Organizational Behavior Perceptions & Attributes - Literature review Example

ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR By Name Course Instructor Institution City/State Date Organisational Behaviour Introduction Individuals’ attributions and perceptions impact how they conduct themselves in their organisation. In this case, attribution describes how individuals behave, showing how workers respond to the behaviours of others while perception explains the manner through which sensory information is filtered, shaped and understood by individuals in the organisation. According to Otten et al. (2014, p.79), correct perception enables workers to effectively deduce what they hear and see in the organisation so as to behave ethically, complete tasks, and make decisions. Defective perceptions results in challenges within the organization, which as a result make people to inaccurately hypothesise. Basically, a combination of individual attributes can generate an environment that is more balanced and stronger. Whereas workers with inaudible individual attributes are the stabilizing factor in the organisation, risk-takers offer the needed push for trying novel things. When a certain individual attribute is in excess, then the workplace is in danger of concentrating on particular tasks, whereas ignoring others. However, a mix of individual attributes aids in compensating for workers strengths and weaknesses. Most organisational teams consist of various individual attributes such as the preservative, explorer, driver, energizer supporter, and pedant (Duggan, 2013). The dormant and prevailing attributes of such personalities integrate so as to generate a diverse team, which offers various attributes that successfully team up. As mentioned by Duggan (2013), contribution from various individual attributes assists in driving the organisation forward in a detailed and stable manner. The essay seeks to explore the issues associated with Individual attributes in addition their effects on job performance. Body There are a range of Individual attributes that one is likely to encounter in the workplace, and mainly they include the Big Five traits. One of the traits is the extroversion, which reveals the level to which individuals’ desires to be the centre of attention (Rothmann & Coetzer, 2003, p.69). Individuals with extroverts attributes are sociable and like attention, whereas introverts eschew the attention (Neubert, 2004). As indicated in Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.111) study, extraverts tend to be impulsive, outgoing, active, positive, and whole-hearted. Moreover, they yearn for social acknowledgement, admiration, command, and control. Another trait is agreeableness, which reveals how much individuals desire for other people to like them. Individuals with agreeable attributes as mentioned by Robbins et al. (2011, p.106) always desires others to become fond of them, but disagreeable individuals care less whether others are fond them. For that reason, agreeable individuals have trouble conveying heartbreaking news and criticising. Agreeable individuals have traits like naive, flexible, polite, obliging, helpful, generous, caring, and unbiased, and have a tendency to be composed, trusting, straightforward, and honest. Besides that, conscientious individuals are determined to finish their work on time and to abide by the rules (Mkoji & Sikalieh, 2012, p.186). Conscientious individuals as per Lin et al. (2014, p.168) are always noticeable, for the reason that they are expected to complete the work they are given. Undervaluing individuals low in conscientiousness is easy, given that they require continuous supervision. Still, those with low conscientiousness may possibly attempt innovative solutions to difficulties, for the reason that they do not abide by the rules. Conscientious individuals have attributes like hard-working, observant, watchful, comprehensive, and accountable, determined and systematized. Individuals with high conscientiousness are rational, dependable, and risk averter so they always concentrate on success, which according to Lin et al. (2014, p.166) is exceedingly important attribute for carrying out work tasks. Openness is another individual attribute and it reflects the readiness of people to consider novel ideas. As stated by O'Boyle Jr et al. (2011, p.809), individuals who are open always attempt novel ideas whereas those closed to experience normally castoff novel ideas simply for the reason that they are new. Therefore, openness to Experience is associated with innovativeness and technical, conflicting approach, as well as political moderation, writes Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.112). In this regard, the social tendency usually associated to Openness to Experience includes being inventive, nurtured, inquisitive, intellectual and open-minded, being diverse, artistic and sympathy (Rothmann & Coetzer., 2003, p.69). The last notable trait is neuroticism, which connotes inconsistencies of individual propensity to endure anguish and is viewed as emotionally uneven and insecure. Neurotics’ have various attributes such as being irritated, stressed, unsociable, hostile, anxious, ashamed, uncertain, undecided, self-doubting, dejected and fearful. As indicated by Fuller et al. (2010, p.40), neurotics lack faith and belief on others, and notably lack social knowledge to manage the circumstances that claim to assume responsibility. Yet again, neurotics as well lack self-image and confidence so negative affectivity is related to neuroticism. Contrary to other persons, neurotics endure more antagonistic feelings. Undoubtedly, individual attributes can have a positive influence on job performance. According to Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.119), performance is a crucial phrase utilised in the contemporary organisational structure. For that reason, performance can be described as efforts’ conversion into outputs so as to realize a number of certain outcomes. Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.119) argue that performance communicates the connection between the minimal and effective cost (economy), it as well expresses the association between productivity and cost (efficiency) and correspondingly between achieved results and productivity (effectiveness).in this regard, individual attributes can help one understand the performance context of the organisation as well as the level to which a worker contributes for the realisation of organisational goals. Various research studies such as Mihalcea (2014) and Yang and Hwang (2014) have concurred that individual attributes have positive and negative impact on job performance. For instance, Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.112) study results proved that Openness to Experience is positively associated with creativity as well as task performance. Le et al. (2011, p.115) established that Workers who are open to experiences displayed an aesthetic sensitivity, active imagination, concentration to innermost feelings as well as an inclination to variety, all this proves that individual with such attributes are top performers and more creativity in the organisation. On the other hand, Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.119) study results confirmed that extraverts are hardworking individuals and are more likely to become leaders in task and social related groups and have a tendency of being regarded by their followers as more effective leaders. Study by Mkoji and Sikalieh (2012, p.186) also echoes these sentiments by suggesting that extraverts are related to more positive happenings like achievements, appraisal, and so forth. Employees higher in extraversion as mentioned by Mkoji and Sikalieh (2012, p.187) always look for social relationships, and more likely to have numerous networks in the workplace. As a result, extraverts socialise quickly with other workers in the workplace, and thanks to social integration and acculturation, they are less likely to resign and therefore positively impact performance (Mkoji & Sikalieh, 2012, p.187). Moreover, there exist various reasons to be certain that individuals with agreeable attributes cannot take part in withdrawal behaviours; therefore, they are also good performers. This can be evidenced by the fact that due to their compliance and adaptability, agreeable individuals understand well the negative facets of their environment. Besides, owing to the propensity to create satisfying and positive relationships with individuals in the workplace, Fuller et al. (2010, p.39) posit that agreeable individuals tend to value their working environments and therefore are inclined to perform effectively in their place of work. Such positive relationships will boost the power of the emotional forces, which motivate workers not to leave their jobs. In addition, because of the agreeableness interpersonal aspects such as friendliness, compassionate, likeability, Neubert (2004) posits that agreeable person’ relationships with others is always successful; thus, impacting other performance positively. Akin to extraverts, individuals with agreeable attributes have stronger acquaintances with their co-workers, and such connections are related to motivational forces as well as the job embedding’s concept, which according to Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.115) encourage individuals not to quit their organizations owing to such interpersonal relationships. Furthermore, the dependence as well as compliance attributes of agreeableness makes workers to become high in agreeableness to see contractual responsibilities to remain in the organization. Individual attributes can have a negative influence on job performance, particularly for individuals with irrational attributes who endure hostile life feelings. Neurotics are self-doubting and that is why they negatively impact job performance and job satisfaction (Neubert, 2004). Normally commitment as mentioned by Awadh and Ismail (2012, p.111) is negatively associated with job performance and neurotics are directly associated with persistence commitment. Robbins et al. (2011, p.600) study point out that there is a negative relationship between complete performance and persistence commitment, and also established that neuroticism negatively related with professional performance. Basically, job performance and neuroticism can be described by the verity that individuals high on neuroticism are susceptible to having unfounded notions, cannot easily control their instincts, and poorly handle their stress. Openness to Experience can as well negatively impact job performance, particularly in developing industries such as pharmaceutical, because organisation in these industries have to continuously adapt to changes. Job absence is a main contributor of poor performance, and this as mentioned by Rothmann and Coetzer (2003, p.72) can be attributed by some individual attributes. Job performance for employees who come to job as they wish is mainly caused by irrational behavior. As pointed out in Lin et al. (2014, p.172) study, conscientious, introverted individuals are always present at work, contrary to extraverted individuals whose are low on conscientiousness. Fascinatingly, neuroticism is less associated with absenteeism, and extraverted employees as per Neubert (2004) are always satisfied for the reason that the job offers them a chance to get a finest level of awakening. Excessive stimulation makes introverted individuals to become less contented in the organization and as a result performance is negatively impacted. Possibly, absenteeism in the workplace occurs because extroverts are fully satisfied in the organization, and so they avoid going to job (Neubert, 2004). Such action can suggest either that extroverts are less conscientious or just that extroverts have a convincing reason to be absent. Manager can make use of this understanding in the workplace to improve the organisation’s performance considering that individual attributes evidently have an impact on lots of things, if not everything. By understanding individual attributes, managers can have a deep insight of the effect of individual attributes on job performance. According to Yang and Hwang (2014, p.7), traits such as emotional stability as well as conscientiousness result in a desire and willingness to exceed or meet job requirements, and these traits can offer the manager the ability to motivate workers, handle pressure, as well as to work efficiently so as to meet the organisational objectives. Understanding traits like agreeableness can help managers reduce workplace conflicts, foster teamwork, as well as interact with workers smoothly (Neubert, 2004). Individual attributes impact performance, so it is imperative for managers to keep in mind that job performances do differ amongst employees depending on their personality and the positions they hold in the organisation. So whereas agreeableness and extroversion can be the main attributes of a team leader or sales representatives, individuals with conscientiousness attributes are inclined to work best in a programming position. For that reason, managers have to be in a position to recognize individual attributes and behaviours in order that they can comprehend the different personalities of the employees. Bearing in mind the fact that personality is a somewhat unchanging set of attributes that impact the behaviour of an individual. So managers should comprehend such personalities in order that the organisation can utilise their noticeable skills and traits in the suitable avenue or job. Understanding individual attributes can as well help the manager train and motivate her new staffs better. Conclusion In conclusion, there is adequate evidence to conclude that individuals’ attributes can have an effect on job performance. Even though naturally the connection between numerous individual attributes and the effect on job performance can appear recognisable, their consequence must not be disregarded. As evidenced in the essay, conscientiousness in addition to agreeableness traits is undoubtedly positively associated with high productivity and performance. Still, agreeableness can be associated negatively with leadership competences. Individuals high in neuroticism are poor performers while those high on conscientiousness are likely to perform exceeding well at workplace. Besides that, individuals low in agreeableness and conscientiousness are likely to perform extremely poorly at workplace. So, understanding individual attributes is important for managers considering that these attributes have a direct impact on performance and behaviours of individual workers. So having knowledge about the Big Five Personality Model, can help managers well comprehend the workplace behaviour, which in turn improve job performance. References Awadh, A.M. & Ismail, W.K.W., 2012. The Impact of Personality Traits and Employee Work-Related Attitudes on Employee Performance with the Moderating Effect of Organizational Culture: The Case of Saudi Arabia. Asian Journal of Business and Management Sciences, vol. 1, no. 10, pp.108-27. Duggan, T., 2013. Organizational Behavior Perceptions & Attributes. [Online] Available at: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/organizational-behavior-perceptions-attributes-10835.html [Accessed 7 January 2015]. Fuller, J.B., Hester, K. & Cox, S.S., 2010. Proactive personality and job performance: exploring job autonomy as a moderator. 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