Organizational Behavior

By Rahul Mathew , MBA II SEM

Objectives of the course

You have spent most of your life in organizations (from schools, to

sports and/or community activities). Your work life will involve working
with, in, or for organizations, and, very likely at some point, creating
your own business enterprise and/or a service organization to help
your community. The purpose of this course is to help you understand
how people and organizations function, based on the latest social
science research on work, workers, and organizations.

1. to help you learn how to effectively manage your

relationships with coworkers, managers, subordinates, clients
and customers

2. to begin acquainting yourself with the ever-growing

body of evidence that will be available to you throughout your
career regarding effective organizations and management
practice so that you can ultimately become a literate, well-
informed professional, able to make decisions that reflect
best available evidence regarding effective practice.

Definition and Explanation

Organizational behavior is a field of study that investigates the impact

that individuals, groups and organizational structure have on behavior
within the organization, for the purpose of applying such knowledge
towards improving an organizational effectiveness”

The above definition has three main elements; first

organizational behavior is an investigative study of individuals
and groups, second, the impact of organizational structure on
human behavior and the third, the application of knowledge to
achieve organizational effectiveness.

Whenever people interact in organizations, many factors come into

play. For e.g. It is the human factor that is the contributing factor to
the productivity in an org , hence the study of human behavior is
important. Hence the subject of Organizational Behavior attempts to
understand and model these factors. This subject is becoming more
important as people with diverse backgrounds and cultural values have
to work together effectively and efficiently.

Scope of the Organizational Behaviour

(a) Impact of personality on performance

(b) Employee motivation
(c) Leadership
(d) How to create effective teams and groups
(e) Study of different organizational structures
(f) Individual behaviour, attitude and learning
(g) Perception
(h) Design and development of effective organization
(i) Job design
(j) Impact of culture on organizational behaviour
(k) Management of change
(l) Management of conflict and stress
(m) Organizational development
(n) Organizational culture
(o) Transactional analysis
(p) Group behaviour, power and politics
(q) Job design
(r) Study of emotions

Contributing Fields to Organizational Behaviour

Psychology: Psychology is an applied science, which attempts to

explain human behaviour in a particular situation and predicts actions
of individuals. Psychologists have been able to modify individual
behaviour largely with the help of various studies. It has contributed
towards various theories on learning, motivation, personality, training
and development,theories on individual decision making, leadership,
job satisfaction, performance appraisal,attitude, ego state, job design,
work stress and conflict management. Studies of these theories can
improve personal skills, bring change in attitude and develop positive
approach to organizational systems. Various psychological tests are
conducted in the organizations for selection of employees, measuring
personality attributes and aptitude. Various other dimensions of
human personality are also measured. These instruments are scientific
in nature and have been finalized after a great deal of research. Field
of psychology continues to explore new areas applicable to the field of
organizational behaviour. Contribution of psychology has enriched the
organizational behaviour field.
Sociology: Science of Sociology studies the impact of culture on
group behaviour and has contributed to a large extent to the field of
group-dynamics, roles that individual plays in the organization,
communication, norms, status, power, conflict management, formal
organization theory, group processes and group decision-making.

Political science: Political science has contributed to the field of

Organizational behaviour. Stability of government at national level is
one major factor for promotion of international business, financial
investments, expansion and employment. Various government rules
and regulations play a very decisive role in growth of the
organization.All organizations have to abide by the rules of the
government of the day.

Social psychology: Working organizations are formal assembly of

people who are assigned specific jobs and play a vital role in
formulating human behaviour. It is a subject where concept of
psychology and sociology are blend to achieve better human behaviour
in organization. The field has contributed to manage change, group
decision-making, communication and ability of people in the
organization, to maintain social norms.

Anthropology: It is a field of study relating to human activities in

various cultural and environmental frameworks. It understands
difference in behaviour based on value system of different cultures of
various countries. The study is more relevant to organizational
behaviour today due to globalization, mergers and acquisitions of
various industries. The advent of the 21st century has created a
situation wherein cross-cultural people will have to work in one
particular industry. Managers will have to deal with individuals and
groups belonging to different ethnic cultures and exercise adequate
control or even channelise behaviour in the desired direction by
appropriately manipulating various cultural factors.Organization
behaviour has used the studies on comparative attitudes and cross-
cultural transactions. Environment studies conducted by the field of
anthropology aims to understand organizational human behaviour so
that acquisitions and mergers are smooth.Organizations are bound by
its culture that is formed by human beings.
MG University Syllabus

ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR

Module-1
Individual and the organization – The individual as psychological
entity and the organization as a social system
Module -11
Models of Organizational Behaviour- Work motivation – Theories
and applications

Module -111
Leadership Behaviour – Styles – Theories – Leadership
effectiveness

Module -1V
Group dynamics – Structure, Effectiveness – Power- Exercise
and sources of power, Power relations

Module -V
Organizational change and development approaches and
methods- Stress- Nature, Source , Effects, Conflicts – Employee
Counseling – Approaches
Extra mural : Experiential Learning programmes , Case Study