IRE260H1 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Organizational Behavior Management, Jeffrey Pfeffer, Human Resource Management
10 Oct 2018
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Chapter 1: Organizational Behavior and Management
● What are Organizations?
○ Organizations are social inventions for accomplishing common goals through
group effort
■ Ex: college sororities and fraternities, Toronto blue jays, Vega, CTV, etc.
○ Social Inventions
■ Organizations are social inventions, meaning their essential characteristic
is the coordinated presence of people, not necessarily things
■ The field of organizational behavior is about understanding people and
managing them to work effectively
○ Goal Accomplishment
■ The field of organizational behavior is concerned with how organizations
can survive and adapt to change
■ People have to
● Be motivated to join and remain in the organization
● Carry out their basic work reliably, in terms of productivity, quality,
and service;
● Be willing to continuously learn and upgrade their knowledge and
skills; and
● Be flexible and innovative
○ Group effort
■ Organizations depend on interaction and coordination among people to
accomplish their goals
■ The field of organizational behavior is concerned with how to get people
to practice effective teamwork
● What is Organizational Behavior?
○ Organizational behavior refers to the attitudes and behaviors of individuals and
groups in organizations
■ Those who study organizational behavior are interested in attitudes--how
satisfied people are with their jobs, how committed they feel to the goals
of the organization, or how supportive they are of promoting women or
minorities into management positions
○ Human resources management refers to programs, practices, and systems to
acquire, develop, motivate, and retain employees in organizations
■ Practices include recruitment and selection, compensation, and training
and development
● Why Study Organizational Behavior?
○ Organizational Behavior is Interesting
■ Organizational behavior includes interesting examples of success as well
as failure
○ Organizational Behavior is Important
■ What happens in organizations often has a profound impact on people
○ Organizational Behavior Makes a Difference
■ In his book Competitive Advantage Through People, Jeffrey Pfeffer
argued that organizations can no longer achieve a competitive advantage
through the traditional sources of success, such as technology, regulated
markets, access to financial resource, and economy of scale
● Today, the main factor that differentiates organizations is their
workforce and human capital
● Human capital is strongly related to and a key determinant of firm
performance
■ The best companies to work for are also the most successful
● How Much Do You Know About Organizational Behavior?
○ Researchers have found that the personalities of effective leaders vary a fair
amount, many people prefer routine jobs, managers are not well informed about
the pay of their peers and superiors, workers underestimate their own
absenteeism, pay is not always the most effective way to motivate workers and
improve job performance, and women are underrepresented in leadership roles
in organizations
● Goals of Organizational Behavior
○ Predicting Organizational Behavior
■ In organizations, there is considerable interest in predicting when people
will make ethical decisions, create innovative products, or engage in
sexual harassment
○ Explaining Organizational Behavior
■ Another goal of organizational behavior is to explain events in
organizations--why do they occur?
■ Organizational behavior is especially interested in determining why
people are more or less motivated, satisfied, or prone to resign
○ Managing Organizational Behavior
■ Management is defined as the art of getting things accomplished in
organizations through others
● Managers acquire, allocate, and utilize physical and human
resources to accomplish goals
■ Evidence-based management involves translating principles based on
the best scientific evidence into organizational practices
● By using this, managers can make decisions based on the best
available scientific evidence from social science and
organizational research, rather than personal preference and
unsystematic experience
● Early Prescriptions Concerning Management
○ The Classical View and Bureaucracy
■ The classical viewpoint tended to advocate a very high degree of
specialization of labor and a very high degree of coordination
● Each department was to tend to its own affairs, with centralized
decision making from upper management providing coordination
Document Summary
Organizations are social inventions for accomplishing common goals through group effort. Ex: college sororities and fraternities, toronto blue jays, vega, ctv, etc. Organizations are social inventions, meaning their essential characteristic is the coordinated presence of people, not necessarily things. The field of organizational behavior is about understanding people and managing them to work effectively. The field of organizational behavior is concerned with how organizations can survive and adapt to change. Be motivated to join and remain in the organization. Carry out their basic work reliably, in terms of productivity, quality, and service; Be willing to continuously learn and upgrade their knowledge and skills; and. Organizations depend on interaction and coordination among people to accomplish their goals. The field of organizational behavior is concerned with how to get people to practice effective teamwork. Organizational behavior refers to the attitudes and behaviors of individuals and groups in organizations.
