Educational Leadership and Organizational Behavior - Assignment Example

Organizational Behavior Student’s Name Learning Institution Compare And Contrast The Behavioral Profiles Of Tom And Luke. Are They Suited To Their Current Jobs? Tom and Luke are work colleagues at Austwide Financial Services (AFS) where Tom is an advisor while Luke is a state manager. They are both university graduates though Luke graduated earlier than Tom and has been in the corporate world for much longer than Tom. In addition to their roles in the organization, the two have very different personality traits. The difference in personality traits has in turn, contributed to their diverse behavioral profiles. To start with, Tom is highly intelligent and hard working, as has been evidenced by his days at the university; he was a hard worker and actively participated in sports and other numerous social commitments. He was always innovative and often tried out new things, in addition to undertaking further learning, to enhance his skills. He had a principle of taking responsibility and determining his own direction and success. Tom’s has strong listening skills and ability to empathize with others. These could have come in handy in understanding and meeting the needs of his clients though it was useful in creating harmony amongst his work colleagues. because he could always be in a position to listen to them and offer solutions to conflicts. On the other hand, Luke is the exact opposite of Tom as far as behavior is concerned. Despite being a senior manager in the organization, Luke is highly irrational in his work. The advisors require sufficient time to complete continual professional development so as to maintain their practicing licenses, but Luke does not allow them to attend such trainings during work. He does not value the free time of his staff which makes him schedule staff meetings at weekends or early in the morning in order to minimize interruptions on the work schedules. He also keeps contacting his staff for work related matters at any time of the day, be it at night or during weekends when the advisors are supposed to have their own free time. Luke is a person who is hungry for success and power. He has attained much success and power with the position he holds at AFS, a factor that has led to his arrogant behavior from the massive rewards he receives. Unlike Tom, Luke is highly disorganized. He makes poor decisions by relying on his instincts instead of facts. His people skills are poor and this can be seen from the way he treats his juniors; very impatient with them with negative communications to them. He also has a blazing temper especially when he is accusing them of poor and unsatisfactory performance, as well as threatening them with sacking if they fail to improve their performance. Luke believes that all people should perform their jobs well at all times, a fact which does not allow him to praise his staff for exemplary results because he says that good performance should be the norm. His unfairness makes him set ever increasing targets despite his advisors achieving good sales figures which often go unrewarded. As stated earlier, Tom takes full responsibility for his failures while working hard towards his successes. This is not the case with Luke who when questioned about his performance by senior management, he typically blames it on others and shows little faith in his own abilities. This is despite a history of staff complaints about him and a series of poor performance reviews. For Tom and Luke, none of them is suited for their current roles at AFS. Tom, with his personality traits and strengths is suitable for the state manager’s position while Luke would be better off in a much lower position in the firm. Tom is hard working, self motivating and has a high level of people skills while Luke is the exact opposite. Tom would therefore, be better off be managing the Sidney office because he would motivate the staff and thus lead to increased and improved performance of the staff. With Reference To Relevant Motivational Theories, Analyze The Work Environment At AFS. What Issues Can You Identify? The work environment at AFS can be analyzed using a number of motivational theories. McClelland’s theory, also known as Learned Needs Theory, was identified by David McClelland in 1961, and lays focus on three motivators; a need for achievement, a need for power and a need for affiliation. All these motivating drivers are characteristic of all persons regardless of age, gender or cultural background. The dominant motivator depends on the culture or the experiences of life (Chance, 2009). From the case study, Luke’s dominant motivator is that of power because he always wants to control and influence other people; enjoys winning by being the overall boss with the most benefits; likes to win arguments by lashing out at his juniors; and enjoys recognition. On the other hand, Tom’s dominant motivator is that of achievement combined with affiliation because he possesses a strong desire to set and accomplish goals; takes calculated risks to accomplish the goals set; enjoys team work; prefers group effort and values regular feedback. The dominant motivators of achievement and affiliation are also characteristic of other advisors in the Sidney office (Krawford, 2010). Frederick Winslow Taylor’s motivational theory states that the chief motivator of workers is pay/compensation / remuneration for work done. He stated that naturally, workers do not enjoy work and this necessitated close supervision and control so as to be more productive, and therefore, management needed to break down major production tasks into smaller tasks for easier control. After this subdivision of duties, the workers are then paid according to the amount of work done (piece-rate pay), which Taylor claimed could motivate workers to maximize productivity (Naoum, 2001). At AFS, this theory is applied by the management because the advisors/ salespeople are paid according to the sales they make. Therefore, the more sales that a person makes, the more commission they are paid, and so are the bonuses. The theory also goes ahead to state that this type of schedule plays a key role of de-motivating workers as they perform the same boring and repetitive tasks all year round. This is the same situation with AFS where the advisors only perform narrowed duties by concentrating on a single product line (Miner, 2002). The concept of autocratic management style bears close links with Taylor’s theory. This concept assumes that managers are supposed to make all decisions regarding the business and its operations, while the work of the junior staff is to take orders from the management. This illustrates the situation at AFS. (Jex & Britt, 2008). Taylor, in a bid to concentrate on the compensation of workers, ignored the fact that workers require to have their social needs addressed (Naoum, 2001). This was taken up by Elton Mayo (1880-1949), who introduced the Human Relation School of thought. The theory laid its focus on management, taking the initiative to have an interest in their workers while treating them as individuals with worthwhile opinions, and realizing that they enjoy interacting with each other. Mayo performed an experiment, and from it, he was able to conclude that better communication between the management and the workers, and greater manager involvement in the working lives of employees were the best motivating factors for any organization. In essence therefore, businesses should take the initiative to re-organize their production in a bid to encourage increased teamwork, while at the same time, introducing personnel departments charged with the major role of looking into personal interests of employees. At AFS, they could also use this theory to motivate their staff because the company’s employees are only seen as a means to a financial breakthrough but with no personal interests (Riley, 2012). The Frederick Herzberg’s motivational theory focuses on two factors; motivators and hygiene factors. While hygiene factors are directly concerned with the actual job such as how interesting the job is or how much opportunity for growth the job provides, hygiene factors surround the job, for instance the level of pay or the safety of working conditions. Herzberg was of the opinion that organizations should motivate their workers by assuming a democratic approach to management, as well as by developing the content and nature of the actual job (Griffin, 2013). The management of AFS could do this for their employees by empowering their staff through training and giving them more responsibilities in their line of duty. Job enrichment would also be important for the staff and the management could do this by giving them a vast range of more complex, challenging and interesting tasks surrounding their duties. Job enlargement would involve giving a wider variety of tasks for the workers, though not necessarily challenging ones (Borkowski, 2009). How Might Optimal Job Design Be Improved For Tom And The Other Advisors? Tom and his other advisor colleagues are currently at the lowest level of production. This is true based on the fact that many of AFS’s competitors have been increasing in size, profitability and market share; while AFS’s performance remained stagnant over the last three years. This could be attributed to the fact that there currently exists much dissatisfaction among the AFS workers. Improving the work design of the advisors responsible for the amount of business that the company receives would go a long way in improving the performance of the AFS. To start with, it would be important to use some motivational factors to increase job satisfaction in the AFS advisor network. Among the issues to consider include: pay/ remuneration, reviewing targets, regulating working hours, job enrichment and taking interest in the welfare of the staff. All these factors may be done using the various motivational theories that have been identified by scholars (Jex & Britt, 2008). From the case study, it is evident that there is no equity in the way that the advisors are treated in terms of compensation. At one instance, Tom’s performance was equal to that of his colleague, but his colleague received a bonus while Tom did not receive a bonus, but was instead ridiculed in front of his colleagues for poor performance. Practising fairness and equality across the board would motivate the advisors towards working harder. In addition, the organization could also introduce a retainer form of payment which would be payable to all staff regardless of the amount of sales. The state manager receives too many benefits, and this is also a form of inequality. To amend this, some of the benefits could be scraped off, or better still, the advisors could also be entitled to some benefits considering the fact that they are responsible for all the revenue that comes to the company (Nelson & Quick, 2012). According to the two factor theory by Frederick Herzberg, individuals are motivated by recognition, achievement, responsibility, opportunities for development and growth, and meaningful work (Losi & Pilati, 2011). This is not practiced at AFS and the management could look into ways of ensuring that their workers are motivated by employing the mentioned factors. For instance, Tom and all his colleagues have been to the university where they received a wide range of training to help them in dispensing their duties at their workplaces. However, they are only allowed to specialize in selling a single product which limits their scope. As such, they do not feel utilized enough, nor are they able to develop or grow their careers. In the same line, the management does not allow them time to attend additional training that is necessary for them to upgrade their qualifications, nor are they involved in making decisions that are important in the day to day running of their activities (Borkowski, 2009). The goal setting theory created by George Odiome advises on the need to motivate people/ workers by allowing them to take part in setting their (challenging) goals for themselves, understanding their specific roles in achieving the goals, and also in measuring the progress. At AFS, workers are not given this chance because the ever-increasing targets are set by the managers without considering the input of the workers. It is also critical for employee engagement to provide regular, ongoing feedback (Miner, 2002). The management of AFS should also look into separating the work and personal life of their employees. This is really crucial because it offers the staff time to relax as opposed to being on the lookout for work-related calls from their superiors. Financial services are not a matter of life and death like clinical/ medical services which require round-the-clock services and so it would be advisable to have clearly defined work hours. However, the management, in consultation with the team of advisors could come up with a schedule where the advisors take turns at attending to any emergencies that come up after regular working hours. This could give the other advisors time to rest and take care of personal matters when not at work (Unco.edu). References Borkowski, N. 2009. Organizational Behavior, Theory, and design in Health Care. Massachusetts: Jones & Barlett Publishers. Chance, P.L. 2009. Introduction to educational leadership and organizational behavior: Theory into practice. New York: Eye on Education, Inc. Griffin, R. W. 2013. Fundamentals of Management. London: Cengage Learning. Jex, S.M. & Britt, T.W. 2008. Organizational psychology: A scientist-practitioner approach. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey. Krawford, K. (2010). Motivational theories in organizations: Acquired needs and theory & Expectancy Theory. Retrieved on 4th December 2013 from Losi,H.L. & Pilati, M. 2011. Managing organizational behavior: Individuals, teams, organization and management. Cheltenham and Camberley : Edward Elgar Publishing. Miner, J.B. 2002. Role motivation theories. London: Routledge Publishers. Naoum, S. (2001). People and organizational management in construction. Wales & West Central England: Thomas Telford Publishing. Nelson, D.L. & Quick, J.C. 2012. Organisational behavior: Science, the real world, and you: 8th Edition. London: Cengage Learning. Riley, J. (2012). Theories of motivation. Retrieved on 4th December 2013 from Read More