The Basic Issues Being Faced within Organizational Behavior - Coursework Example

Organizational behavior and HRM Name: Institution: Date: Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 1.0 Introduction 4 2.0 Causes of the problem 4 2.1 Promotion at work 4 2.2 Factors that Chris considered when selecting members of a team 5 2.3 Comments regarding the new product 5 2.4 Challenges faced by Chris’s team 6 3.0 How the situation might be corrected 8 4.0 Avoiding such problems in the future 9 4.1 The right time to initiate change 9 4.2 Organizational culture 10 4.3 Effective communication 10 5.0 Analysis of the behavior of Chris and Meg that led to DSS’s difficulties 11 5.1 Chris’s behavior as a leader 11 5.2 Meg’s behavior as a manager 11 6.0 Recommendations 12 7.0 Conclusion 13 8.0 References 14 Arnold, J et al (2004). Work Psychology, 4th Edition. FT Prentice 14 Abstract The purpose of this paper is to examine the basic issues being faced within organizational behavior and human resource management and how they can be managed. As the human resource director at DSS Consulting, I have received a complaint from Chris Peterson regarding the removal of her responsibilities by Meg Cooke who is her manager. I decide to examine the situation and form a plan to avert similar cases happening in future. HRM potentially plays very key roles in the context of preventing or managing dysfunctional behavior whereby it develops the skills and awareness of an employee; it effectively governs the practices and structures of HRM and delivery mechanisms; it also develops an ethical culture and environment. DSS Consulting was started in 1997 to offer organizational support to small schools districts basically within the mountain west and mid-west. By 2005, some changes had started to affect DSS. Due to these alterations, the founders considered a shift in strategy that would be important for DSS to maintain its growth and succeed. For instance, Meg Cooke was promoted to the rank of chief operating officer. Chris Peterson on the other side was promoted to the position of project manager and her role in leading consulting projects was very successful. When time came to reorganize into teams that are cross-functional, Chris was assigned to lead the Southwest Region team. It is thus recommended that both Chris and Meg should change their attitudes for the purpose of accommodating one another. It is also concluded that both Chris and Meg had differences. The organizational culture for the company is also to blamed for the problems that arose 1.0 Introduction Human resource is the most important segment of any particular business, hence efficient utilization of capability of an employee becomes the main center of attention within the organization. Considering the function of organizational behavior/human resource management (OB/HRM), assessment and evaluation of an organization’s needs, getting people to fill the evaluated needs, and offering the most favorable environment to great levels of inspiration and performance are all features that run OB/HRM in an organization. There is a relationship between OB and HRM and this arises from the truth that HRM can be executed as equipment for organizational behavior shaping (Mullins, 2005). Organizational behavior by itself can be used to describe the concept of the character for people who make up the human essentials of an organization. This report will therefore analyze how concepts of OB and HRM intertwine in relation to the case study of Chris Peterson at DSS Consulting. 2.0 Causes of the problem 2.1 Promotion at work After Chris was assigned to lead the team in the Southwest Region, she viewed her new assignment with a combination of excitement and hesitation (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). A lot of the excitement originated from the opportunity to head a permanent team instead of coordinating people for consulting projects that are short timed. Her hesitation on the other side was due to a number of uncertainties regarding how the latest strategy would spread out. Chris was well informed that a lot of people were hesitant regarding the new strategy and unsure about the need of the change and if or not it was prone to be successful. According to Ancona & Caldwell (2010), this brought about a great deal of anxiety amidst several consultants concerning the future of DSS and their responsibilities in the latest structure. Chris also thought that the strategy was still growing and might alter as management grasped a sense of how well the fresh company was operating. Among the decisions that Meg had made regarding the new teams formed was that there was need for the team leaders to have a higher flexibility in welcoming individuals to be part of their teams. Chris had no issue with this therefore she required individuals who possessed good skills and had an experience within the process of DSS consulting. Secondly, she thought she wanted people who had the capacity of working together effectively. However, the team she selected did not want external pressure from other members of the Southwest group. 2.2 Factors that Chris considered when selecting members of a team Chris decided to select individuals who already in terms of work had some experience in working together. In general, Chris was pleased with the team she managed to bring together. The team then settled into its location and work commenced without any delay. Chris knew that the team would want to share their experiences and utilize their general knowledge hence she helped the team pull together their new experience. Sharing information was not a great deal as the group was comfortable sharing information with each other. In the course of finishing the projects, the group was able to dedicate a lot of time to developing designs for the latest system. Chris had two main goals for her team. For instance, she did not want the team to lose focus on the responsibilities of defining the latest system and establishing particularly how DSS consultants would execute it. She also wanted to assist the team not to be distracted and maintain the cohesion. Additional to working with the group, Chris was able to develop friendships with two officers in small districts and she had the opportunity to explain the system her group was developing (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). This portrays her skills of leadership as an effective communicator. In general, she received a positive feedback and she communicated this to her group. Occasionally, Chris met with Meg to give her updates on the project but their meetings were basically short. Chris noticed that a number of the other group leaders spent a lot of time meeting with Meg than she did. 2.3 Comments regarding the new product Upon the completion of the particular design of the suggested budget and planning scheme, Chris felt there was need to share the completed work of her group with others. A number of specific questions came up regarding how the scheme would deal with matters that were extraordinary to a district. Other questions concerned the products’ price and how it would be different from other products that were on the market already. This explains the behavior of people regarding their views on new products on the market. Chris shared people’s comments with her group and they tried to alter the first specifications and design of the program so as to meet people’s concern (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). In the short run, this worked well but when a lot of comments came in, the team started to have difficulties as they tried to adjust the design to suit outsider’s questions. The response from within DSS varied from the ones received from the districts. Various functional experts who got the project’s descriptions basically acknowledge receiving them although they did not provide actual comments. The group started to modify the project particulars in response to the remarks from the districts. However, Chris noticed that the group’s effective process built had started to go wrong. Disagreements came up concerning how significant various remarks were and movement in finalizing the particulars appeared to slow. Members of the team started to rise concerns than they did in the past regarding DSS direction and question if the team would manage to finish its responsibility (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). As a leader, Chris felt something must be done before the group loses its track. So, on Friday, she cancelled work and organized a meeting for the entire team. The team discussed their performance and what was required to accomplish designing the project. The meeting was successful. On Monday, the team finalized the particulars and classified the necessary steps to basically develop the product and consulting procedures. 2.4 Challenges faced by Chris’s team The team however experienced some difficulties because some tasks needed detailed knowledge concerning carious types of projects districts might perform. Although team members had the experience and knowledge to finish most of the task, they frequently found that they required some help from specialized knowledge from DSS specialists within the practice groups (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). Since the other teams of the group believed Chris’s team did not want external team work, they did not offer much help to them when they needed help. The mode of communication was either by email or by face-to-face encounter with the expert. For simple matters, this worked well but was a bit tricky for complex matters. Members of the team did not get enough time working on complex matters with the functional specialists and they did not get sufficient help and occasionally, they were rejected. As the leader, Chris went to the manager of practice so as to get help. In fact, this did not always work. Chris met with the Contract Negotiation’s head to identify the particular information regarding a district’s staff that would require to be inserted into the program (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). She was told that she would be given a specialist to work on it. When a member of Chris’s team got in touch with the specialist, he was informed that the scheme had not been scheduled into her program and that she would not provide any help until other things were done. Chris scheduled to meet with Meg to talk about the hardships her team was going through in getting help. According to Chris, the meeting was not fruitful. When Chris got back to her team, the general reaction was negative. Some comments concerned how decisions at DSS appeared to be somehow political in the new organization and that Meg appeared to be favoring some people. Despite the hardship, Chris’s confidence was contagious whereby she made her team increase efforts and carried out independent studies to fill in the gaps in their knowledge (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). It took only ten days and the team was ready with the entire product prepared for beta testing. Chris had a meeting with Meg which started off well. Meg appreciated Chris’s efforts on the system and also acknowledged Chris’s leadership. Meg changed the conversation and asked for a report regarding the kinds of services districts within her area might require DSS to offer in the future. In another meeting, the problem came when Meg told Chris that after reviewing the project of her team and its potential, she had made a decision that DSS would not be able to go forward with the project of scheduling and budgeting. When Chris wanted explanations for this, she was told that the number of fresh products DSS could be able to support was inadequate and that teams within different areas had not shown any interest on the section of the regions they had worked with for the kind of product developed (Ancona & Caldwell, 2010). Meg also stated that she was worried that the scheme might not interest the large districts. Chris was not satisfied with this observation. Meg insisted that her decision concerning cancelling the project was final. She then said that Southwest Region Team had to concentrate entirely on marketing products from DSS and should not be involved in product development task in the future, and that some alteration to the team composition would be done. Chris was asked if she was ready to lead the team in a fresh direction or if she would consider returning to the practice group of Information and Technology as a functional expert, a question that Chris found disturbing. 3.0 How the situation might be corrected Every time individuals are engaged, devoted and fired up, disagreement and conflict is bound to take place (Mullins, 2005). As the HR director at DSS consulting, it is my duty to respond to Chris’s complaint regarding her removal of responsibility by her manager. For starters, I would seek to know Chris’s welfare regarding job evaluation. This is an organized process for establishing the relative worth of responsibility in an organization (Henderson, 2008). With this in mind and considering the case study, Chris was promoted from being a functional specialist to head Southwest Region team as project manager. As a project manager, she was able to encourage action and motivate her team by demonstrating ideas and attaining results. Hence it would have been fair if Chris would be compensated. Another factor to channel in is the issue of organization development. This is a continuing effort, led and encouraged by top management. Much weight is put on team working and facilitation. This is something that Chris portrayed when she led the Southwest Region group and particularly her team. Satisfaction of customers, including present products and services and also future markets are all essential for the goals and expectations of the organization (Mullins, 2005). Meg being the manager, considered this factor concerning lack of interest by the large districts towards the product which still comprises of the future market and that’s why she cancelled Chris’s project. Considering approaches to change, like negotiation and agreement, Meg and Chris needed to come to an agreement towards the removal of responsibility. This is important because negotiation and agreement brings about the achievement of a formal agreement and everyone goes home happy (Mullins, 2005). As a human resource manager, I would encourage negotiations between Meg and Chris, whereby a consensus is made and Chris is compensated for her lost resources and time (Bratton & Gold, 2007). If Meg could have offered Chris a compensation for her change of work, then Chris would have been contended and adjust to change without much ado (Arnold et al, 2004). The art of good communication is very crucial in any business. This is because it creates motivation (Fielding, 2006). Agreement promotes good morale in an organization, while conflicts distort the morale. Better communication is also considered as a great foundation of growth. As a manager, being open to ideas arising from employees promotes the correct motivation hence making the whole organization work better. If Meg could have considered Chris’s ideas, the consensus between them could have been more productive hence flexibility of Chris in accepting changes. Considering the problems that happened to Chris’s team, apart from using team role whereby members assume various roles within the structure of the team, hence spreading efforts, the problem could be avoided through groupthink whereby the group preserves the harmony of the group through suppression of opposing perspectives. Another way is through homogeneity whereby members of the team are different or similar to each other. This is because teams that are homogenous appear to be very cohesive and can develop effective communication ways easily, hence reduce conflict within the organization (Plowman, 2010). 4.0 Avoiding such problems in the future 4.1 The right time to initiate change Every organization has need for initiating change. Leaders need to have a vision of the organization through assessing the present status and the market’s future and make a decision of where they want the organization to be (Tanner, 2010). The changes and priorities to be made should match the organization’s achievement. During the organization’s analysis, one needs to use the analysis methods like SWOT where the organization is evaluated in terms of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. There are various approaches of change. For instance Mullins (2005), suggest that education and communication as a change approach brings about sharing of information. Another approach to change is negotiation and agreement whereby people establish a formal agreement hence less chances of having conflicts. Organizations need to evaluate the right time when change needs to be initiated within the company so that people are prepared for it and reduce the risk of not embracing change. It is important to know that some people in the organization may resist change due to a number of factors like peer pressure and organizational politics (Tanner, 2010). For instance, Chris was hesitant to change basically because of organizational politics. 4.2 Organizational culture Organizational culture is a concept acknowledged as an influential feature controlling the failures and successes of organizational change endeavors. The structure of the organization is also important in determining the culture of the organization (Draft, 2006). By itself, organizational structure is the sequence of relationships amongst ranks within the company and among organization’s members. This structure facilitates a framework of command and order through which the organization’s activities can be planned, scheduled, directed and managed. When there is proper organizing within the organization, there will be differentiation whereby employee’s tasks or jobs are defined completely (Mullins, 2005). There will also be differentiation in terms of defining boundaries involving tasks and jobs. With the correct organizational culture in place whereby people have a common platform, issues of misinformation can be reduced (Draft, 2006). A culture that is healthy basically promotes the motivation of employees to stay loyal towards the organization (Stone & stone-Romero, 2008). 4.3 Effective communication An organization is not able to run properly without effective communication. Effective communication here means ability to communicate with employers, staff, clients, and the public in general (Kondrat, 2009). It is important for managers to communicate with their employees because without effective communication, whichever decision will be lost, as the employees will act on what they consider as right and not act upon what is required to be done. Hence, it is paramount that managers master the communication art (Kondrat, 2009). Effective communication is also seen when people are given the right responsibilities. For instance, Chris would have been informed earlier enough that the Southwest Region team would concentrate on marketing DSS products and not developing fresh products. 5.0 Analysis of the behavior of Chris and Meg that led to DSS’s difficulties 5.1 Chris’s behavior as a leader Every organization has heads and followers (Mullins, 2005). There are various factors to be considered so that an organization runs effectively. For instance, manager’s behavior and the employee’s behavior both attribute the smooth running of a business. However, when this is neglected, the business can either fail or succeed. Considering the aspect of leadership in Chris who was the leader of the Southwest Region, she was able to outline and share a vision that gave direction to the work of her team. As a leader, Chris was able to influence the direction of her group through the use of strategy which was specifying and developing a new product so as to achieve the vision of the organization. Leaders require willing support and teamwork of the followers and depend on managers to execute the mission of the company (Rollinson et al, 1998). This is evident when Chris’s team was able to work with her successfully toward accomplishing the task that they had. Hence leaders encourage their team to increase productivity. Chris managed to lead her team successfully and their work was good, but somehow this did not please her manager, hence change of responsibility. 5.2 Meg’s behavior as a manager Meg as the manager on the other hand is directed towards attaining the aims and objectives of the organization and this only happens through other people’s efforts (Rollinson et al, 1998). In the case study, the decisions she makes as the manager are considered as political because she seems to play favorites whereby she considered some people special than others. This is evident in the case where she spends a lot of time with leaders from other teams while spending less time with Chris in the meetings. Managers need to carry out several roles in an organization and the way they handle different situations will rely on the management style (Mullins, 2005). Management styles are features that guide managers in making decisions and relating to employees. With regards to management styles, the case when Meg cancelled Chris’s project and termed that as a final decision is characterized as an autocratic style of management. This type of management is seen when the manager makes unilateral decision without much consideration for the employee (Draft, 2006). 6.0 Recommendations Considering the above case, I would suggest a number of factors to be considered for the future of DSS Company. For instance, the importance of good organizational structure must be considered. Since good organizational structure by itself does not yield good performance, the proper allocation of responsibilities, the decision making, grouping of functions, co-ordination, rewards and control become very essential necessities for the continual running of an organization (Mullins, 2005). However, the structure’s quality will affect the way these necessities are met. An organizational structure that is poor creates impossibility to good performance, regardless of how excellent the individual manager might be. With respect to the case study, decisions that Meg made were at some point considered as political hence making the company particularly Southwest Region go through a lot of difficulties. Secondly, since OB incorporates various processes like individual, group and organizational as a whole, these processes are hence incorporated to sociology and psychology (Arnold et al, 2004). Therefore, I suggest that Meg encourage and promote team work since the success of a company mainly depends on teams. When this is done, problems arising within the management can be easily solved without any hardships. Reflecting on the case study, Southwest Region team and mainly Chris’s team was recognized as hardworking since they worked together effectively. Another factor that I would recommend is selecting the right people to do the right task. This is important because it promotes building a strong team and people tend to be self-motivated (Mullins, 2005). This is well illustrated in the case study when Chris selected the right people for her team. She mainly considered people with experience working in the DSS firm and she also considered people who had a chance of working together. This was indeed the right ingredient for the success of her team and the organization as a whole. I finally recommend that managers like Meg find effective ways of changing their employees’ responsibilities so that they can be accommodative. They should also try to consider their employees’ ideas before making decisions that are unilateral regardless of their employees’ opinions (Beardwell, Claydon & Beardwell, 2007). With a good leader like Chris in place, I think Southwest Region will definitely be successful. 7.0 Conclusion In conclusion, various concepts have been discussed above with respect to the case study. It is actually true that some issues may arise within the organization hence proper management of the situation is fundamental to keep the organization going. For instance, when changes are made in the organization, it is good for managers to consult with various department of the organization so that everyone is aware of the anticipated change hence less resistance to change will be observed. Chris felt undervalued because she had invested a lot of her time and her colleagues’ on working on the project to see it succeed only to be told by her manager Meg that the project had been cancelled. Due to this, she was not happy hence sort help from the HR director. Chris’s case brings the issue of priorities made by organizations regarding their objective and goals. When goals are set, whether short or long term, strategies of working upon them are very important so that both time and money is saved. On the other hand, the issue of present and future markets also plays a substantial role in determining the company’s products. This is so because organizations want to create products that fit in the market hence would value their opinions of their customers. In future, I think people should be given the right tasks so that resources and energy of people is not wasted and if it happens, compensation should be considered. 8.0 References Arnold, J et al (2004). Work Psychology, 4th Edition. FT Prentice Bratton, J. & Gold, J (2007). Human Resource Management - Theory and Practice, 4th Edition. Palgrave Macmillan Beardwell, I, Claydon, T and Beardwell, J (2007). Human Resource Management: A Contemporary Approach, 5th Edition. FT Prentice Hall Daft, R L (2006). Organization Theory and Design. Ohio: South Western College Publishing Fielding, M. (2006). Effective communication in organizations: [preparing messages that communicate]. Lansdowne, Cape Town: Juta Academic. Henderson, I. (2008). Human Resource Management for MBA Students. CIPD Kondrat, A. (2009). Effective Communication in the Workplace. Retrieved on 20 June, 2012, from http://suite101.com/article/effective-communication-at-workplace-a95815 Mullins, L (2005). Management and Organizational Behaviour, 7th Edition. FT Prentice Hall Plowman, N. (2010). Seven Factors of Effective Team Performance. Retrieved on 9th July, 2012, from Rollinson, D, Broadfield, A, & Edwards, D, (1998). Organizational Behavior and Analysis. FT Prentice Hall Stone, D and Stone-Romero, E (Eds) (2008). The Influence of Culture on Human Resource Management Processes and Practices. Psychology Press Hall Tanner, R. (2010). Organizational change: 8 Reasons Why People Resist Change. Retrieved on 20 June, 2012, from http://managementisajourney.com/2010/01/organizational-change-8- reasons-why-people-resist-change/ Read More