MHR 405 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Intellectual Capital, Organizational Memory, Organizational Learning
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Chapter 1
Communities of practice: Informal groups bound together by shared expertise and passion for a particular
activity or interest.
Contingency approach: The idea that a particular action may have different consequences in different
situations; that no single solution is best in all circumstances.
Contingent work: Any job in which the individual does not have an explicit or implicit contract for long-term
employment, or one in which the minimum hours of work can vary in a nonsystematic way.
Employability: The "new deal" employment relationship in which the job is viewed as a temporary event, so
employees are expected to keep pace with changing competency requirements and shift to new projects as
demand requires.
Environmental scanning: Receiving information from the external and internal environments so that more
effective strategic decisions can be made.
Ethics: The study of moral principles or values that determine whether actions are right or wrong and whether
outcomes are good or bad.
Globalization: Occurs when an organization extends its activities to other parts of the world, actively
participates in other markets, and competes against organizations located in other countries.
Grafting: The process of acquiring knowledge by hiring individuals or buying entire companies.
Intellectual capital: The knowledge that resides in an organization, including its human, structural, and
relationship capital.
Knowledge management: Any structured activity that improves an organization's capacity to acquire, share,
and use knowledge in ways that improve its survival and success.
Network organization: An alliance of several organizations for the purpose of creating a product or serving
a client.
Open systems: Organizations and other entities with interdependent parts that work together to continually
monitor and transact with the external environment.
Organization: A group of people who work interdependently towards some purpose.
Organizational behaviour (OB): The study of what people think, feel, and do in and around organizations.
Organizational learning: An organization's capacity to acquire, disseminate, and apply knowledge for its
survival and success.
Organizational memory: The storage and preservation of the organization's knowledge (i.e., its intellectual
capital).
Organizations: Groups of people who work interdependently towards some purpose.
Scientific method: A set of principles and procedures that help researchers to systematically understand
previously unexplained events and conditions.
Stakeholders: Shareholders, customers, suppliers, governments, and any other groups with a vested interest
in the organization.
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Telecommuting: Working from home or another location away from the office, usually with a computer
connection to the office. (also called teleworking)
Virtual teams: Cross-functional teams that operate across space, time, and organizational boundaries with
members who communicate mainly through electronic technologies.
Chapter 2
360-degree feedback: Performance feedback is received from a full circle of people around the employee.
Ability: The natural aptitudes and learned capabilities required to successfully complete a task.
Absorptive capacity: Employees must have a sufficient level of related knowledge to be aware of and make
sense of information outside the organization.
Action learning: A form of on-site, experiential-based learning in which participants investigate an
organizational problem or opportunity and possibly implement their solution.
Behaviourism: A perspective that focuses entirely on behaviour and observable events, rather than on a
person's thoughts.
Competencies: The abilities, individual values, personality traits, and other characteristics of people that lead
to superior performance.
Continuous reinforcement: A schedule that reinforces behaviour every time it occurs.
Extinction: Occurs when the removal or withholding of a consequence decreases the frequency or future
probability of the behaviour preceding that event.
Feedback: Any information that people receive about the consequences of their behaviour.
Fixed interval schedule: A schedule that reinforces behaviour after it has occurred for a fixed period of time.
Fixed ratio schedule: A schedule that reinforces behaviour after it has occurred a fixed number of times.
Implicit learning: The experiential phenomenon of acquiring information about relationships in the
environment without any conscious attempt to do so.
Intellectual capital: The knowledge that resides in an organization, including its human, structural, and
relationship capital.
Job satisfaction: A person's attitude (beliefs, assessed feelings, and behavioural intentions) regarding the
job and work context.
Knowledge management: Any structured activity that improves an organization's capacity to acquire, share,
and use knowledge in ways that improve its survival and success.
Law of effect: States that the likelihood that an operant behaviour will be repeated depends on its
consequences.
Learning: A relatively permanent change in behaviour (or behaviour tendency) that occurs as a result of a
person's interaction with the environment.
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