Organizational Behavior test #1:

Multiple choice section:

Concepts:
 Various causes and level of dissatisfaction:
Main causes of job dissatisfaction:
a. on-the-job stress – being over worked
b. Pay – being underpaid, not being paid what your worth.
c. Promotion – limited career growth. Not having the opportunity to climb the ladder and
grow your career.
d. Work- lack of meaningful work, employees lose interest in work that offers no
challenges. Also, work and life balance, companies must recognize that employees have a
personal life.
e. security
f. Supervisor- having an unsupportive boss leads to employee’s lack of motivation,
inspiration, and support.
g. coworkers
Levels of dissatisfaction:
 low level
 high level
2. Disciplines that have contributed to OB:
Psychology: seeks to measure, explain, and sometimes change the behavior of humans and other
animals. Those who have contributed and continue to add to the knowledge of OB are learning
theorists, personality theorists, counseling psychologists, and, most important, industrial and
organizational psychologists.

Social psychology, generally considered a branch of psychology, blends concepts from both
psychology and sociology to focus on peoples’ influence on one another. One major study area is
change —how to implement it and how to reduce barriers to its acceptance. Social psychologists
also contribute to measuring, understanding, and changing attitudes; identifying communication
patterns; and building trust.

Sociology: While psychology focuses on the individual, sociology studies people in relation to
their social environment or culture. Sociologists have contributed to OB through their study of
group behavior in organizations, particularly formal and complex organizations.

Anthropology is the study of societies to learn about human beings and their activities.
Anthropologists’ work on cultures and environments has helped us understand differences in
fundamental values, attitudes, and behavior between people in different countries and within
different organizations.
3. Myer Briggs type indicator:

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is the most widely used personality assessment
instrument in the world. 10 It is a 100-question personality test that asks people how they usually
feel or act in particular situations. Respondents are classified as extraverted or introverted (E or
I), sensing or intuitive (S or N), thinking or feeling (T or F), and judging or perceiving (J or P).
These terms are defined as follows:
● Extraverted (E) versus Introverted (I). Extraverted individuals are outgoing, sociable, and
assertive. Introverts are quiet and shy.
● Sensing (S) versus Intuitive (N). Sensing types are practical and prefer routine and order. They
focus on details. Intuitive rely on unconscious processes and look at the “big picture.”
● Thinking (T) versus Feeling (F). Thinking types use reason and logic to handle problems.
Feeling types rely on their personal values and emotions.
● Judging (J) versus Perceiving (P). Judging types want control and prefer their world to be
ordered and structured. Perceiving types are flexible and spontaneous.

These classifications together describe 16 personality types, identifying every person by one trait
from each of the four pairs.

4. Big 5 Personality model:

The MBTI may lack strong supporting evidence, but an impressive body of research supports the
thesis of the Big Five Model —that five basic dimensions underlie all others and encompass
most of the significant variation in human personality. 12 Moreover, test scores of these traits do
a very good job of predicting how people behave in a variety of real-life situations.
The following are the Big Five factors:
● Extraversion. The extraversion dimension captures our comfort level with relationships.
Extraverts tend to be gregarious, assertive, and sociable. Introverts tend to be reserved, timid,
and quiet.
● Agreeableness. The agreeableness dimension refers to an individual’s propensity to defer to
others. Highly agreeable people are cooperative, warm, and trusting. People who score low on
agreeableness are cold, disagreeable, and antagonistic.
● Conscientiousness. The conscientiousness dimension is a measure of reliability. A highly
conscientious person is responsible, organized, dependable, and persistent. Those who score low
on this dimension are easily distracted, disorganized, and unreliable.
● Emotional stability. The emotional stability dimension—often labeled by its converse,
neuroticism—taps a person’s ability to withstand stress. People with positive emotional stability
tend to be calm, self-confident, and secure. Those with high negative scores tend to be nervous,
anxious, depressed, and insecure.
● Openness to experience. The openness to experience dimension addresses are creative,
curious, and artistically sensitive. Those at the other end of the category are conventional and
find comfort in the familiar.
5. Self-core evaluation: core self-evaluation Bottom-line conclusions individuals have about
their capabilities, competence, and worth as a person.

Core Self-Evaluation People who have positive core self-evaluations like themselves and see
themselves as effective, capable, and in control of their environment. Those with negative core
self-evaluations tend to dislike themselves, question their capabilities, and view themselves as
powerless over their environment. Core self-evaluations relate to job satisfaction because people
positive on this trait see more challenge in their job and actually attain more complex jobs. But
what about job performance? People with positive core self-evaluations perform better than
others because they set more ambitious goals, are more committed to their goals, and persist
longer in attempting to reach these goals.

6. Machiavellism: The degree to which an individual is pragmatic, maintains emotional distance,

and believes that ends can justify means.

The personality characteristic of Machiavellianism (often abbreviated Mach) is named after

Niccolo Machiavelli, who wrote in the sixteenth century on how to gain and use power. An
individual high in Machiavellianism is pragmatic, maintains emotional distance, and believes
ends can justify means. “If it works, use it” is consistent with a high-Mach perspective. A
considerable amount of research has found high Mach’s manipulate more, win more, are
persuaded less, and persuade others more than do low Mach’s. They like their jobs less, are more
stressed by their work, and engage in more deviant work behaviors. Yet high-Mach outcomes are
moderated by situational factors. High Mach’s flourish (1) when they interact face to face with
others rather than indirectly; (2) when the situation has minimal rules and regulations, allowing
latitude for improvisation; and (3) when emotional involvement with details irrelevant to
winning distracts low Mach’s.

7. Narcissism: The tendency to be arrogant, have a grandiose sense of self-importance, require

excessive admiration, and have a sense of entitlement. Evidence suggests that narcissists are
more charismatic and thus more likely to emerge as leaders, and they may even display better
psychological health (at least as they self-report). Despite having some advantages, most
evidence suggests that narcissism is undesirable.

Because narcissists often want to gain the admiration of others and receive affirmation of their
superiority, they tend to “talk down” to those who threaten them, treating others as if they were
inferior. Narcissists also tend to be selfish and exploitive and believe others exist for their
benefit.

8. Proactive personality: People who identify opportunities, show initiative, take action, and
persevere until meaningful change occurs. Proactives create positive change in their environment,
regardless of, or even in spite of, constraints or obstacles. Not surprisingly, they have many
desirable behaviors that organizations covet. They are more likely than others to be seen as leaders
and to act as change agents. 53 Proactive individuals are more likely to be satisfied with work and
help others more with their tasks, largely because they build more relationships with others.

9. Successful, effective and average managers (how they spend their time):

1. Traditional management. Decision making, planning, and controlling.

2. Communication. Exchanging routine information and processing paperwork.
3. Human resource management. Motivating, disciplining, managing conflict, staffing, and
training.
4. Networking. Socializing, politicking, and interacting with outsiders.

The “average” manager spent 32 percent of his or her time in traditional management activities,
29 percent communicating, 20 percent in human resource management activities, and 19 percent
networking. However, the time and effort different individual managers spent on those activities
varied a great deal. As shown in Exhibit 1-2 , among managers who were successful (defined in
terms of speed of promotion within their organization), networking made the largest relative
contribution to success, and human resource management activities made the least relative
contribution. Among effective managers (defined in terms of quantity and quality of their
performance and the satisfaction and commitment of employees), communication made the largest
relative contribution and networking the least.

This research offers important insights. Successful managers give almost the opposite emphases
to traditional management, communication, human resource management, and networking as do
effective managers.
10. Surface level and deep level diversity:

surface-level diversity: Differences in easily perceived characteristics, such as gender, race,

ethnicity, age, or disability, that do not necessarily reflect the ways people think or feel but that
may activate certain stereotypes.

Deep-level diversity:
Differences in values, personality, and work preferences that become
progressively more important for determining similarity as people get to know one another
better.

11. Law of Belize that deals with protection of sexual harassment:

PROTECTION AGAINST SEXUAL HARASSMENT ACT CHAPTER 107 REVISED

EDITION 2000 SHOWING THE LAW AS AT 31ST DECEMBER, 2000:

 Defines and prohibits sexual harassment at the workplace and at institutions. Employers
who fail to take action against sexual harassment may be liable under the Act. Provides
for procedures for complaint hearings and sets forth penalties.

Consists of five parts; part I – Preliminary, part II – Forms of sexual harassment, part III –
Hearing of complaints, part IV – Offences and penalties, part V – Miscellaneous.

12. Forms of organizational commitment:

Organizational commitment: The degree to which an employee identifies with a particular

organization and its goals and wishes to maintain membership in the organization.

1. Affective Commitment – emotional attachment and belief in its value

2. Continuance Commitment – perceive economic value of remaining with the

organization (believes to be well paid)

3. Normative Commitment – remain for moral or ethical reasons (spearheading a

new initiative)

Essay questions:

1. Our text tells us that research has shown that managers today are less interested in our
appliance ability to perform a specific job than the appliance flexibility to meet changing
situations and commitment to the organization. Discuss by supporting or opposing that
statement from a Belizean working environment perspective. (chapter 5; person jobfit
theory)
2. Discuss how managers can attract, select, retain employees and develop effective
diversity programs.

3. Discuss with examples the 3 main components of attitude.