Environmental Impact on Organizations - Essay Example

Environment and organizations Introduction Environment plays an important role in the smooth functioning of an organization. It is difficult for an organization to progress rapidly if the environment does not provide the necessary atmosphere. For example, consider a country like Pakistan or Afghanistan. Big organizations will think twice or thrice before investing in these countries because of the internal agitations and wide spread of terrorism in these countries. On the other hand, China and India like countries are believed to be the investor friendly countries at present because of the economic reforms, liberalization of rules and pleasant investment climates in these countries. Political stability and civilized social culture are some other environmental factors; organizations are looking for before investing in a country. Most of the African countries are infamous for the internal agitations and political instability. Such countries are incapable of attracting foreign direct investment because of the negative environment they possess for the business build up. In short, healthy environment is essential for organizations to cement their bases and strategies. Business Psychology is one of the rapidly developing business segments in which the psychology of the employees, and the environmental parameters (customers, society and other stakeholders) are comprehensively investigated. Proper awareness of psychological dimensions of the environment can help the organization immensely in advertising, public relations and the way in which the organization visualise its customers and in the management of organization- employee relationships. This paper briefly explains the environmental impacts on organizations. Environment and organizations Internal factors Musacco Ph.D (2009) has argued that harassment, mobbing, bullying, and emotional abuses are common at the workplaces which resulted in increased fear and minimal trust between workers (Musacco Ph.D, 2009, p.2). No two individuals are alike either in their physical appearance or in their behaviours. An organization is a place where different people from different social, economical, cultural, communal and political backgrounds are working together. These people may have extremely different attitudes and characters. Even though they are working for the same organization, it is difficult for them to leave all their individual differences outside the organization and work for the common objectives inside the organization. Different opinions and views may occur between workers which may often result in harassment, mobbing, bullying, and emotional abuses. Stress, anger and turmoil at workplace have the effect of creating more toxic work environments (Musacco Ph.D, 2009, p.51). Another major factor which affects an organization is the stress factor of the employees. Family, society and workplace are the three major places in which a person commonly interacts. The commitments towards all the above three entities is accumulated at the same place; the mind. Different types of responsibilities and commitments towards, family, society and workplace may increase the stress level of an employee immensely and it is not possible for him to leave out all the thoughts about his family and society while entering to the organization. Another major environmental factor which can affect the functioning of an organization is the unprecedented downsizings, restructurings and mergers of companies (Musacco Ph.D, 2009, p.15). These exercises can result in a pressurised work environment for the affected workers. Many companies are currently engage in the restructuring process. Such restructuring processes can result in loss of jobs for some people and shifting of departments and shifting of work locations. Inertia is a physical phenomenon. Every object likes to continue its state of rest or of motion unless it is compelled by an external force. The above physical law is applicable to organizations also. No employee likes to change his department easily. The organization needs to apply certain force upon the employees in order to convince them about the need of changing departments or locations. In any cases, the restructuring of the organization often brings anxieties among workers. Creating an atmosphere or environment that encourages personal interactions and discussion allows knowledge to be spread and enhanced across the organization (Knowledge Management, 2007). But many organizations are still struggling to achieve the above objective. Competition is stiff both inside and outside of the organization. While employees competing each other inside the organization, it is competitors who create stiff challenges to the organization outside. Under such circumstances, it is difficult for an organization to ensure proper spreading of knowledge either inside or outside the organization. Dr. Brown & Dr. Irby, (2009) has mentioned the importance of social needs in the functioning of an employee. They pointed out for example that IT managers in general have both lower social needs and higher growth needs than other managers (Dr. Brown & Dr. Irby, 2009). The extremely dynamic field in which Information Technology workers must function is the major reason for the above attitudes of IT managers. IT managers may think that they already have the respect of the society because of their higher academics and qualifications. So they are not much particular about the social acceptance. On the other hand, they are keen in selecting their organization based on the remuneration package and career growth prospects offered to them. On the other hand, other managers mostly look for both. They need social acceptance as well as good remuneration and career prospects. So organizations must account such peculiar environmental factors related to employees while formulating their strategies. Gender is another environmental factor which can affect an organizations environment internally. Even though the abilities of both male and females are almost same in performing a task, it is impossible to anticipate equal levels of performances from males and females in all the assignments. For example, females are well suited to the secretarial and clerical jobs whereas males are least suited to such jobs. On the other hand, males are more suited to marketing profession which require extensive travelling compared to females. Such environmental factors related to gender needs to be considered by the organization while recruiting suitable staffs for different departments. Women can easily enter IT fields and acquire salaries close to that of their male counterparts. However, pressures exerted by the culture found in these occupations results in them leaving the industry (Dr. Brown & Dr. Irby, 2009). The abilities to handle pressure seem to be more for males compared to females. Females are generally considered as weak compare to male both physically and psychologically. Even under extreme pressure situations, males may continue in the organization because of their better pressure handling abilities compared to women. Recently, management practitioners and an increasing number of organizational scholars have suggested that under certain circumstances, organizational members develop possessive feelings for their job and for their employing organization. Psychologists, philosophers, geographers, and child development specialists among others have observed that possession and feelings of ownership are a natural part of the human condition (Pierce et al, 2004) It is a fact that an employee who has served an organization for a longer period may find it extremely difficult to leave the organization under any circumstances. The emotional attachment towards the organization and the environment will prevent the employee from leaving the organization. It is a fact that all the people like to stay in their mother country and that also in a place where they have taken birth. Even though short stays at other places might be an interesting one, many people like to stay in the location where they have taken birth because of the emotional attachment towards that particular place. Same way an employee develops a strong bond between him and the organization in the long run and this bond will become a double bond if the organization also extends the same respect to the employee. In an environment undergoing change, such as during the privatization of state-owned enterprises, employees commitment to the organization is easily disrupted because privatization is often linked to downsizing. Downsizing has been found to have a negative influence on surviving workers loyalty, which is an important element of organizational commitment (Chen & Chen, 2008) Globalization has brought many opportunities and challenges to organizations. Privatization is one of the core aspects of globalization policies which created lot of concerns among the employees. Many of the public enterprises were privatized as part of the globalization policies. Privatization often resulted in downsizing of employees. It is difficult for an employee working in a public organization to keep his place in tact if the organization is privatized. Downsizing of employees will result in lessened productivity of the employees. For example, consider an employee who was working as a manager downsized as a clerical staff. It is impossible for the manager to exhibit the same level of loyalty towards the organization if the organization demotes him as a clerical staff. Downsizing of employees may affect not only the affected employees, but it can affect others as well. Survivors from the humiliating experience of downsizing may have worries about their own job security, there may be anger associated with the process by which the redundancy program has been implemented and there may be concerns about the creation of heavier workloads due to the reduction of manpower (Campbell et al, 2000, p.8). Downsizing may develop counterproductive behavior among employees which may spoil the interests of the company. Counterproductive behaviors may lead to absenteeism, accidents, decreased productivity, theft, violence, sexual abuse etc. Misirian, (n. d) has argued that it is difficult for the workers to perform well when there is a high level of challenge but little control or good levels of control but contains little or no challenge for the individual. The ideal situation will challenge the employee to work at or near his or her capacity while allowing that individual or team the authority to make decisions about how to reach the goal (Misirian, n. d). For example, consider an organization has given little time to complete a difficult task for an employee. In such a case, the employee forced to work under immense stress and will try to finish the work within the stipulated time, but the quality of his work may be affected severely because of the tight control and norms enforced by the organization. On the other hand, if the task given by the organization lacks any challenge for the employee, there may be little motivation for the employee and he will perform his tasks in a passive manner and his actual productivity may not come out. The organization should provide the employees an opportunity to perform near to his or her capacity and that also under a teamwork environment. Teamwork will help the employee to seek the advice or assistance of the team members whenever he is need of it which will definitely reduce the stress level and the maximum productivity of the worker may come out through this strategy. Psychologist, Author, and Professional Speaker, JOHN WEAVER, PSY.D has argued that integrating systematic training of the mind with clear guidance in the dimensions of wellness can transform resistance into successful lifestyle change (Weaver, n. d). Training is an essential part of organizational development. There is no point in anticipating that the employees are perfect and they will perform as per the changing needs of the organization. It is the responsibility of the organization to provide adequate training to the employees in order to make them capable of understanding the mission and vision of the organization and also to accustom with the new trends in the market and the technological areas. Training will make the employees capable of countering the challenges which may occur unexpectedly at the time of executing a project or task. External factors Morgan (1989) has mentioned that everything exists in the context of wider environment as far as an organization is concerned (Morgan, 1989, p.72). It is not possible for an organization to function properly if it neglect the characteristics of the environment is which it operates. Environment of an organization is not limited to the organization and its surrounding areas alone. In the current globalized world, big organization has worldwide customers. For example, American business tycoon Microsoft has customers in almost the entire world. So any problems occurred in any part of the world can affect Microsoft because of its global presence. If rapidly changing technologies and unstable turbulent environment were to characterize the industry, then the structure of the firms should be temporary and decentralized (Morgan, 1989, p.43). Technological changes and unstable environments can affect the functioning of an organization immensely. For example, many of the American financial institutions and automobile manufacturers were forced to close or reduce their operations because of the current financial crisis. Real estate or construction sector also reduced their activities because of the weaker performances of the economy. It is a fact that even the wealthy people will stay away from the market if the market undergoes fluctuation. Organizational environments are influencing the products and administrative processes in every industry (Morgan, 1989, p.73). Environment is the wide canvass in which the organizations draw pictures. The quality of these pictures depends on the quality of the employees and the products produced by the organization. A good organization always creates much enthusiasm among the employees and the customers whereas poor organizations may not create much impact on the environment in which it operates. Advertising is one of the core business functions. The organization is communicating its messages about its product details, vision and mission to the customers through advertising. Advertising should be done as per the characteristics of the environment in which the organization is operating. Even if the organization is engaged in the manufacturing of same products in different countries, they need to formulate separate advertisements for each country, region or locality in which it operates. For example, Sachin Tendulkar might be a good brand ambassador for an international company operating in India. But he may not succeed as a brand ambassador in China. In China the company needs to appoint Jackie Chan like celebrities in order to convey their message properly to the people. Even in India itself, there are more than 28 states, each have different culture and language. Sachin might be good brand ambassador for the northern regions whereas same thing cannot be said about the southern regions. In short, advertisements and brand development strategies should be custom made for each location even if the organization market same products in different locations of the same country. The environment and the customer psychology might be different in different places. Conclusions Organizational psychology has progressed a lot for the last couple of decades. Management Gurus have realized that the study of internal and external environmental psychology is important for the organization for sustaining the growth. An organization is functioning in an environment in which the employees and other stakeholders are active. The development of the organization depends on how well the organization was able to manage these internal and external environmental parameters. Even though an organization is functioning with the help of resources provided by the environment, all these resources and the environment is controlled by the human factor. So it is important for the organization to analyse the human psychology at different instances to develop proper strategies for the development. Consumer psychology, employee psychology, social psychology etc are some of the areas in which the organization needs to focus more. References 1. 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Knowledge Management, (2007), Retrieved on 10 February 2010 from http://knowmgt.blogspot.com/2007/07/importance-of-environment.html 5. Misirian Nathan (n. d), Positive Psychology at Work, Retrieved on 10 February 2010 from http://www.psychologyforbusiness.com/articles_alternative2.htm 6. Morgan Gareth (1989), Creative Organization Theory: A Resourcebook, Publisher: Sage Publications, Inc (February 1, 1989) 7. Musacco Stephen, Ph.D,(2009) Beyond Going Postal: Shifting from Workplace Tragedies and Toxic Work Environments to a Safe and Healthy Organization, Publisher: BookSurge Publishing (January 27, 2009) 8. Pierce, Jon L.; ODriscoll, Michael P.& Coghlan, Anne-Marie (2004), Work environment structure and psychological ownership: the mediating effects of control, Retrieved on 10 February 2010 from http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-122376719.html 9. WEAVER JOHN, PSY.D (n. d), Transforming the Workplace with Healthy Thinking, Retrieved on 10 February 2010 from http://www.psychologyforbusiness.com/john_contact_information.pdf Read More