1. Introducing Organizational Behaviour
Chapter 1: pp.13-28
Organizational Behavior 261
Gabrielle Durepos

2. Reminders Attendance Make sure you are registered for this class
Check the Globe and Mail for articles for your assignment
You want to avoid being limited to articles that appear in the week that the assignment is due
Assignment is due October 1st, 2012
Group formation is due on September 19th 2012

3. Outline What is OB Why Study OB Different approaches to OB
The Roots of OB
Quick overview of One of Many Different approaches to OB:
Managerialist
Conclusions

4. What is Organizational Behaviour? 1/2
The study of relationships between the behavior of people in organizations and:
Individual (self-esteem)
Organizational (effectiveness)
Societal (gender, racial discrimination)
Organizations include:
For profit business
Not for profit organizations
Any institution (church, school)
Any collective with a common goal with individuals who work together

5. What is Organizational Behaviour? 2/2
Multidisciplinary as a field of study
Psychology
Sociology
Anthropology
What is the difference between
Macro OB
Focus on collectives and teams
Focus on what happens between individuals
Micro OB
Focus on individuals – individual level of analysis
Focus on what happens within individuals

6. Why Study Organizational Behavior?
We live in an organizational world
Organizations SHAPE our expectations of how people should behave
Shape our expectations of how we should behave
Normalize…
Many key decisions that affect our lives occur in organizations
The success of an organization depends on individuals involved
Organizations affect:
Individuals, clients, customers
Local communities
Nation states
World events

7. Different Approaches to OB
What is an ‘approach’?
A paradigm
A lens
Managerialist approach (mainstream)
This is the dominant approach
Alternative approaches:
Actionalist (interpretive) approach
Radical approach
Feminist
Racioethnicity
Postmodern
There is NO correct approach, some are more comfortable…
QUESTION: why are these different approaches important?
“But Gabie… no one else cares except academics…” I want you to challenge this... Give me an instance where we see groups who have adopted each a particular approach – and are in conversation…

8. The Roots of Organizational Behavior 1/5
OB developed from an interest in:
Improving efficiency
Improving profitability
And everything else leading to this such as:
Human relations at work
Culture at work
Diversity at work
Gender at work

9. The Roots of Organizational Behavior 2/5
Frederick Taylor
Midvale steel company
Concerned with efficiency
Develops Scientific Approach to Management
Taylor believed that inefficiency is due to:
Attitudes of workers
Deliberately restricting output “Systematic Soldering”
Methods of work
Left to workers who were inefficient
System of management control
Managers exert arbitrary control

10. The Roots of Organizational Behavior 3/5
Taylor corrects the perceived problems at Midvale through:
Work design and standardization
Chose routine tasks
Finding the “one best way”
Producing a standardized way of completing a task
Employee selection
The correct employee for a particular job
Employee Motivation
How to improve attitudes?
Piece work payment incentives
Hierarchal control
Managers use rules and regulations associated with their job to exercise control
Taylor writes “Principles of Scientific Management”
Refines his theories at Bethlehem Iron Company
Begins consulting
His ideas spread throughout the 1920’s and beyond in the:
United States
Soviet Union
Italy

11. The Roots of Organizational Behavior 4/5
Taylor is very influential to the study of OB:
Job redesign
Structure of organizations
Selection
Training
Motivation
Managerial control and style
His ideas commonly known as:
Scientific Management
Taylorism

12. The Roots of Organizational Behavior 5/5
Frank and Lillian Gilbreth: Time and Motion Studies
Eliminate workplace fatigue
Roethlisberger and Dickson: The Hawthorn Studies at Western Electric
Focus on factors of “human relations”
Focused on communication, participation, leadership
People are motivated by social as well as economic rewards
Look at group membership and how this affects behavior
These theorists were all in:
Industry as they developed theories
Time of mass change and industrialization

13. Quick overview of different approaches to OB: The Managerialist Approach
Steams from the work of Taylor, Gilbreth, Roethlisberger and Dickson and others
The most dominant; usually taken for granted as being the only approach
From the managers point of view
Concern with:
Understanding how behavior leads to: Improved efficiency, productivity, profitability, growth
Definition is:
Investigates the impact that individuals, groups and structures have on behavior within organizations to improve effectiveness
Also known as (sort of):
Mainstream
Functionalist
Clinical

14. Conclusions Different approaches to OB yield different definitions
Today we have focused on a Managerial approach, next class we will explore:
Actionalist
Radical
Feminist
Racioethnicity
And do the ‘Norma Rae Exercise’
No approach is “superior” or “correct”