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Organizational Behavior
[Name of the Writer]
[Name of the Institution]
Organizational Behavior
Abstract
This paper will examine what is organizational behavior, what factors influence organizational behavior and how can one determine an organizations behavior. The reading will also explore diversity in organizations, its benefits, and challenges for people and the organization itself, and lastly motivation. Also, how they are related to my work experience as Store In-charge in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and what factors motivate me.
Introduction
OB (Organizational behavior) explores and studies three elements of behavior in organizations that are groups, individuals and structure (Robbins, Judge, 2017). In organizational behavior, the information regarding individuals, groups and the structure of the organization is used to bring about better changes in the organization. The behavior of individuals or workers related to their jobs, absenteeism, work, turnover, employment, human performance, productivity and management, communication, motivation, and leadership significantly affects the organizational behavior, and therefore, these elements are used to determine the organizational behavior and what changes are needed for betterment.
Diversity means differences or dissimilarities. These differences can be of different types such as personal qualities related to age, race, gender, ethnicity, marital status, religion, and education, etc. Diversity in an organization or organizational diversity means how many of the workforce is from different backgrounds or with different characteristics, qualities, and beliefs, etc. Organizational diversity has its benefits and challenges.
Motivation is the cause of ones' actions, enthusiasm, and goals. It is a need that requires satisfaction or fulfillment. There are inward and outward elements that stimulate aspiration and vigor in individuals to be persistently fascinated and dedicated to a job, character or subject, or to try to realize a goal. Motivation is the result of the collaboration of both unconscious and conscious reasons such as passion of need or desire, rewards or incentive of achieving the target, and anticipations of the individual and or of relatives and friends.
Discussion
Organizational behavior
Organizational behavior is all about being thoughtful of how the organization workforce and groups behave in the organization. Organizational behavior is the study of explaining and predicting behavior. By inspecting behavior in three various levels of effect. First is at the individual, organizational or the group level. Through these three levels of behaviors, an organization can well understand work in the workplace and increase collaborations among the staff members.
Companies should participate in organizational behavior as it delivers the understandings needed for the organization to run efficiently and successfully. OB is crucial to be operative at all administrative levels. Businesses cannot excel when personnel's do not understand how their behaviors impact the company's performance and empower policy implementation. When workforces are managed efficiently and are encouraged to perform well, the entire company prospers. The acknowledged profits of OB are as wide-ranging as the businesses that inculcate it. Much of the studies highlight enhanced well-being and yield within work settings, which explains higher job contentment, better production, a better pledge to the organization and a decline in employees’ turnover.
During my job period in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia as a Store In-charge of a chocolate company, I noticed that the behavior of individuals or workers concerning their jobs was always taken very seriously and accordingly the organization used to intervene and make necessary changes in order to keep the organizational behavior standardized and effective. Individual and group behaviors related to performance, absenteeism and on-time task completion were strictly monitored, and any shortcoming in the organizational check process would be handled swiftly. The manager or supervisors used to monitor daily activities and timings etc. of groups and employees and forward the data to top managers who would make necessary changes if required. In such a way, an organization's functioning and performance were always kept standardized. Both of these countries that I worked in focus immensely on studying individual and group behaviors so to make future decisions or changes. Personally, I had to observe closely those supervised by me to keep track of their behaviors and ensure its compliance with the organization objectives and standards.
Organizational diversity
Diversity can be very beneficial for a company, and the more diverse an organization is, the more it has the ability to cover a diverse range of issues and opportunities effectively. This means that people from varied backgrounds, experiences, social statuses, regions, and other characteristics are able to offer various skills sets that can help an organization cope with issues or take advantage of those differences in any other way. Likewise, dialogs and debates among diverse people will usually produce a wider variety of ideas. Furthermore, in current globalized marketplace organizations having a diverse range of employees can more effectively serve that global market as the employees will be able to speak different languages and wider cultural understanding that is required.
Communication and language obstacles are the biggest challenges to effective organizational diversity. Employees may communicate in dissimilar primary languages, making communication hard for other employees. Cultural differences and perspectives on different points result in many conflicts and may hinder effective decisions as well. It is very hard for managers as well as employees to understand each other viewpoints and way of work. Many individuals from different cultures might not get along well with each other resulting in issues or poor productivity. Therefore, it is very important for an organization with the diverse workforce to equip its employees with the effectively communicate knowledge and train them on how to effectively work and communicate with coworkers, irrespective of their dissimilarities (Hajro, 2017). Diversity training can also assist in reducing interpersonal issues within the organization.
There are multiple levels of diversity namely, surface level diversity and deep-level diversity. According to experts' characteristics such as age, ethnicity, religion, race, disability, and gender are demographic characteristics, and they are just the tip of the iceberg as they reveal surface-level diversity, and they do not reveal any feelings and thoughts processes. This level of diversity can lead workers to see one another through assumptions and stereotypes. Nonetheless, studies have illustrated that with time as individuals or groups get to know each other and intermingle, they become less anxious about regional and ethical dissimilarities if they see the more significant features or individualities like values and personalities, that symbolize deep-level diversity.
During my time in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I witnessed more diversity than ever before, in the organization I worked in as well as outside the organization. I learned a lot about different cultures, people, beliefs, work ethics, the positives and negatives and about managing diversity and co-existing with different people under the same roof with the same goals to achieve. In my office, I had to work with other employees who were from Algeria, Syria, Philippines, Nepal, India, Georgia and Pakistan, etc. Almost everyone in my workplace was different from the other, with different accents, languages, beliefs, attitudes, and motivations. In the beginning, it was hard for me even to understand the accent of many of these coworkers, it took me a couple of months to get easy with their accents. When working in an organization with a diverse workforce, it is hard to know what people from different backgrounds expect from you and how to deal with them in a way that is more appropriate to them. Similarly, my coworkers experience the same difficulties when communicating with me, but with time things got nearly normal.
Organizations with diverse workforce should train their employees on how to communicate effectively with other coworkers and staff members. Also, new hires must be introduced to his or her coworkers so break the ice and have some understanding. Any communication issues or conflicts should be immediately reported and resolved. For this reason, it is imperative for an organizations success and productivity prepare its teams, and personnel's to successfully work and connect with each other, regardless of all the differences.
In my opinion, diversity in an organization is very advantageous for the employees and the organization. An organization with staff that belongs from different backgrounds and have unique personality traits add a lot of new sights and unique ways of work that usually is not possible with the same workforce. For instance, an individual from Africa can provide the organization with the insight or method of managing people of resolving a specific conflict in a way that is unique, very effective and not practiced in the home country of the organization. Moreover, people from various regions with various languages are able to communicate more effectively with diverse range customers or businesses, contributing to the effectiveness and productivity of the organization. Moreover, diversity is also very beneficial for employees. Working in an organization with dissimilar workforce adds tremendously to employees overall experience, especially, communication skills. Employees get hands-on experience working with different people, they learn and gain knowledge from people from around the world. Employees and managers acquire managing skills that cannot be learned from books usually. In addition, diversity increases organization and its staff confidence and morale. Diversity is in particular beneficial for organizations that operate on a global or international marketplace.
Motivation
Motivation is a psychological or a mental phenomenon in which wants and needs of the individuals have to be tackled by outlining an encouragement plan. The word 'motive' means desires, needs, drives or wants within the individual. Motivation means something that pushes an individual to do something or work hard for his or her need or desire. It can also be termed as the process of encouraging people to activities to achieve the objectives. There are many factors that can push an individual to work hard such as, desire for money, appreciation, success, job satisfaction, etc. One of the major function of any manager or management is to provoke the employees to execute in the best of their capacities and talents.
One type of motivation is known as Self-motivation. Self-motivation is a strength that pushes an individual to keep moving forward. It inspires endless learning and achievement in all situations. Self-motivation is the most important means of achieving our goals and continuous development. It is essentially correlated to our imagination in setting vivacious objectives for ourselves, and our belief that we have the necessary abilities and skills for realizing those challenging objectives. The need for self-motivation is always felt, and we should find it one way or the other to keep going and achieving our goals.
There are three types of motivations, mainly divided into two groups; extrinsic and intrinsic. Scholars have identified a third kind of motivation that is said to be remarkably effective if the first two types do not work well. the first motivation type is known as extrinsic motivation. In extrinsic motivation, an individual reason for motivation for doing something or activity is to accomplish something or avoid something. For instance, if a student will work and study harder if he or she wants to get ‘Grade A' in his school exams, or avoid getting scolded by teachers or parents for not getting good grades. The second type of motivation is known as intrinsic motivation. The drive or eagerness inside of an individual to do something purposeful or be successful in something is termed as intrinsic motivation. For example, if I want to become a business person and earn a lot and desire to help my community through my business, I will work hard every day to achieve my goal and fulfill my desire. The third kind of motivation suggested by many scholars is Family. Many people believe that to provide for the family or do something for them has always been the primary motivation on an individual. So, if intrinsic and extrinsic motivations are weak or not available at some times, Family should be made one's motivation to achieve one's goals or targets.
There are multiple theories of motivation, for example, Theory X and Theory Y, Two-Factor Theory, McClelland's Theory of Needs, Self-Determination Theory, Goal-Setting Theory, Self-Efficacy Theory, Reinforcement Theory, Expectancy Theory, etc. The most well-known theory of motivation is the hierarchy of needs theory by Abraham Maslow. Maslow postulated that every human being has five needs basic needs that motivate them. First is Physiological need that Includes appetite, shelter, sex, thirst, and other physical needs; second in the hierarchy is the need for safety or security and shelter from emotional and physical harm. Third on the list is Social need that is needed for affection, acceptance, belongingness, and friendship. Fourth is Esteem; esteem refers to Internal aspects, for instance, self-respect, self-sufficiency, and accomplishment, and external factors include in social status, appreciation, and thoughtfulness. Lastly, Self-actualization; self- actualization is a determination to become what one feels capable of becoming; such as personal or professional growth, attaining ones potential, and self-fulfillment.
What motivates me comprises different factors. My first motivation is my family. Specifically my parents. From the beginning, I have always wanted to do something for my family, make them proud, provide them with basic necessities and more, etc. whatever I have done so far was for my family and their likes. The motivation that comes from family or because of the family is the most common and effective motivation. Other than that, I have my personal goals and imaginations of becoming something, achieving success and fulfilling my desires; moreover, meeting the expectations of people close to the organization I work for or me is also a motivational factor for me. I always want to meet and even exceed the expectations that people have from me, and therefore I work hard to make people proud or happy. When I started working in Kuwait, my motivation was to get exposure and experience and earn for my family; along with that was the motivation to serve the organization well that gave me the opportunity to work with them and help them in achieving their objectives.
Conclusion
To conclude, organizational behavior is all about being considerate of how the human resources and structure of an organization and the groups behave within the organization. Organizational behavior is the study of clarifying and forecasting its workforce and groups behaviors in order to keep the behavior aligned with the company’s objectives and mission. Diversity in an organization refers to the variety of its workforce, such as people having dissimilar backgrounds, different features, potentials, and philosophies, etc. Organizational diversity has its advantages and some challenges as well. Motivation, on the other hand, is something that drives people to do something, achieve or provide something in order to get satisfaction or realize their objectives. In my experience of job in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I have come across all these features and learned that organizational behavior study is extremely important for the success of an organization; moreover, organizational diversity is very beneficial for the company as well as the employees, though it is challenging to handle diverse workforce. Lastly, motivation plays a key role in any individual work and success.
References
Hajro, A., Gibson, C. B., & Pudelko, M. (2017). Knowledge exchange processes in multicultural teams: Linking organizational diversity climates to teams’ effectiveness. Academy of Management Journal, 60(1), 345-372.
Robbins, S. P. & Judge, T.A. (2017) Organizational Behavior (17th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson
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