Organizational Behavior Analysis - Term Paper Example

? Organizational Behavior Analysis Organizational Behavior Analysis Organizational behavior (OB) refers to the attitudes and behaviors of individualsand groups in organization. As such organizations are inactive or lifeless entities. Individuals and groups are responsible for giving life to an organization. An organization speaks or communicates with the external world through its employees. Since individuals and groups have different attitudes and behavior patterns, OB can be described as the sum total of individual and group behaviors. It is often said that that no two individuals are alike. If that is true, it is logical to say that no two organizations are the same either in behavior, culture or attitude. Organizational behavior plays a vital role in determining the success and failures of modern organizations. Globalization and liberalization have brought huge changes in organizations world. Modern organizations are working in a multicultural environment. Diverse workforce is common in most of the current organizations. Multicultural workforce would definitely have diverse communication means. Same way, strategies necessary to motivate a diverse workforce could be extremely different. Instead of intelligence quotient, emotional quotient of the employees appears to be more important in modern organizations. In short, new paradigms of OB are entering organizational world as time goes on. Apple Inc. is one of the prominent organizations in the world at present. They are the second largest in terms of market capitalization and also the most valuable technology company in the world at present. This paper analyses the importance of culture, communication, motivational techniques, emotional quotient and new paradigms in controlling the behavior of modern organizations, by taking Apple Inc. as the example. Culture As mentioned earlier, multiculturalism is not a myth, but a fact in modern organizations. It brings plenty of opportunities and challenges in the current organizational world. Pluralism and dualism are common in modern organizations. Pluralism refers to the diversity of views, and stands in opposition an approach whereas dualism refers to the existence of different cultures in organizations. Values, beliefs, norms and behavioral patterns of one culture may not be the same in other cultures. When people from different cultures are working in the same organization, human resource managers may face lot of problems. The success of the organization lies in how well the HR managers solve such problems. For example, Muslims always like to have weekly off on Fridays whereas Christians like to have that on Sundays. These kind of contrasting interests or beliefs often cause problems to the HR managers. Even in the same culture, different subcultures often exist. For example, Roman Catholics and Protestants are two of the prominent communities in the Christian culture. Same way, Shia, Sunnis Kurds and Arabs are the subcultures in Islamic culture. The behavior, rituals, and customs of these subcultures are often different. “Some cultures put more emphasis on universal commitments (like honesty) while others put more weight on loyalty to particular people and relationships” (Ghemawat and Reiche, 2011, p.2). For example, people from some cultures are ready to tell even lies to save the interests of their companion. Such people places the value of relationships much above than anything else in this world. At the same time there are plenty of people who are not ready to tell lies even when their friends need their support badly. In short, modern organizations are operating based on the principles of pluralism and dualism and hence the salad bowl theory is extremely relevant to the modern organizations. As everybody knows, salad in a bowl consists of different vegetables and fruits. In other words, salads integrate the tastes of different vegetables and fruits and give eaters a unique taste. The taste of a salad is the sum total of the tastes of the individual components in it. It should be noted that the final taste of the salad would be entirely different from the tastes of individual fruits or vegetables. In short, a multicultural organizational behavior would be different from the behaviors of a single culture organization. Since people from different cultures are working in an organization, the possibility of evolution of a unique organizational culture cannot be ruled out as the case of the taste of salad in a bowl. Communication “Communication is not just speaking, writing or gesticulating. It's more than the transmission of information” (Effective Business Communication, n. d). Communication is the entity which gives life to an organization. In other words, it is blood of an organization. No organization can survive long if it fails to incorporate proper communication strategies in its premises. Apple seems to be having a bad reputation in terms of communication with its employees. They often develop new products without taking the employees into confidence. “Apple employees know something big is afoot when the carpenters appear in their office building. New walls are quickly erected. Doors are added and new security protocols put into place. Windows that once were transparent are now frosted. Other rooms have no windows at all. They are called lockdown rooms: No information goes in or out without a reason” (Lashinsky, 2012). Effective communication is easy in a single culture environment whereas it is difficult in a multicultural environment. The cultural dimensions of communication are well documented by former professor of Eastern Michigan University, David A. Victor in his famous LESCANT model. They are Language, Environment, Social organization, Contexting, Authority, Nonverbal behavior, and Temporal conception (Kelm, N.d., p.2). The importance of language for communication is known to everybody. When an American speaks to another American, both of them understand the ideas of each other quite clearly because of the absence of any language barrier. However when an American speaks to a Chinese person, the barriers of language, differences of nonverbal communication means and many other factors influence and effectiveness of the communication. Apple is a company in which people from different parts of the world are working. Verbal communication is often been a problem in Apple because of the language barrier. For example, the accent of Americans is extremely difficult for others to grasp, even though they know English language well. Many people have the illusion that most of the communication occurs through verbal channels. However, modern studies have proved that more than 60% of the messages conveyed in a communication process are through nonverbal channels. Nonverbal communication helps people to avoid conflicts and clashes. Verbal means of showing displeasure and nonverbal means of showing displeasure affect the party at the receiving end differently. Body languages, gestures, hand signals, eye contacts, touching behaviors, head movements, shrugs, dresses etc are some of the major means of nonverbal communication. An American may shake hands to greet others whereas a Chinese person may bow his head to mark his respect towards others. Understanding of such nonverbal channels of communications by different cultures is important for an organization while operates in a multicultural environment. Diverse Apple employees have little idea about the nonverbal means of communication of others. “Social context influences information exchange through perception, cognitive interpretation, and communication behavior. Social context barriers, such as status differences, will not constrain communication if senders and receivers are unaware of them” (Sproull and Kiesler , p.1495). Americans are predominantly dominating type whereas Japanese people are exactly opposite in nature. Japanese people often show readiness to hear the views of others. They are good listeners. On the other hand, Americans normally try to dominate in a communication process and they are poor listeners. Thomas hardy once said that “A man's silence is wonderful to listen to”. In other words, it is easy to become a great orator, but it is difficult to become a good listener. In short, social context plays a vital role in the communications process in a multicultural organization. The domination of American employees in Apple Company often forces others to stay as passive listeners. The perceptions of time are different in different cultures. Some cultures are monochromic whereas other cultures are polychromic. Monochromic styles concentrate one thing at a time. Such people do not believe in more than one type of relationships. On the other hand, polychromic styles believe in doing many things at a time. Such people do not have any reluctance in maintaining more than one type of relationships at the same time. In short, different time perceptions can bring different views and opinions in the organizational world. The different temporal conceptions among diverse Apple employees often bring many problems in the organization. Motivational Techniques “Motivation is the inner power that pushes human toward taking action and toward achievements. Motivation is powered by desire and ambition, and therefore, if they are absent, motivation is absent too” (Sasson, 2013). There are two types of people in this word according to the XY theory of motivation; those who are interested in doing works and those who dislike their works. Different strategies are necessary to motivate different types of people. People who are interested in their works should get rewards whereas people who dislike their works should get punishment as a strategy to motivate them. “Because of this inherent dislike of work, most people must be coerced, controlled, directed, or threatened so as to induce them to put forth enough effort so as to meet their goals and get their work done” (Furst, 2009). Motivation can be of two types; intrinsic and extrinsic. According to Areepattamannil et al., (2011), “Intrinsically motivated behaviors are those whose motivation is based in the inherent satisfactions of the behaviors per se, rather than in contingencies or reinforcements that are operationally separable from those activities”(p.428). Intrinsic motivation is driven by inherent traits. Suppose a computer engineer being asked to work in the accounts department. He will never be motivated to undertake those jobs because of his inherent likes towards another profession. On the other hand, if he is allowed to work in the computer division, no further motivational techniques are necessary to bring out his inherent traits. “Extrinsic motivation, by contrast, “refers to a broad array of behaviors having in common the fact that activities are engaged in not for reasons inherent in them, but for instrumental reasons” (Vallerand and Ratelle 2002, p. 42). Unlike intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation is driven by external factors. Even if a computer engineer was successful in getting a profession in the computer field, he may not be motivated properly, if the organization fails to provide him necessary working conditions and environment. Suppose the organization asks him to stay back for overtime on a regular basis, he will not be motivated much because of failure in maintaining a work-life balancing. Same way, if the organization follows an autocratic management style, the employee may not be motivated much. Racial discrimination, prejudices, biases, stereotyping, gender inequalities etc are some of the other factors which prevent an employee from getting motivated to his work. “In situations where pressures to work longer hours are higher, employees feel overloaded and likely to experience greater dissatisfaction with their jobs which may result in higher stress and fatigue, and greater work—life imbalance” (Macky, 2008, p.38). It should be noted that modern employees like to work as part of teams to reduce job stress. Apple on the other hand encourages individual work more than team work. Moreover, Apple often threatens the employees that the company is more concerned with employability rather than employment security. All these factors demotivate Apple employees extrinsically. “The work culture in Apple is demanding and the employees forced to work for 60-70 hours per week” (Qumer, 2009, p.7). In other words, Apple provides less importance to work-life balancing compared to other organizations. Even though Apple employees are getting good remuneration, they are experiencing huge job stress also. “Unfairness in promotions and overall treatment is a common complaint in Apple Company” (Qumer, 2009, p.15). Apple gives promotions based on skin color rather than abilities. Such organizational culture is causing big damage to Apple’s reputation as a valuable company. Emotional Quotient “Many people with high cognitive intelligence achieve the success, but many people with low cognitive intelligence are successful” (Ghorbani and Sani, 2012, p.1110). This is because of the fact that some people have better emotional quotient even though they have low cognitive intelligence. EQ is much more important than IQ in organizational world. The challenges in modern corporate world severely test the emotional stability of the employees rather than their intelligence. Emotional intelligence refers to the ability handle feelings. It also represents one’s ability to read the emotions of others. Since the work culture in Apple is demanding, they are always interested in recruiting employees with better EQ. They know very well that turnover rate would increase drastically if they fail to recruit people with poor EI. New paradigms Since theories and principles of doing business are changing rapidly, new paradigms are entering the organizational world quite regularly. Organizations forced to make drastic changes in their behavior because of rapid changes in the business sector. For example, exchange of workforce is taking place rapidly across the world because of globalization. It is impossible for a multicultural organization to cater the needs of only a specific group of people and neglect the needs of others. Strategic human resource management is a new paradigm in the organizational world at present because of the entry of multiculturalism in the corporate world. Apple has the bad reputation of treating the overseas employees. They are often blamed for looking after the interests of only Americans while neglecting the needs of others. Conclusions An organization’s behavior can be evaluated based on its management of culture, communication, motivational techniques, and emotional quotient. Apple Inc. has bad reputation in terms of motivating the employees and providing opportunities for work life balancing. Many of the Apple employees are demotivated because of the unfairness in promotions, racial discriminations and the tight secrecy the company keeps while developing new products. The dominance of Americans in Apple Company is causing big problems to employees from other parts of the world. Apple should improve its OB drastically to keep its reputation intact and to develop further in the right direction. References Effective Business Communication. (n.d). Retrieved from http://www.howtobooks.co.uk/business/networking/ Furst, P. G. (2009). Supervisor’s role in employee performances Retrieved from http://www.irmi.com/expert/articles/2009/furst11-construction-risk-management.aspx Ghemawat, P. & Reiche, S. (2011). National Cultural Differences and Multinational Business. Globalization Note Series. Retrieved from http://www.aacsb.edu/resources/globalization/globecourse/contents/readings/national- cultural-differences-and-multinational-business.pdf Ghorbani, M. & Sani, SAB. (2012). Emotional Intelligence and Personnel Organizational Commitment. Middle-East Journal of Scientific Research, 11 (8), 1100-1115. Kelm, O. R. (n.d.). Overview of David Victor’s LESCANT Model: International Business Communication. Retrieved from http://www.laits.utexas.edu/orkelm/culture/lescantkelm.pdf Lashinsky, A. (2012). The secrets Apple keeps. Retrieved from http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/01/18/inside-apple-adam-lashinsky/ Macky, K. (2008). High-involvement work processes, work intensification and employee well- being: A study of New Zealand worker experiences. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 46 (1), 38-55. doi: 10.1177/1038411107086542 Qumer, S. M. (2009). Apple Inc’s corporate culture: The good, the bad and the ugly. ICMR Center for Management research. www. Icmrindia.org Sasson, R. (2013). What Is Motivation and How to Strengthen it? Retrieved from http://www.successconsciousness.com/strengthen_motivation.htm Sproull, L. & Kiesler, S. (1986). Reducing Social Context Cues: Electronic Mail in Organizational Communications. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/2631506 Vallerand, R. J., & Ratelle, C. F. (2002). Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation: A hierarchical model. Handbook of self-determination research (pp. 37–63). Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press. Read More