Discuss the theories of Personality, Perception, and Attitudes and demonstrate your ability to

practically apply such theories in the following situations:

a) When an organization is planning to intake new recruits
b) When Unions see the Management as being unfair
c) When feels that they need to do something to change attitudes of their subordinates

Personality, Perception and attitudes are all integral components classified under the discipline of
Organizational Behavior. They are diverse and function in interrelation to one another in the
workforce of an organization.
Organization behavior can be defined as a field of study that investigates the impact that
individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior within organizations, for the purpose of
applying such knowledge toward improving an organization’s effectiveness. It delves into and
studies three determinants of behaviour in organizations, namely, individuals, groups, and
structure. In addition to this, OB applies the knowledge gained about individuals, groups, and the
impact of structure on behaviour in order to make organizations function more effectively and
efficiently.
To sum up, in simple terms, OB is the study of what employees do in an organization and how
their behaviour directly and indirectly affects the overall performance of an organization.
Personality, perception and attitudes are factors with the potential to influence and impact several
primary functions in an organization, ranging from recruitment to performance to even
termination. Therefore understanding the practical application of these theories in real life
scenarios in a workplace is of vital importance.

Scholars have defined “Personality” in multiple ways throughout the years. According to Gordon
Allport, “personality is the dynamic organisation within the individual of those psychophysical
systems that determine his unique adjustments to his environment. Stephen P Robins describes
personality as the sum total of ways in which an individual reacts and interacts with others.
Moreover, according to Gibson (2003) personality is a relatively stable set of characteristics,
tendencies and temperaments that have been significantly formed by inheritance and by social,
cultural and environmental factors.
Simply, Personality is a collection of attributes and characteristics that define an individual.
Perception, on the other hand is defined as the process by which individuals organise and
interpret their sensory impressions in order to give meaning to their environment. Perception
differs from person to person and there is no one fixed thought process when it comes to
perception.
Attitudes are likes and dislikes – they can be favourable or unfavourable evaluations of and
reactions to objects, people, situations, or other aspects of the world, including abstract ideas and
social policies, as defined by Hilgard. Attitudes, just like personality and perception differ from
one individual to another. It’s never constant.
In the recruitment arena, all three components are used as determinants in selecting the
workforce of an organization. They collectively factor in forming biases and assumptions about
employees, which can both strengthen and hinder the process. It is interesting to note, that most
organizations now take soft skills like personality, perception and attitude into account rather
than technical skills or hard skills because the workplace of today functions on teamwork and
collective effort. Therefore, selecting the perfect fit that complies with all these requirements, is
not only tough, but also vital to the performance of the organization.
It is a general belief, that there are five main types of personalities (The big five), namely
extroversion/ introversion, agreeableness/ non agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional
stability and openness to experience. It is these five personalities that are taken into consideration
in recruitment and selection. Attitude and perception are complimentary factors in this.
An organization would prefer to recruit an employee who is optimistic and more likely to take on
challenges, than one who is pessimistic and shies away from responsibility and challenges. A
positive employee is a strength to an organization, whereas a negative employee can cause
disruption in the work process by intentionally or unintentionally influencing other workers with
their mindset as well. Therefore, the ideal employee to recruit would be somewhat of an
extrovert, open to new experiences, emotionally stable with the ability to bear pressure and
agreeable to the extent where he also knows when to put his foot down.
When it comes to recruitment, perception too plays a role. There are certain perceptual errors
that can hinder the selection process. These are:
 Selective Perception
 Halo / Horn Effect
 Stereotyping
 Contrast effects
There are also other errors such as Attribution theory, Central tendency, Recency effect, and so
on.
Perception biases are very common across most organizations when it comes to recruitment.
Many employers tend to draw an initial impression, either good or bad over a candidate and then
stereotype them, causing this initial impression to hinder their judgment on other redeemable or
unfavourable characteristics the employee may possess. In the same way, a favourable bias
towards one candidate can blind the employer to a potential recruit that is an even better fit to the
organization, simply because they are not willing to change their perception.
This then brings us to attitudes. Attitudes, like stated earlier, are positive, negative or neutral
views towards an “object”. An employee’s attitude towards his job, his peers and his workplace
determine his success or failure in the organization, and also impacts the performance of the
organization as a whole. Therefore, flagging down on negative, or potentially threatening
attitudes at the initial screening process will go a long way in ensuring a successful recruitment
process, and thereby aiding in finding the perfect fit.
Personality, perception and attitude also play a role when it comes to handling unions. Dealing
with unions is a tricky business and therefore using the optimum approach in handling them can
prevent a lot of potential issues down the line. Understanding what personalities the organization
has to interact with, and what attitudes to possess when dealing with them is of primary
importance.
Most often, unions identify issues and believe they’re being treated unfairly by the management,
due to mismatched perceptions on the part of both the organization and the union. The vision one
party manifests may be entirely different from the other. For an instance, if the unions are
demanding a pay hike, bringing forth valid concerns and reasons, and the management rejects
their demands, they will be frustrated and aggressive, believing they’re being unfairly treated.
However, the management might also have valid reasons for rejecting this demand, like
undergoing financial trouble. As this is not the perception the union holds, there will be a
mismatch in perceptions. The union will simply believe that their concerns are not being
appreciated, thereby leading to problems. Therefore, it is very important to identify this
mismatch, and have all parties be on the same page about any matter to prevent issues from
cropping. For this, perception plays a key role.
It is also important to identify the different attitudes in play at the workplace. Managers should
be interested in their employees’ attitudes because attitudes give warnings of potential problems
and influence behavior. Evidence strongly suggests that whatever managers can do to improve
employee attitudes will likely result in heightened organizational effectiveness.
Finally, we come to changing the attitudes of subordinates in the workplace. Changing the
mindset of individuals is a challenge as most people are not willing to change their preference or
views towards something as they tend to be very set in their ways. However, sometimes, change
is not just required, it can even be mandatory in an organization and that’s where change
management comes into place. It involves dismantling current attitudes and perceptions of
subordinates, instilling the necessary change and then nurturing in new attitudes.
Attitudes can be changed through education and new knowledge. Managers are therefore
expected to be good teachers. However, in order to be good teachers managers must first spend
sufficient time in learning and internalizing new knowledge.
For an instance, maybe the reason for changing the current attitudes of subordinates can be due
to the implementation of a new system or process in the organization. As most people dislike
venturing beyond their comfort zone, they will initially reject or be dissatisfied with the new
system as they already hold an individual perception that is negative towards it. It is the duty of
the management to change this mindset, by providing necessary training in the new system and
thus familiarizing them to it, and working towards changing their perceptions towards the new
system, and ultimately leading towards adjusting and embracing it.
Doing regular temperature checks in an organization to identify employee attitudes is also
important as dissatisfied employees tend to perform poorly, influence their colleagues with their
negative mindset, leading to issues like workplace accidents and carelessness, tardiness,
absenteeism, and even an increase in turnover. However, by flagging down on attitude issues,
these problems can be addressed and stopped at the root itself before it aggravates even further.
Therefore when it comes to changing the attitudes of employees, tact is required.
Thereby, to conclude, understanding the personalities, perceptions and attitudes that manifest in
an organization can go a long way towards organizational success. However, these three
components should be approached with caution, as employees, like all humans, are emotional
creatures. Properly understanding the way to approach problems related to these components will
help you reach a better understanding about organizational behavior, and thereby be key to
improving the overall performance of the organization and satisfaction of employees as a whole.