Organizational behavior & leadership

MG 630-152

BHAVANI SAGAR AINALA

Monroe College New Rochelle

Professor: - C. Colds Fecther

Week 1 Homework Assignment

Respected Professor,

My Name is BHAVANI SAGAR AINALA, I am from INDIA. I did my under graduation in Bachelor
of Commerce from osmaina university.

I really apologize as I am submitting my 1st assignment and 2nd assignment due to non-
accommodation. I will make sure that it will on time to time.

Answer the following questions:-

Question 1.

1) What is the importance of interpersonal skills?

Answer 1
Interpersonal skills:
The set of abilities enabling a person to interact positively and effectively with
others. And build up a relationship with him/her. Development of the interpersonal skills of
employees is a key goal of training and development initiatives from many companies and is
considered a constructive manner in which to handle office disputes and other personnel
issues. This skills include area of communication, listening, delegation of task and leadership

We use everyday to communicate with people and to interact. People who have worked on
developing strong interpersonal skills are usually more successful.

Here are few factors which are used for the internal personal skills
a) Compatibility: - Two individuals at a work place should be compatible to each other to get
the best output and success at the workplace, mainly there should be no scope of
misunderstanding. Their mentality should match according to the project where they are
assigned to and their aim, attitude and thought process should keep molding as per the other
persons need, this will give as the better picture and understanding the other person and if
they fail to carry then there will be a lot of difference so compatibility is needed.
b) Communication: - Communication plays a pivotal role in all types of relations whether in
personal and in professional. This seems to be basic function of a manager but still has an
effective role to play. Communication seems very simple but it is quite important that either
speaking or writing clearly any message you intend to send someone else should understand
the content of it, exactly for what youre referring too and at the same time, it also important
to decide the medium of communicating the message to other person. Eg: Face to face, email
or over the call.
Once the message is conveyed, it is also your responsibility to get a feedback on it. By
doing this it will help you to understand whether the receiver of the message is in the same
page with you.
Listening is also a basic function of communication but mostly it is ignored. If youre not a
good listener then you can never become a good manager. It helps you to understand, analyze
the feelings and information provided by the individuals and helps you to take any further
action.
c) Relationships: - Basically relationships are formed by communicating the messages with
others at work place. A message can be interpreted in different ways by different people and
this might have a huge impact on their motivation or morale.
Its quite critical to maintain healthy relationships with every individual in a work place,
because the communication process differs for a fresher when compared with an experience
employee. Therefore its mandate to analyze the information even before it routed to the
individual and should make sure that it wont have any kind impact on him.
d) Stay Calm: - At times we should not over react on petty things, we should be calm and
should adjust. Mainly we should be the first one to say sorry so that this will solve half of our
problems.
e) Forgiving: - An individual should be little more forgiving in relationship, we should not drag
the issue for unnecessary things.
f) Smile: - As there is saying that Smile is curve that makes everything straight so flash your
smile more often at work place it really works. Need to take care of the facial expressions while
interacting with the other persons.
g) Time: - According to me time plays important role in interpersonal skills. We should spend
adequate time to know each other better and in organization, individuals must spend quality
time with their co-workers to strengthen the bond amongst themselves.
h) Roles: - Its very common that a group of people are asked to work together as a team.
Initially it will take some time to get through the inferior or superior complexities within the
team and later they get to know the others and start working to the common goal. Here the
roles should be wisely assigned to the individuals basing on the skills they possess. This also
includes the decision making ability of a manager, that how exactly the work is assigned and
getting the work done with the team within the specified time.

2) What do managers do in terms of functions, roles and skills?

Answer 2

Management is a process that is 1used to achieve the goals set up by the organization
and this task is assigned to people who are called as Managers.

Manager
A manager is a person one who accomplishes the organizational goals through
effective and efficient use of resources. In simpler words, a manager is a person who does
the right things at the right time.
To be an effective manager, it is necessary to possess many skills. Not all managers
have all the skills that would make them the most effective manager. As technology steps
ahead and grows, the skills that are required by managers are constantly changing.
Different levels of management in the organizational structure also require different types
 of management skills. Generally, however, managers need to have communication skills,
human skills, computer skills, time-management skills, and technical skills.

Functions of a manager

Planning
All the functions of the managers are inter-related to each other and first function is
planning. Planning includes setting up the objectives and determining how they will be
accomplished. So it turns out to be the key function of the manager, as the rest of the
functions follows.

Organizing
Organizing includes delegating and coordinating tasks along with allocation of
resources. A manager should have a very good idea of his resources (employees, finance) in
order to allocate the right work to the right person which in turns helps in efficient output.

Leading
This function includes motivating the employees to achieve the set objectives. A
manager should be very keen to understand the employees and then influence them with the
kind of attitude they looking for like by giving special rewards, recognizing and delivering a
speech which pumps up the employee to put his heart and soul to achieve the desired goal.

Controlling
It is a process of monitoring performance and taking the right actions at the right time
to accomplish the desired results. It ensures that the individuals and groups are consistent as
per the plan established and also ensures that accomplishments objectives & are in consistent
throughout an organization.

Roles of a manager
The roles of a manager can be further classified in to three categories.

Interpersonal
Informational
Decisional
Interpersonal

Figure head
As a manager, you hold the all types of responsibilities like social, ceremonial and legal.
Therefore, you stand as source of inspiration to them. They will look out to you as person with
authority.

Leader
As a leader of your team, department or organization. Its your responsibility to manage
the performance of everyone in the group.

Liaison
As a manager, you need to communicate with external and internal contacts, at the
same time you to network effectively on behalf of your organization.
Informational

Monitor
As a manager, you need to monitor your team, in terms of both their productivity,
quality and wellbeing.

Disseminator
In this role, a manager distributes the information to his supervisors and subordinates
by various methods like sending circulars, holding meetings and through phone calls.

Spokesperson
In spokesperson role the manager will be interacting with outsiders like customers,
suppliers, financer, government or agencies on behalf of his organization.

Decisional Role
Has to take the final decision for the development of the process or the project.
Entrepreneur
As an entrepreneur the manager has to vital decisions like expansion or diversification,
development of older process and initiating new projects.

Disturbance Handler
Manager must be ready to take charge of any uncertain situation faced by the
organization and its also his responsibility to handle certain disturbances within the
organization like employee disputes and strikes.

Resource Allocator
As a resource allocator manager must determine the effective utilization of
organizational resources and also to ensure that no team or unit suffers the inadequacy of
physical and financial needs.

Negotiator
As a negotiator manager may require to take part in negotiating with teams,
departments or organization.

3) What is organization behavior (OB)?

Answer 3

Definition

In simple words it is the actions and attitudes and groups towards one other and
towards the organization as a whole, and its effects on the organizations functioning and
performance.

Organizational behavior studies the impact individuals, groups, and structures have on
human behavior within organizations. It is an interdisciplinary field that includes sociology,
psychology, communication, and management. Organizational behavior complements
organizational theory, which focuses on organizational and intra-organizational topics, and
complements human-resource studies, which is more focused on everyday business practices.
Organizational Behavior is the study of individuals and groups behavior with respect to
organizations in order to achieve the desired goals. A field that investigates the impact of
individuals and groups with the behavior of organization. OB theories are used for human
resource purpose to maximize the output from individual group member.

4) Why it is important to complement intuition with systematic study?

Answer 4

Every one of us is student of behavior. It is a complicated task to analyze the behavior of

the other person and a casual or commonsense approach to read the behavior of others can
lead to fallacious predictions. In order to improve your predictability you need to replace the
intuitive opinions with systematic approach. So with the help of systematic approach you will
be able to predict the behavior more accurately. Behavior is predictable, if we know how the
person understands the situation and what is more important to him or her. While the
behavior of the individual may not appear to be logical to an outsider but it is usually intended
to be logical and even they see their behavior as logical. There are some fundamentals
consistencies that can be identified and modified to reflect the differences among the
individuals.

These fundamental consistencies allow predicting the behavior of individuals almost

accurately.

There are rules in each and every setting.

By this it states that the behavior can be predicted. Systematic study itself refers to
looking at the data collected is under controlled conditions and interpreting accurately.

5) What are the major behavioral science disciplines that contribute to OB?

Answer 5

The major behavioral science that contributes to OB are

Political sciences

Psychology
Social psychology

Sociology

Anthropology

Political Sciences

The study of behavior of individuals and groups with in a political environment. Study
areas: - Structuring of conflicts, allocations of power, how people manipulate power for
individuals self-interest.

Psychology

Psychology is a branch of science that mainly deals with human and animal behavior. It
helps to measure, explain and sometimes help to change the behaviors of humans and
animals. Recently they expanded the study which included learning, emotions, leadership,
motivation, performance, appraisals, work design, job stress, employee selection process, job
satisfaction etc.

Social psychology

This is a combination which includes both the concepts of sociology and psychology. It
mainly focuses on behavior of people on one another. An area within psychology that blends
concepts from psychology and sociology and that focuses on the influence of people on one
another.

Sociology

This is a study which explains how individuals will fill their roles. In simpler words, what
would be their relation to other fellow human beings?

Anthropology

Anthropology studies human behavior towards the society and their activities. Study on
cultural and environment has helped us understanding differences in fundamental values,
attitudes, and behavior between people in different countries and within different
organizations.
6) Why are there few absolutes in OB?

Answer 6

Unlike fundamental sciences, OB was developed be applying general concepts to a

particular situation, contingency, and conditions. Other few simple and general principles that
explain the organizational behavior. Organizational behavior cannot determine the accurate
results or predictions(in case of human behavior) unlike other subjects like physical sciences,
chemistry, astronomy and physics but it does mean that x can lead to y under conditions
specified in z. Its because everyone is unique and behaves differently at same situation. For
instance, not everyone is motived by recognition and rewards.

Organizational behavior might explain more theories about how people behave in different
organization but it wont explain the straight cause and effect relationship because it depends
on the situation.

7) What are the challenges and opportunities for managers in using the OB concepts?

Answer 7

There are many major challenges and opportunities for managers to use OB concepts

Responding to Globalization

Increased Foreign Assignments

There are no geographical barriers for any organization after globalization. They can
freely operate for any point in the world which increases the work flow from one to other
country.

Working with different people

Working with different people who come from differ rent religions, race and geographic
conditions, it is must to understand that how are they shaped to work as a team and work
effectively.

Coping with Anti-capitalism backlash

Not every country will have the capitalist views, so it is must to understand and modify
the practices according to the cultures in which country the organization operates.

Overseeing movement of jobs to countries with low labor cost

Due to globalization, its quite common that the jobs flow to the countries with more
comparative advantages in terms of cost like cheap labor, natural resources etc.

Managing people During the war on terror

Organizations must find different ways to deal with employee fears at the time of war.

Managing work force diversity

It is a complicated job to manage the work force diversity as it mainly focuses on

differences between people from different countries,
mix of people in terms of gender, age, race, and sexual orientation.

Embracing diversity: - Diversity is about empowering people, it makes an organization

effective by capitalizing on all of the strengths of each employee.

Changing US demographics

Changing management philosophy

Recognizing and responding to difference

Improving quality and productivity

Quality and Productivity Improvement

Customer Service Improvement

People Skills Improvement:-

People skills are essential to succeed in todays organizations.

Stimulating Innovation and Change

Coping with Temporariness:-

Employees need to be able to cope with flexibility, spontaneity and unpredictability

Working in the Networked Organizations:-

Managers must adapt their skills and communication styles to succeed in an online
environment

Helping Employees Balance Work-Life Conflicts

Positive Work Environment Creation:

Improving Ethical Behaviors

organization behavior on how exactly they deal

8) What are the three levels of analysis in this books OB model?

Answer 8

There are three levels of analysis OB model in this book are

Individual level

Group level

Organizational level

These three are basic level analogous to build blocks, each level is constructed upon the
previous level.

Individual level

This level mainly involves in the study of perception, learning, turn over, creativity,
cooperative behavior etc. This level draws the organization behavior upon the psychology,
engineering and medicine.
Group level

This level of organizational behavior study on intra and inter group conflicts,
leadership, power, norms, interpersonal skills networks and roles. At this level, organization
behavior draws heavily upon sociological and socio-psychological sciences

Organizational level

This level involves in the study of major topics such as organization structure, cultural
diversity, cooperation and conflict, technology. In this level organization behavior draws upon
anthropology and political science..