Notes on Behavior and Communication in Organizations (BCO) - Public Administration and Organizational Science
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Course
Gedrag en communicatie in organisaties (S_GCO)
Institution
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU)
Book
Organizational Behavior
All notes from the GCO colleges, in English, including relevant images from the book. Additional information, outside the book, is also included in the document.
Behavior and communication in Organizations - HC1 - 08-02-2023
Wolves: Synonym for behavior and people in organizations:
- They work in groups.
- They work together.
- There is a hierarchy.
- They communicate verbally and non verbally.
What is an organization?
- A system of consciously coordinated activities or forces of two or more persons
Four common characteristics of an organization
● Coordination of effort -> There has to be a coordinated effort:
○ Achieved by: policies, rules, regulations
● Common goal
● Division of labour
○ Individuals perform separate but related tasks to achieve the common goal
○ Individuals have different tasks
● Hierarchy of authority
○ Chain of command dedicated to make sure that the right people to the right
things at the right time (often reflected in organizational chart)
○ Clear chain of command
○ Right people do the right thing at the right time
Example of an organizational chart:
→Hierarchy
Organizational Behavior
- An interdisciplinary field dedicated to understanding and managing people at work.
● Interdisciplinary? Yes, using knowledge of different disciplines. But the field of research
is not so much.
, - Knowledge from different disciplines, organization sciences and communication
science
- But, not so much coordinated
- Multidisciplinary?
History of organizational behavior
1. Scientific management
● 1880-1930
● Creating standards established by facts or truths gained through systematic
observation, experiment, or reasoning to improve organizational efficiency
○ Taylorism, Taylor
● Use systematic observation;
● Reduce tasks to basic elements;
● Reducing the number of motions for individual workers.
● Negative connotations
○ Associated with mass production, assembly line, negative perception of
workers.
○ McGregor’s Theory X (Human Relations Movement)
● Ground-breaking
○ Scientific selection and training of people
○ Scientific job redesign based on time-motion research.
2. Human Relations Movement
- 1930-1970
- Workers were threatened more like humans, they appreciated people more.
- From a negative to a positive set of assumptions about people -> McGregor’s
Theory X vs Y.
- More focussed on the worker instead of the tasks.
3. Quality Movement
- 1980s
- Organization dedicated to training, improvement and customer satisfaction
- More attention, focus to the customers
- Deliver the best quality and satisfy our customers
- Total Quality Management (TQM)
4. The internet and social media movement
● 1990s
● Many changes.
● Virtual organizations; Organizations where people work (partly) independent of
location, supported by ICT.
● People wanted a little bit more freedom, responsibility and flexibility.
● Working from home, organizations without an office, ‘New World of Working’.
Organizations are looking and searching for a balance. They want to give freedom to their
workers, but not too much.
,Diversity
-> Diverse working enviornments
- The positive and negative effects of diverse working environments.
- Diversity at work → Usually refers to demographic differences between group members
Demographical characteristics: ‘Differences in background’
- Gender - Nationality
- Ethnicity - Education, expertise
- Religion - Social status
Definition: Diversity represents the multitude of individual differences and similarities that
exist among people.
Based on four layers:
- Personality
● Internal (surface-level) dimension: We cannot control, but
we use to chatecorisize immediately.
○ The things that we use to divide people into sub
groups
○ Stereotyping
○ If we talk about diversity, we talk about the green
layers of the circle (the internal dimensions)
- External (secondary) dimensions: We can control
- Not all actually; for example your income
- Organizational dimensions: Places you work
Why should we strive for diversity?
- Business case: Diversity is the smart thing to do.
- Provit; it can lead to better performance, productivity and creativity.
- Moral case: Diversity is the right thing to do.
- You don’t have to profit from it; people should have equal opportunities.
- Equal opportunities for all individuals.
Diversity is a mixed blessing for an organization, for teams;
● Positive effects
○ Higher performance;
○ More creativity;
○ More flexibility;
➔ Different perspectives, backgrounds and approaches.
● Negative effects
○ Less satisfaction, commitment;
○ Less trust;
○ More conflicts
➔ Categorization processes
, Information / decision making theory: Diversity leads to better task-relevant processes and
decision making, because diverse groups …
- Are better at early stages of problem solving by using their diverse backgrounds to
generate a more comprehensive view of a problem;
- Uncover more alternatives during problem-solving activities;
- Enhance the number of contacts they have available which provides access to (new)
information and expertise.
Social categorization theory:
- Diversity leads to categorizing the self and other into groups, resulting in negative
outcomes for groups
- Similarities and differences creates ingroup (‘us’) vs. outgroup (‘them’)
- Liking of ingroup members, ingroup favoritism
- Disliking of outgroup members, outgroup derogation
- Conflict between ingroup and outgroup
➔ Leads to conflicts into groups
➔ Evidence from the minimal group paradigm
➔ Negative effects of diversity
Minimal group paradigm:
- Groups are formed based on a arbitrary criterium; preference for painters
- Group members then divide outcomes among ingroup vs outgroup members
A process model of diversity
The negative effects of diversity are stronger when ‘fault lines’ are
more salient
- Categorization processes become more likely
- Fault lines: Hypothetical dividing line that splits groups
into demographically based subgroups
Can you benefit from diversity with categorization processes?
Categorization processes: 3 levels
1. Superordinate / inclusive level: It depends on the context, how big this group really is
2. Subordinate / low level: more diversity: national vs international, b&o vs
communication science. It depends on what you find important.
3. Individuals: no groups, individuals are just individuals.
a. You start as an individual, and slowly slide into the subgroups or
superordinate.
- How you can think of the categorization process; it is really contextual
- In different contexts, it is never the same. It depends on the context what the
subordinate level is.
- Het is niet heel strikt, het gaat rustig over in elkaar.
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