to the best of his or her abilities and neither the worker nor the manager will be happy. For small business owner, this is especially important because there are less people around to catch mistakes than there would be in a large corporation. Therefore, a small business owner should remember that in order to be competitive, each and every worker must contribute to the best of his or her abilities and the only way that this will happen is if each worker is put into a situation that he or she is comfortable with. A force that allows for employers to have a psychological advantage over their employees is job security. There have been massive layoffs lately and those who were lucky enough to keep their jobs must work hard to ensure that they are just as lucky when the next cuts are made. This gives the employers all of the power, as they can work the employees harder, without any backlash because there are so few jobs in many sectors. The employers know that if an employee does not perform up to expectations, then someone else will be readily available to take his or her place. The employees also know this so they must work hard to keep their jobs. The second force at work here is the amount of money that these employees are currently making. While the extra work does tire the employees out quite a bit, they know that there might not be another time when work is this profitable so they work especially hard. The employers have all the power right now in the workforce. This backfires, however, because employees have learned not to trust their employers anymore. This distrust means that businesses are no longer run with both the employee and the employer’s best interests in mind, but rather everyone is only looking out for themselves. Employees no longer have any loyalty towards their company which means that they take less pride in what they do or how they speak about it. There is always the fear of losing one’s job, which might make the employee work harder, but it might also make the employee just do enough so that he or she is not fired. This would mean that he or she will do just enough to stay away from the forefront, so that he or she will not be among the cuts if the company is downsized. Mergers are another thing that factor into this problem, as they can leave the employees who do survive the downsizing in a foreign environment with completely new ways of doing things. The new landscape in the business world has led to constant cultural changes. For example, with corporate mergers becoming a very regular thing, there is often disgruntlement amongst employees of the corporation that has been taken over. This leads to them being even less trusting of their new bosses and, at the same time, confused about what their day-to-day duties are as well as where they sit in office politics. Office politics can very often come into play in situations like this because people who were parts of the two corporations that have merged will form separate subcultures. This can lead to divisions within the company, which will cause all of the internal workings to be fragmented. Winners of the merger will also often place their will upon the losers, which makes the losing side even more disgruntled and can make the work environment even more fragmented. Those who were a part of the losing side of the merger are forced to adapt to an entirely different culture and that is a very difficult thing to do. While in theory they are doing the exact same job as before, things could be different because the new company will have a much different way of doing things. This can also lead to things like longer hours and averted overtime pay, which would completely ruin employee moral and cause them to look for other employment opportunities. While there would be some employees would might believe that it is still worth it, many of them would be forced to look for other jobs, as they would not be able to handle the workload, especially without the promise of overtime pay. Employees would also begun putting less effort into their work, as they would begin to have distain for the company. This type of policy would almost certainly lead to a backlash by employees, as they would not be given a fair deal if this were to happen. Conflicts will happen in society regardless of how people act towards each other, so it is important to resolve these conflicts when they do occur in order to calm down volatile situations. Many times, these conflicts will come about as a result of stereotypes, or stereotypes will effect how the situation is handled, and therefore, it is important that people know how to resolve these types of conflicts, so that they do not escalate into something more serious in the future. One such situation where stereotypes might come into play is with sexism. Men and women have stereotypes of each other and these can lead to conflicts. Many times, there might not even be a reason for conflict, but conflict does occur anyway because the participants get the wrong idea because of pre-existing stereotypes. The same can be said for racism, as different races have developed stereotypes of each other that can lead to conflict in various situations. The main thing that can be done in order to eliminate these stereotypes is to educate everyone that they are not necessarily true and also speak about the dangers of them continuing. One such situation where stereotypes might affect the resolution of a conflict is when a male is attempting to resolve a conflict with a female, or the other way around. Males often stereotype females as being moody and difficult to deal with and this causes them to speak differently to females. Females are also regarded as being the weaker sex, which can effect how a man will talk to them, which will also effect how the conflict is resolved. Men, since they are generally more aggressive than females, can sometimes use intimidation in order to have the desired resolution to a conflict. What this does, however, is lead to the conflict not really being solved at all, which can lead to problems in the future. With these stereotypes in place, it is often difficult to realize what exactly needs to be done to resolve any conflicts. For example, if a man is behaving in a manner that is stereotypically male, then is it reasonable for a female to ask him to stop? This is a huge question because females and males do not understand each other all that well, so with differing behavioral patterns, conflicts are inevitable because we do not live in an ideal world. The most important thing that could be done in order to resolve conflicts that are impacted by stereotypes would be to educate people more completely than has been done in the past. A workplace conflict that has sexism or racism involved can be much more difficult to overcome because it is like a personal attack on the other person. While many workplace conflicts are a direct result of performance, situations where sex and race are brought into the equation are always much more volatile and more difficult to contain. One way to educate people is to get them to look at it in a different manner. While many negative stereotypes do come from African-American culture, African-Americans are proud of this culture and wish to protect it, much the same way an Irish-American would like to protect his or her culture, even if it leads to him or her being labeled as a drunk. It is important to look at both sides of the story to see what is best for everyone, not just what looks best on the surface. Stereotyping comes from assumptions so it is necessary to educate people about the truth of the matter in order to avoid these problems in the future. In order to keep an organization running smoothly, the administrator must keep any negative attitudes that exist out of the building. By eliminating certain things from the work environment, he or she will be able to focus on work-related problems, which will make his or her job much easier in the future. By following a specific course of action, he or she will be able to do more job more affectively. First, he or she should focus on eliminating any negativity in the workplace, as this is a change that has been implemented in most businesses recently. The attitudes of the employees are something that must constantly be considered by management. Next, administrators should attempt to raise worker moral even further by making sure that every employee is in a role that he or she is best suited for. Thirdly, conflicts that might arise in the workplace are now handled in a much more professional manner, which helps to eliminate the social problems that could occur, and people are only terminated if they are in flagrant violation of company policies. Following hearsay is a dangerous thing for a manager to do, so he or she must make sure that he or she knows the facts before making any personnel moves. If the administrator is able to do these things, he or she will run the company much more effectively and will also have the respect of his or her employees. This will be a huge advantage when motivating employees in the future, as well as dissolving any conflicts that may occur while in this position. The workplace has changed in recent times because of the competitiveness to keep the best employees and to keep them happy. The workplace is becoming more worker friendly, especially those workers with a great reputation, because good workers are becoming increasingly difficult to find. Works Cited Buckingham, Marcus and Coffman, Curt. First, Break All the Rules: What the Worlds Greatest Managers Do Differently. New York: Simon and Schuster. 1999. Read More