Session 1: An Introduction to Organizational Behaviour

1. Why study Organizational Behaviour (OB)?

- “OB is a field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups, and structure have on
behaviour within organizations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an
organization’s effectiveness.”
- Ultimately, organizations are a meaningless idea without people, and people exhibit behaviours which
permeate all other aspects of the organization.
- All other aspects of organizational life – the technical, financial, technological, strategic, policy-oriented,
innovation-oriented, etc. aspects – cannot be meaningfully understood, applied, or improved without first
understanding how people and their behaviours influence these other aspects.
- When behaviour is systematically understood, organizational effectiveness and organizational performance
can be systematically enhanced.
2. The Challenges in Modern OB:
- Organizational life is changing faster than ever before.
- COVID-19 wasn’t the beginning of the “challenge of change” and it will not be the end (consider e.g.
artificial intelligence; climate change; “COVID-23”
- People want different things from work these days (e.g. work-life balance).
- Globalization and global integration are more pronounced than ever.
- The demands for evidence-based management (EBM) in organizations means that OB has to become
increasingly scientifically-precise as an academic discipline; using higher and higher standards of evidence.
- Rapid changes in business require rapid refinements in the philosophies, policies, and practices of
management and leadership.

- Many organizations still cling to outdated ideas from yesteryear.

- Organizations are often led by people who can’t effectively understand, navigate, or strategize around the
modern rate of change.
- There are some qualities in leadership and management that are “timeless” and common across cultures,
but there are many other qualities that are specific to the context of time and place.
- For modern organizations to perform at their best, they need to be led by people that can maximize the
value of their human resources, in a way that makes the best use of the available scientific evidence.
- In your career, do you want to manage based on “yesterday’s news” or “tomorrow’s innovations?”

3. Skills in Modern Management:

 - Technical skills: “The ability to apply specialized knowledge or expertise.”
- Interpersonal (human) skills: “The ability to understand, communicate with, motivate,and support other
people, both individually and in groups.”
- Conceptual skills: “The mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex situations.”

4. Interpersonal Skills:
- "Students may get by on their technical and quantitative skills the first couple of years out of school. But
soon, leadership and communication skills come to the fore in distinguishing the managers whose careers
really take off.” (Textbook, p. 4)
 - Interpersonal skills distinguish excellent leaders from extraordinary leaders.
- Technical skills are a bare-minimum necessity for professional success, but they are not the difference-
maker – especially for high-level leaders.
- Conceptual skills – and the ability to respond to complexity – is becoming increasingly important in
modern business, but is also influenced by factors that are outside the manager’s control (e.g. changes in
the business environment).
- Interpersonal skills can (and should) be steadily refined during a career.

5. Primal Leadership:
- “When people feel good, they work at their best.” (p. 26)
- In modern organizations, successful leadership is about driving the positive emotional direction of the
organization.
- Leaders who bring out the best in other people are resonant leaders.
- Leaders who undermine other people and make the underperform are dissonant leaders.

6. A Model For Modern OB:

- OB is about developing more scientifically-precise inputs, in order to improve processes, so that we can
create better overall outcomes.

7. Prosocial: A Framework for Modern OB:

- “None of us are more or less important than anyone else, and ultimately our work is grounded in an ethic of
caring for the well-being of others and respecting individual self-determination in the context of collective
good.” (p. 18-19)
- “As humans, we do better when we have the competence and self-determination to act effectively in the
world in ways that align with our values and goals.” (p. 18).
- The Prosocial approach is based on building groups and organizations that are fair, just, altruistic, and
motivated by achieving important collective outcomes.
- By creating groups and organizations that are more equitable and collaborative we also create groups that
are more productive and therefore organizations that are more profitable.
- The Prosocial approach is an evidence-based approach to understanding how to create better groups and
organizations, drawing from fields such as psychology, economics, biology, and neuroscience.
- Based on the Nobel Prize-winning work of Eleanor Ostrom, and her Eight Core Design Principles.
 Session 2: Leadership (page 402)

1. What is Leadership?
- “The ability to influence a group toward the achievement of a vision or set of goals.” (Textbook, p. 368)
- Leadership is essentially the transformation of a strong overall knowledge of organizational behaviour into
a vision and subsequent action.

2. Trait Theories of Leadership

- Differentiate leaders from non-leaders in terms of observable personal characteristics and inherent
qualities.
- The Big-5 Personality Traits (introversion-extroversion; conscientiousness; neuroticism-emotional
stability; agreeableness; and openness to experience) remains the strongest trait-based framework for
predicting leadership.
- The Myers-Briggs (MBTI) approach is now completely discredited.
- Emotional Intelligence (EI) is incredibly important (next class).
- Traits are a far bigger predictor of leadership emergence than leadership effectiveness.

3. Behavioural Theories of Leadership:

- Differentiate leaders from non-leaders in terms of trainable qualities that can be developed over time.
- Initiating structure: the task- and performance-oriented aspects of leadership behaviours (“task-
oriented” leadership).
+ For example: Assigns group members to particular tasks,” “expects workers to maintain definite
standards of performance,” and “emphasizes the meeting of deadlines.
- Consideration: the human- and interpersonal-oriented aspects of leadership behaviours (“human-oriented
leadership”).
+ For example: Helps employees with personal problems, is friendly and approachable, treats all
employees as equals, and expresses appreciation and support
- Different business cultures often place a greater emphasis on either initiating structure or consideration
behaviours, but modern leadership requires a balance of task- and human-oriented leadership.

4. Contingency Theories of Leadership:

- The Fiedler Model: Aligning leadership style with the degree of control a leader has in a particular
situation in order to maximize performance.
- Situational Leadership Theory: Aligning leadership style with the degree of readiness and willingness
among their particular followers.
 - Path-Goal Theory: Aligning the information, support, and other resources required for followers to
achieve their goals, based on aspects of both initiating structure and consideration of the followers’
psychologies.
- Leader-Participation Model: The way a leader makes a decision must be aligned with what they actually
decide.
- All contingency theories of leadership tacitly assume a consistency and constancy among followers, but
humans are more complex than that.

5. Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Theory:

- Leaders establish a special relationship with a small group of their followers (the “in-group”).
- Disparities between the in-group and out-group are not random, and are based on distinct personal
characteristics.
- Followers with in-group status have:
+ Higher performance ratings
+ Greater commitment to the organization
+ Lower turnover intentions
+ Greater satisfaction with their superiors
+ Higher overall satisfaction than those in the out-group

6. Charismatic Leadership:
- Leaders who followers see heroic or extraordinary leadership abilities when they observe certain
behaviors.
- Have a vision, are willing to take personal risks, are sensitive to the needs of followers, and show
unconventional behaviours.
- Charismatic leadership is usually a combination of traits (“leaders are born”) and behaviours (“leaders
are made”).
- Depends on the situation: charismatic leadership is effective in a crisis, in politics, or in a new company.
- People working for charismatic leaders are motivated to exert extra effort and, because they like and
respect their leader, express greater satisfaction
- Charismatic leadership has a dark side:
+ Gullible people or people with low self-esteem can be led astray.
+ Charismatic leaders may not always act in the best interests of the organisation.

7. Transformational Leadership:
- Inspire followers to transcend their own interests for the sake of the organisation and achieving collective
goals.
- Change followers’ awareness of issues by helping them look at old problems in new ways
(“transformation”).
 - Are creative, and encourage followers to be creative.
- Vision even more important than charismatic leadership: Promotes agreement in the organisation about
ambitious goals.
- Not effective in all situations (e.g. complex bureaucracies)
- Compare with transactional leaders - establishes goals by clarifying role and task requirements.

8. Authentic Leadership:
- Being ethical:
+ Treating employees with fairness
+ Encouraging and rewarding integrity (chính trực) in others
+ Sets a good moral example for others to follow
- Practicing servant leadership:
+ Not self-interested; selfless and altruistic, and wants to serve others
+ Focuses on opportunities to help employees grow and develop
+ Based on listening, empathizing, and persuading (interpersonal skills)
- Creating trust:
+ Integrity: consistency between what you say and what you do.
+ Benevolence (nhân từ) focused on other’s interests, even when not aligned with own interests
+ Ability: Does the person know what he or she is talking about?

9. The Leadership Style Repertoire:

Affiliative: liên kết
10. Prosocial: The Core Design Principles
 Session 3: Attitudes and Job Satisfaction; Emotions and Moods (Page 104 +
132)

1. Job Attitudes:

- The ABC Model of Attitudes:

+ (Affect + Behaviour + Cognition) = “What I think” + “How I feel” + “What I’m going to do about
it.”
2. How Job Attitudes Manifest in the Workplace:
- Job involvement:
+ The degree to which people identify psychologically with their job and consider their perceived
performance level important to self-worth.
+ An attitude of genuinely loving and fully engaging with the work you do.
+ Closely related to psychological empowerment; people given the mental tools and freedom to
succeed.
+ High job involvement is a major predictor of performance, plus significantly reduced absenteeism
and turnover.
- Organizational commitment:
+ The degree of identification with an organization and its values and mission, and the associated
commitment to remain with the organization because of this identification.
 + Improves loyalty; during times of job dissatisfaction, committed employees are more likely to stay
in their jobs.
+ Reduces absenteeism and turnover, and modestly predicts productivity.

3. What are the main causes of job dissatisfaction?

- United States (2019 study):

+ Insufficient pay.
+ Limited career-growth prospects.
+ Lack of work-life balance.
- Vietnam (2018 study):
+ Lack of independent work opportunities.
+ Lack of opportunity to improve skills.
+ Lack of participation in leadership.

4. How satisfied are people in their jobs?

- United States (2019 study):
+ About 50% of US employees feel unsatisfied in their jobs.
+ Employees with lower pay feel less satisfied about all aspects of their jobs.
- Vietnam (2020 study):
+ Satisfied when adhocracy is high.
+ Dissatisfied when bureaucracy is high.

5. Emotions And Moods:

- Emotions are intense feelings directed at someone or something.
- Moods are less intense feelings than emotions and often (though not always) arise without a specific event
acting as a stimulus.
- Emotions and moods have proven relevant for virtually every OB topic we study, and they have
implications for managerial practice.
 - Modern leaders can’t just focus on how employees think and behave — how they feel is just as important.
- Emotions are fundamental to human interaction.
- Negative emotions can be destructive to the goals of the organisation.
- Positive emotions can lead to higher morale, improved performance and better job satisfaction, which leads
to better productivity and profitability.

6. Emotional Intelligence (EI):

- According to several studies, Emotional Intelligence is the single biggest predictor of leadership
effectiveness and performance.
- EI is based on your relative ability to
+ (1) Perceive emotions in yourself and in others;
+ (2) Understand the meaning of these emotions;
+ (3) Regulate your own emotions.
- Organizations that are led by leaders with high EI are consistently more satisfying places to work, and are
staffed by people with better job attitudes – with higher job involvement and greater organizational
commitment.
- EI can be developed over time, and it is now considered one of the most vital components of a leadership
development program. Modern organizations invest heavily in increasing overall EI.
7. OB Applications of Emotions and Moods:
- Selection: Employers should consider EI a factor in hiring for jobs that demand a high degree of social
interaction.
- Decision Making: Positive emotions can increase problem-solving skills and help us understand and
analyze new information.
- Creativity: Positive moods and feedback may increase creativity.
- Motivation: Promoting positive moods creates a more motivated workforce.
 - Leadership: Emotions help convey messages more effectively.
- Negotiation: Emotions may impair negotiator performance.
- Customers: Customers “catch” emotions from employees (emotional contagion).
- Job Attitudes: “Never take your work home with you.”; people who had a good day at work tend to be in
a better mood at home that evening, and vice versapeople who had a good day at work tend to be in a
better mood at home that evening, and vice versa
- Deviant workplace behaviours: Those who feel negative emotions are more likely to engage in
aggressive or unethical behaviour at work.
- Safety and injury at work: Bad moods can contribute to injuries on the job.

8. Becoming a Resonant Leader:

- Resonant leadership recognizes that mastering EI is like any other skill. Anyone who has the drive and
motivation can improve as long as they understand what is required of them.
- People naturally develop stronger EI competencies as they get older and more experienced, and have
spent more time working with and leading others.
- But this general trend does not guarantee that ALL leaders will develop a high-enough level of EI.
Developing a plan to enhance the leader's strengths while overcoming their weaknesses is crucial.

9. Applying Psychological Flexibility:

- Psychological flexibility: Consciously moving in the direction of values even in the presence of difficult
thoughts and feelings.
- Trust: When people are able to trust others, not only are they more likely to cooperate, they are also more
likely to reciprocate when others cooperate with them.
- Long-term thinking: People tend to act more prosocially when their attention is less on their immediate
reactivity and more on what they want for the longer term. A long-term view requires predictable rules of
social engagement, and the development of long-term supportive relationships.
- Social value orientation: The degree to which you care about others’ outcomes relative to your own.
 Session 4: Personality and Values; Diversity in Organizations (166)

1. Personality Determinants:
- Heredity
- Physical environment
- Experiences
2. The Big-5 Personality Traits:
- Extroversion-Introversion: Extroverts are outgoing and tend to gain energy in social situations; Introverts
tend to be more reserved and have less energy to expend in social settings.
- Conscientiousness: Highly conscientious people tend to be organized and mindful of details. They plan
ahead, think about how their behaviour affects others, and are mindful of deadlines.
- Openness to experience: People who are high in this trait are curious about the world and other people and
eager to learn new things and enjoy new experiences. People low in this trait are often much more
traditional and less adventurous, and may struggle with creativity and abstract thinking.
- Agreeableness: People who are high in agreeableness tend to be more cooperative, while those low in this
trait tend to be more competitive and sometimes even manipulative.
- Neuroticism/Emotional Stability: Individuals who are high in this trait tend to experience mood swings,
anxiety, irritability, and sadness. Those low in this trait tend to be more stable and emotionally resilient.
3. Other Traits of OB:
- Core Self-Evaluation: tend to dislike themselves, question their capabilities, and view themselves as
powerless over their environment.
- Machiavellianism: The degree to which an individual is pragmatic, maintains emotional distance, and
believes that ends can justify means.
- Narcissism: The tendency to be arrogant, have a grandiose sense of self-importance, require excessive
admiration, and have a sense of entitlement.
- Self-monitoring: A personality trait that measures an individual’s ability to adjust his or her behavior to
external, situational factors.
- Risk-taking:
- Proactive Personality: identify opportunities, show initiative, take action, and persevere until meaningful
change occurs.
4. Values: Terminal vs Instrumental Values
- Values lay the foundation for our understanding of people’s attitudes and motivation and influence our
perceptions.
- Terminal values (desirable end-states): - what questions
+ Values based on things a person would like to achieve during their lifetime.
+ e.g. Health and wellbeing; Economic security; Independence.
 - Instrumental values (how to achieve these end-states): - how questions
+ Values based on behaviours or means for achieving terminal values.
+ e.g. Self-reliance → Economic security
+ e.g. Personal development → Health and wellbeing
5. Generational Values in the Workplace:
- Traditionalists (< 1943): Value workplaces that are conservative, hierarchical and have a clear chain of
command and top-down management.
- Baby Boomers (1943-1964): Value workplaces that have flat hierarchies, democratic cultures, humane
values, equal opportunities, and warm and friendly environments.
- Generation X (1965-1976): Values workplaces that are positive, fun, efficient, fast-paced, flexible,
informal and have access to leadership and information.
- Millennials (1977-1997): Value workplaces that are collaborative, achievement-oriented, highly
creative, positive, diverse, fun, flexible and continuously providing feedback.
- Generation Z (> 1997): Motivated by security, may be more competitive, wants independence, will
multi-task, is more entrepreneurial, wants to communicate face-to-face, is truly digital- native and
wants to be catered to.
- BUT people in all working generations mostly value the same things. Values are much more a reflection
of individual personalities than generational values.

6. Person-Job-Organization Fit:
- Person-Job fit:
+ Job satisfaction and turnover depend on how well individuals match their personalities to a job.
⇒ People in jobs that match their personality should be more satisfied and less likely to voluntarily
resign than people who don't match their jobs.
+ Should be assessed during the selection process.
⇒ Predicts performance and job knowledge.
- Person-Organization fit:
+ People are attracted to organizations that match their values, and leave organizations that are not
compatible with their personalities.
⇒ Predicts job satisfaction, commitment to the organization, and low turnover.
- For adaptable organizations, it is more important that employees’ personalities fit with the overall
organization’s culture than with the characteristics of any one specific job.

7. Cross-Cultural Values:
- Hofstede’s Five Value Dimensions of National Culture:
+ Power distance: power in institutions and organizations is distributed unequally.
+ Individualism/ Collectivism:
 ● Individualism: prefer to act as individuals rather than as members of groups and believe
in individual rights above all else.
● Collectivism: expect others in groups of which they are a part to look after them and
protect them
+ Short/long-term orientation:
● Long-term orientation: A national culture attribute that emphasizes the future, thrift, and
persistencep.
● Short-term orientation: A national culture attribute that emphasizes the past and
present, respect for tradition, and fulfillment of social obligations.
+ Masculinity/femininity:
+ Uncertainty avoidance:
● Society feels threatened by uncertain and ambiguous situations and tries to avoid them.
- The GLOBE Framework For Assessing Cultures:
+ Retains power distance, individualism/collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, gender differentiation
(masculinity/femininity), and short/long-term orientation,
+ Adds performance orientation and humane-orientation.
- The latest research suggests that it has become more difficult to attribute distinct values based on culture
alone.
- Frameworks like Hofstede and GLOBE are becoming less useful and meaningful in an increasingly
global business landscape.

8. Demographic (Group/Surface-Level) Diversity:

- All people are members of a variety of population groups.
- Population groups have qualities that are different from and similar to other population groups. These are
called demographics.
- Demographic diversity is an increasing source of concern for modern organizations and leadership;
particularly since more cultures are striving to achieve greater workplace equality and inclusion for people
of different e.g. genders; ethnicities; sexual orientation; region of origin (e.g. Vietnam)
- This topic is often very controversial and inflammatory, and this is understandable based on how different
population groups have been (and unfortunately continue to be) disadvantaged in the workplace.
- But this topic can also be approached in a very measured, democratic, and humane manner: the key is open
dialogue about diversity in groups.

9. Individual (Idiosyncratic/Deep-Level) Diversity:

- But people are not just members of population groups. They are also individuals who are unique and
distinctive even when compared to other people within their population groups.
- Individual diversity is about the combination of all the different variables which make you you. No other
person on Earth – past, present, or future – has the exact same combination of variables.
 - This combination is responsible for your “deep”, idiosyncratic qualities: your personality; your values;
your interests; your experiences; your emotional repertoire; your imagination.
- These qualities represent what people can offer an organization in terms of improving its performance and
effectiveness. (“What can you bring to the table that someone else can’t?”)

10. Diversity in Modern Organizations:

- Demographic and individual diversity work hand-in-hand.
- By promoting a greater commitment to demographic diversity in hiring, selection and recruitment
processes, organizations will widen their talent pool and increase the degree of individual diversity
available to them.
- This has a two-pronged effect:
+ Greater fairness and equity in the workplace, and better representation of marginalized or
underrepresented population groups in organization.
+ A diversification of the range of individual approaches to problem-solving; creativity; solutions
analysis; innovation; strategic thinking; and other qualities that organizations value when trying to
recruit the best talent.
- The ethical case for diversity and the business case also go hand-in-hand.

11. Benefits of Workplace Diversity:

● 1. Diversity leads to more creativity within teams
● 2. Diverse teams are better at solving problems
● 3. Teams that are diverse make better business decisions
● 4. Diverse companies report productivity levels that are at least 33% higher than non-diverse companies
● 5. Diverse companies are at least 35% more profitable than non-diverse companies
● 6. Diverse companies are 70% more likely to capture new markets
● 7. Companies with diverse management teams have 45% revenue increases directly related to innovation
● 8. Workplace diversity leads to 68.3% improved employee retention
● 9. Diversity and inclusion leads to engaged employees
● 10. A diverse workforce improves company culture
● 11. 76% of job seekers are looking at diversity when making a final decision about accepting a job offer
● 12. Diverse companies attract 73.2% more top talent than non-diverse companies
● 13. Being publicly committed to ensuring diversity leads to a positive reputation of the employer brand.

12. Challenges in Workplace Diversity:

- Meritocracy (chế độ tài đức) is still important. The best individual candidate for the job should be hired
regardless of their demographic qualities.
- But biases in attitudes and discrimination in policies and practice can sometimes prevent demographic
minorities from being given the chance to prove they are the best candidate.
 - There are sometimes innocent, non-discriminatory explanations for demographic underrepresentation (e.g.
women in information technology; men in nursing and care professions).
- Diversity training programmes have not been proven to be especially effective (because most people aren’t
actually e.g. racist or sexist).
- Generational changes can take time, and people’s attitudes are often a product of the generation they are
from.

13. Equitable Distribution of Contributions and Benefits:

- Fairness matters a lot to people in groups. It’s built into the prosocial aspects of human nature.
- Unfairness can be incredibly toxic in groups; reducing performance and causing individuals and groups to
exert less discretionary and cooperative effort.
- When employees believe that organizational resources are allocated fairly, processes for decision making
are fair, and the organization treats them fairly:
+ They are more motivated
+ They are more likely to cooperate and support group decisions, and develop effective working
relationships with others
+ They are more likely to be creative and happy at work
+ They are more likely to internalize the organization's values and promote its shared identity
+ Trust in the organization will be higher, and uncertainty is lower

Session 5: Perception and Individual Decision Making (200)

1. Perception:
- Perception is a process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory impressions in order to
give meaning to their environment.
- What we perceive can be substantially different from objective reality... People’s behaviour is based on
their perception of what reality is, not on reality itself.
- The world as it is perceived is the world that is behaviorally important.
- Factors That Influence Perception:
+ Perceiver
+ Target
+ Situation
2. People Perception: How and Why We Judge Others:
- Attribution theory: How we judge others based on attributions we make about their behaviour, and
whether it was internally- or externally-caused:
+ Internally-caused behaviours are those we attribute to individual control.
+ Externally-caused behaviours are those we attribute to situational factors.
- We make attributions of internally- or externally-caused behaviour based on:
+ Distinctiveness: “Is it unusual for this person to do something like this?”
+ Consensus: “Did other people behave similarly in the same situation?”
+ Consistency: “Does this person do this regularly?”
- Fundamental attribution error: Over-estimating internal factors and under-estimating external factors in
others’ failures (i.e. “Too quick to blame the person and not the situation.”)
- Self-serving bias: Over-estimating external factors and under-estimating internal factors in our own
failures (i.e. “Too quick to blame the situation and not ourselves.”).

3. Cognitive Biases and Perceptual Shortcuts:

- Cognitive biases: A set of predictable mental errors that arise from our limited ability to process
information objectively. It can result in illogical and irrational decisions, and it can cause you to misjudge
risks and threats.
- Perceptual shortcuts: Occur when the perceiver categorizes the perceived and infers something about the
perceived based on past experiences or the influence of other subjective influences. Such judgments are
made quickly, without attending to objective information.
 - Managerial processes involving interpersonal communications and interactions with other people are
imperfect because they are greatly influenced by perception. Perception often involves biases and shortcuts
which may have significant negative effects on managerial functions.

4. Cognitive Biases and Perceptual Shortcuts:

5. Decision Making: Risks and Uncertainty:

- “If all risks are known, good decisions require logic and statistical thinking.”
- “If some risks are unknown, good decisions also require intuition and smart rules of thumb.”
- “We have to learn to live with uncertainty.”
- “In the real world of uncertainty, where we do not know all the alternatives or the consequences, and the
risks are very hard to estimate because everything is dynamic, there are domino effects, surprises happen,
all kinds of things happen.”
- “People with a high need for certainty are more prone to stereotypes than others and are less inclined to
remember information that contradicts their stereotypes.”
- “If we become aware of our different biases and our perception errors, we can correct for the problems of
instinct and use it to compliment our analysis.”

6. Individual Differences in Decision-Making:

- Energy and Metabolism:
+ People differ in their ability to use different energy sources effectively and efficiently.
- Personality:
+ Personality traits like conscientiousness influence our decision-making quality.
+ Achievement-striving people were more likely to escalate their commitment, whereas
Achievement-dutiful people were less likely.
- Intelligence:
 + Smart people are just as likely to fall prey to anchoring, overconfidence, and escalation of
commitment, probably because just being smart doesn’t alert you to the possibility you’re too
confident or emotionally defensive.
+ Higher IQ better allows people to overcome many decision-making errors.
- Gender:
+ Rumination refers to reflecting at length. In terms of decision making, it means overthinking
problems.
+ Women are more likely to ruminate than men – (more likely to overanalyze problems before
making a decision and to try to change a decision once it has been made). Men are more likely to
make impulse decisions than women – (more likely to make risky decisions with low information
based on perceived short-term gain).
- Cultural Differences:
+ Limited research available, but individual differences in cultural experience undoubtedly influence
decision-making in some way.

7. Organisational Constraints on Decision-Making:

- Performance Evaluation:
+ People may hide or withhold important information if it reflects badly on their performance.
- Reward Systems:
+ The rewards and incentives in an organisation influence how “rationally” decisions are made.
- Formal Regulations:
+ Most organisations have rules and norms which restrict the range of possible decisions.
- Time Constraints:
+ Time is always a factor in decision making, but organisational deadlines are an additional factor
that influences perceptions of time.
- Historical Precedents:
+ “Decisions made in the past are like ghosts that haunt current choices.”

8. Ethics and Creativity in Decision Making:

- Three criteria for ethical decision-making:
+ Utilitarianism: “The greatest good for the greatest number.” (e.g. productivity; profitability)
+ Deontology: Protecting basic rights of individuals (e.g. due process for employees)
+ Justice and fairness: Costs and benefits distributed in an equitable manner.
- Leaders have to make the “right” ethical trade-offs for a particular decision.
- Different ethical standards in different cultures change the decision dynamics
- Using the 3-Component Model of Creativity for better decision-making:
+ Expertise: The potential for creativity is enhanced when individuals have abilities, knowledge,
proficiencies, and similar expertise in their field of endeavor.
+ Creative-Thinking Skills: The ability to use novelty and analogies as thinking tools.
 + Intrinsic task motivation: The desire to work on something because it’s interesting, involving,
exciting, satisfying, or personally challenging.

9. Fair and Inclusive Decision Making:

- When a group is cooperative and includes multiple perspectives, better information is used to make
decisions.
- Cooperative groups make better decisions than individuals, and divergent perspectives often reflect the
different risks and opportunities involved in the decision.
- Inclusive decision-making systems are more resilient over time because they are less dependent upon
individuals and their specific preferences.

10. Fair and Inclusive Decision Making:

- Psychological flexibility helps make sharing decision-making power a lot less threatening. It can help
people be OK with the discomfort of disagreements and bold decisions, to be less attached to defending
their positions and identity, and to feel empowered to readily step up to make decisions to influence their
own circumstances.
- Decision making is about commoning:
+ Enable those who have the urgency to take the initiative to make proposals to actually make them.
+ Move authority to whomever has the best information, provided they are willing to take the
authority.
- If we are creative and intelligent, we can come up with better ways to make decisions that include
everybody who is affected by the decisions.
 Session 6: Groups and Teams (307)

1. What are Groups:

- Group: two or more individuals, interacting and interdependent, who have come together to achieve
particular objectives.
- Formal group: “[A group] defined by the organization's structure, with designated work assignments
establishing tasks.”
- Informal group: “Natural formations in the work environment that appear in response to the need for
social contact.”
- Several characteristics make a social identity important to a person:
+ Similarity: people who have the same values or characteristics as other members of their
organization have higher levels of group identification
+ Distinctiveness: identities that show how they are different from other groups.
+ Status: people use identities to define themselves and increase selfesteem
⇒ Most interested in linking themselves to high-status groups
+ Uncertainty reduction: how employees should develop a unique identity that corresponded more
closely to what the division was becoming.

2. The 5-Stage Group Development Model:

- Forming: Members “test the waters” to determine what types of behaviors are acceptable.
- Storming: Members accept the existence of the group but resist the constraints it imposes on individuality
⇒ clear hierarchy of leadership within the group.
- Norming: close relationships develop and the group demonstrates cohesiveness
 ⇒ group structure solidifies and the group has assimilated a common set of expectations of what defines
correct member behavior.
- Performing: Group energy has moved from getting to know and understand each other to performing the
task at hand.
- Adjourning: wrapping up activities and preparing to disband.
3. The Six Properties of Groups:
- Roles: A set of expected behaviour patterns attributed to someone occupying a given position in a group.
- Norms: Acceptable standards of behaviour shared by group members that express what they should and
should not do under certain circumstances.
- Status: A socially defined position or rank given to groups or group members by others.
+ What Determines Status?:
● The power a person wields over others.
● A person’s ability to contribute to a group’s goals.
● An individual’s personal characteristics.
- Size: The number of people that constitute the group.
- Cohesiveness: The degree to which members relate to each other and are motivated to stay in the group
and keep the group in-tact.
+ Cohesiveness affects group productivity.
- Diversity: The degree to which members of the group are similar to, or different from, one another – at a
deep-level and surface-level.

4. Group Decision Making:

- Advantages: Groups generate more complete information and knowledge, increased diversity of views,
and increased acceptance of a solution (refer last class).
- Disadvantages: Group-decision making takes more time, is subject to conformity pressures (e.g.
groupthink), domination by a small number of members, and unclear division of responsibility.
- Effectiveness and efficiency: Group decision-making tends to be more effective, but can be less efficient
(although depends on decision-making context and group size).
5. What is a Team?
- Textbook: "A group whose individual efforts result in performance that is greater than the sum of the
individual inputs."
- American Psychological Association "A group of people who are joined for achieving a common goal
within a stipulated period, having collective accountability."

6. Differences between groups and teams:

- A group can be a collective of mutually independent individuals with separate goals who are brought
together by common interests and experience.
 + Even though everyone shares information and resources with other group members, each member
can be responsible for their own work.
- A team is always an interdependent group of individuals who share responsibility and are focused on a
common goal.
+ People in a team have a mutual understanding with other members.
+ By working together, they tend to maximize each other’s strengths and minimize weaknesses.
+ Unlike a group, where each member may be expected to contribute separately, the most important
characteristic of a team is synergy: the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

7. Defining and Creating Effective Teams:

- Productive output: The productive output of the team must meet or exceed the quantitative and qualitative
standards defined by the organisation.
- Personal need satisfaction: Teams are effective if membership facilitates employee need satisfaction.
- Capacity for future cooperation: Effective teams employ social processes that maintain or enhance the
capacity of their members to work together on subsequent tasks.
- Adequate resources: Support received from the organisation; timely information; proper equipment;
adequate staffing; encouragement; and administrative assistance.
- Leadership and structure: Agreement on the specifics of the team’s work and how they fit together to
integrate individual skills.
- Climate of trust: Trust among team members facilitates cooperation, reduces the need to monitor each
others’ behaviour, and bonds members around the belief that others on the team won’t take advantage of
them.
- Performance evaluation and rewards systems: Creating rewards that reflect team performance and
individual contributions to the team; using reward incentives and other policies that can reinforce team
effort and commitment.

8. Shared Identity and Purpose:

- Being part of a group with strong bonds of commitment, trust, and shared purpose is deeply satisfying and
motivating for human beings.
- Shared identity and purpose requires integrating individual and collective interests so that each member is
more likely to identify with the group: they are happy to say that the group represents something they care
about, they believe in the group’s goals, and they are committed to staying with the group.
- Building groups with shared identity and purposes requires two factors:
+ Social cohesion: The quality of the relationships between people in the group.
+ Task cohesion: The quality of commitment to the shared group purpose.
- More cohesive groups perform better, and higher performance leads to greater group cohesiveness.

9. Monitoring Agreed Behaviours:

 - If groups are to cooperate effectively, people in the group must know what other people are doing. If
people don’t notice and care about others’ behaviour, the group cannot effectively coordinate its actions,
discourage disruptive or self-interested behaviour, or encourage helpful cooperative behaviour.
- Although monitoring can sometimes be centralized as the responsibility of a single leader, addressing it as
a collective responsibility, in which all members monitor whether group members are acting in ways that
benefit the group usually leads to better results.
- The objective of group monitoring is to build on the positive reinforcement arising from cooperation rather
than the negative processes of coercion and control.

10. The Emotional Reality of Teams:

- When teams and organizations face their collective emotional reality, they begin a healthy evaluation of the
shared habits that create that reality. Teams can only change for the better when individuals recognize that
some group situations are dissonant or uncomfortable.
- Teams are better than individuals in decision making ONLY when the team has a collective quality of
Emotional Intelligence. It is the responsibility of a leader with high EI to help foster increased EI in their
team.
- Strong norms informed by high EI differentiate a high-performing team from a loose group of people
working together.
- Empathy and social awareness allow teams to create positive norms and manage relationships more
effectively.
- Effective teams are self-aware (mindful of the emotions of others), self-managed (take responsibility for
the teams emotions and norms), and empathic (understands differences in emotions and uses this
understanding to drive success).
 Session 7: Motivation Concept (236)

1. Motivation:
- Motivation = (Intensity + Direction + Persistence) → Goal attainment
+ Intensity = the concentration and application of effort
+ Direction = where or for what purpose the effort is being concentrated and applied
+ Persistence = how long the concentration and application of effort occurs for, and how much
resolve is shown when goal attainment proves difficult
- The particular goal to be attained depends on the values, objectives, anddesired outcomes of the particular
organization.
- Whether and how the particular goal is attained also consequently affects
subsequent motivation; creating a feedback loop.
2. Classical Theories of Motivation:
- Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: Our actions are motivated by certain physiological requirements;
represented by a pyramid of needs, with the most basic needs at the bottom and more complex needs at the
top.
- Theory X + Theory Y: People dislike work and must be coerced, controlled, and directed toward
organizational goals (Theory X) or has intrinsic interest in work and desire to seek responsibility (Theory
Y).
- Two-Factor Theory: There are certain factors in the workplace that cause job satisfaction while a separate,
independent set of factors cause job dissatisfaction.
- McLelland’s Theory of Needs: Every person has one of three main driving motivators: the needs for
achievement, affiliation, or power, and we develop each through our culture and life experiences.

3. Modern Theories of Motivation:

- Job Engagement Theory: By challenging, supporting, and inspiring employees, organizations increase the
satisfaction and maximize the output of their staff.
- Goal-Setting Theory: Specific and challenging goals along with appropriate feedback contribute to higher
and better task performance.
- Self-Efficacy Theory: A person's particular set of beliefs about themselves determines how well one can
execute a plan of action in particular situations.
- Reinforcement Theory: Behaviour is driven by its consequences: positive behaviors should be rewarded
positively, while negative behaviors should not be rewarded or should be punished.
- Equity/Organizational Justice Theory: Employees are motivated by whether they perceive workplace
procedures, interactions and outcomes to be fair.
- Expectancy Theory: Employees will behave in particular ways because they are motivated by what they
expect the result of that selected behaviour will be.
4. Self-Determination Theory:
- People are motivated to develop as professionals and positive change their behaviours due to the
fulfillment of three innate and universal psychological needs: Competence; connection; and autonomy.
- Two primary assumptions of SDT = (1) People are actively directed toward growth, and mastering
challenges and having new experiences help to develop that growth (2) Autonomy and acquiring
knowledge and experience are bigger motivators than monetary rewards.
- SDT has a large and growing evidence base to support its connection to increased employee engagement;
job satisfaction; positive workplace relationships; employee productivity, and organizational profitability.

5. Intentional Change Theory:

- Any significant aspect of personal or professional motivation that produces sustained results requires
intentionally developing an aspect of who you are or who you want to be, or both.
- The change may relate to you taking on a major new role, making a big life-career move or developing
behaviours to enhance your effectiveness as a leader.
6. Designing and Redesigning Jobs For Motivating Potential:
- Jobs need to be properly designed if people are going to be motivated by them (i.e. to make the jobs high in
motivating potential).
- Jobs also need to be re-designed over time in order to maintain motivating potential (people get bored with
their jobs and routines)
- In order to maximize motivating potential, jobs need to be designed and redesigned so that the work is
meaningful (high in skill variety; task identity; or task significance; or some combination of these
qualities), autonomous (high in personal freedom and independent initiative); and feedback-intensive (the
worker receives clear and direct insights about the quality and standard of their work).
- Approaches such as job rotation and enrichment can help to ensure that these job characteristics are
refreshed over time.

7. Extrinsic Motivators:
- Extrinsic motivators such as monetary rewards and remuneration remain important motivators in the
workforce (e.g. for personal/family security).
- Both what people are paid (in terms of internal vs external equity) and how they are paid (e.g. merit-based
pay; bonuses; profit-sharing) influence how extrinsically motivated people are.
- However, as behaviour becomes increasingly controlled by external rewards, people begin to feel less in
control of their own behaviour and overall motivation can be diminished.
- The best way to think about it is that extrinsic motivators such as money are necessary but not sufficient to
properly motivate people. Gen-Z in particular are not singularly motivated by extrinsic motivators.

8. Intrinsic Motivators:
 - Theories such as Self-Determination Theory and Intentional Change Theory have increasingly shown that
intrinsic motivators (e.g. the opportunity to learn on the job; finding purpose and passion in work; forming
bonds with co-workers; acquiring experience and experiences) are a bigger cause of overall motivation
than extrinsic motivators.
- This is especially true in the modern workforce. Most people these days simply aren’t motivated by money
alone, and people’s motivation levels don’t increase simultaneously with increases in how much they are
paid.
- This is why designing and redesigning jobs to increase and maintain motivating potential is contingent on
qualities such as job meaningfulness, autonomy, and feedback – not remuneration.

9. Modern Workforce Motivation / Flexible Working Arrangements:

- COVID-19 has revealed the degree to which people increasingly prefer flexible working arrangements in
their jobs (although this phenomenon was already underway prior to the onset of COVID-19).
- The ability to work from home (and often the preference for working from home) has been a significant
paradigm shift in the area of motivation.
- For people who can do the exact same job from home, the motivation for commuting to the office each day
has been rendered questionable.
- Similarly, organizations that insist on a “9AM-5PM” work day are now proving less successful than more
flexible organizations that allow their employees to set their own hours (provided the same amount and
quality of work still gets done).

10. Goal Setting For Action:

- In groups, goals are particularly important from a motivational perspective because they help people to
coordinate action in a shared direction, and to initiate and sustain effort even when a particular task or
project is difficult.
- 20-30 years ago, solving problems of coordination and cooperation required simple problem solving and
goal setting. In the modern workforce, these problems require a more learning-oriented approach:
experimenting with trying out things to see how they work, and remaining open to flexibly changing
direction based on the feedback received.
- A learning-oriented approach is focused less on what must be achieved and more on learning how to get to
that outcome.
- At the level of the group, this is consistent with the realities of intrinsic motivators at the level of the
individual.
 Session 8: Communication (370)

1. Communication:
- Business communication is at the core of everything that is done in the workplace. It’s how interaction
with colleagues and customers to meet business objectives takes place.
- Communication is not the mere exchange of information. It requires the transmission of meaning between
two or more parties.
- Communication in business and management is always goal-oriented: it is the transmission of meaning
purposed toward achieving important and desired organizational outcomes (e.g. productivity; profitability).
- When it comes to effective leadership, there is no such thing as “over-communicating”, insomuch as
multiple communication channels can (and should) be used in order to facilitate clarity and specificity in all
workplace interactions.

2. Functions of communication:
- Regulation, monitoring, and controlling
- Information exchange
- Social interaction
- Motivation and persuasion
- Emotional expression
3. Oral vs Written Communication:

4. Non-Verbal Communication / Body Language:

5. Organizational Communication:
- Formal communication network = A network is created by management and specified with the help of an
organizational chart which specifies the hierarchy and the reporting directions (i.e., upward, downward,
and horizontally) within the organization. Information is passed on only through official channels such as
memos, bulletins and intranet or internal emails.
- Informal communication grapevine = A grapevine is communication held without following a
recommended or prescribed structure in an organization, and may happen outside official organizational
channels.
- Grapevine communication can improve speed in addressing grievances, enhance everyday interactive
relationships, and make feedback more efficient and direct, but can also increase possible
misunderstandings and reduce the degree of necessary managerial control.
6. Automatic vs Controlled Processing:

- Automatic processing: Rapidly and reflexively using intuitions, instincts, heuristics, and mental shortcuts
in order to quickly process information.
 - Controlled processing: Slowly and deliberately analyzing facts, figures, and other contextualizing data in
order to studiously process information.

7. Communication Barriers:
- Filtering: A sender purposely manipulating information so the receiver will see it more favourably.
- Selective Perception: Receivers selectively see and hear based on their needs, motivations, experience,
background, and other personal characteristics, and project their interests and expectations into
communications as they decode them.
- Information overload: When the information we have to work with exceeds our processing capacity.
- Emotions: Emotions alter our experience of communication; increasing the influence of subjectivity.
- Language: The same words can mean different things to different people, and differences in tone and
linguistic style can also be interpreted differently by different people.
- Silence: Easy to ignore, but common and problematic.
- Apprehension: Effects of social anxiety on speaking up.
- Lying: Very prevalent, but has many different meanings.

8. Effective Intercultural Communication:

- Assume people communicate differently than you until you have reason to believe otherwise.
- Be descriptive rather than interpretive or evaluative.
- Practice empathy.
- Treat your interpretation as a provisional hypothesis (that you will confirm or disconfirm based on more
information).
9. Communication to Encourage Helpful Behaviours and Discourage Unhelpful
Behaviours:
- Encourage positive social interactions: These might include creating opportunities to notice and appreciate
the work of others, celebrate successes, or say thank you for a job well done, and even kind supportive
words when things go wrong despite the group member’s best efforts.
- Meet individual needs and interests: When the personal needs, values, and interests of members of the
group are well understood by others, it is easier for those others to respond appropriately to support
cooperation.
- Avoid destructive competition: Competition can be destructive if the gains that result from increased
winner motivation are canceled out by losses in motivation on the part of losers. It’s also destructive if
increased competition undermines trust and communication as incentives shift from overall group
effectiveness to one individual “winning” over others.
 Session 9: Power and Politics & Conflict and Negotiation

1. Formal Power in Organisations:

- Legitimate power: Based on the formal authority or job title required to use organizational resources to
make decisions.
- Reward power: Based on the ability of someone to distribute or withhold rewards and other sources of
value.
- Coercive power: Based on the threat or application or force or action to achieve compliance.
2. Informal (Personal) Power in Organisations:
- Expert power: Based on influence or perceived authority wielded as a result of expertise, special skill, or
knowledge.
- Referent power: Based on identification with a person who has desirable resources or personal traits; based
on their charismatic dynamism, likability, and emotional effects on us.
3. Dependence and Power:
- Power requires dependence: “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”
- The greater Person B ’s dependence on Person A, the more power Person A has over Person B.
- Dependence is based on:
+ Importance: Do people want what you have?
+ Scarcity: Do you have something that others don’t?
+ Non-substitutability: Does what you’re offering have viable alternatives?
4. The Reality of Organisational Politics:
- Politics are a part of organisational life, because organisations are made up of different interests that need
to be aligned.
- 93% of managers surveyed reported that workplace politics exist in their organisation, and 70% felt that in
order to be successful, a person has to engage in politics.
- Politics relies on ambiguity.

5. What Influences Organizational Politics?:

- Individual factors: Does this person have the personality traits, needs, and behavioural qualities that will
motivate political behaviour?
- Organizational factors: Are there opportunities in the structure, policies, and practices in the organization
that will create incentives for political behaviour?

6. Issues with Organizational Politics:

 - For most people — those who have modest political skills or are unwilling to play the politics game — the
outcomes of organisational politics tend to be predominantly negative: e.g. Lower job satisfaction;
increased job anxiety and stress; Lower employee motivation and performance; Higher job turnover
- When people have good political skills, they will see office politics as an opportunity for growth, and will
likely perform well.
- When people have poor political skills, they will see office politics as a threat to their position, and will
likely perform poorly (as well as resort to defensive behaviours (e.g. avoiding action or blame).
- There are no easy or straightforward answers when it comes to the ethics of power and politics in the
workplace.

7. Healthy vs Unhealthy Conflict:

- Conflict is inevitable in organizations because people have competing interests, inclinations, information,
and influences over power dynamics.
- Conflict is healthy when it is purposed toward trying to make the organization better. This kind of conflict
should be nurtured within organizations, and explicit disagreements over e.g. company strategy, policy,
practices, tasks, analyses, etc. should all be openly encouraged. When conflict is healthy, people in the
organization recognize that nothing about the conflict is intended to be personal.
- Conflict is unhealthy when it is oriented around relationships and is personal. This kind of conflict is
centered on tension, hostility, animosity, pettiness, vendettas, and causing and taking offense. This kind of
conflict needs to be actively discouraged and avoided at all costs.
8. Good vs Bad Conflict Management:

9. Fast and Fair Conflict Resolution:

- Conflict is normal and inevitable in any high-performing group, and if a group is to find a way through
conflicts, it needs to ensure it has effective capabilities in three key areas:
+ Interpersonal skills such as listening well and speaking assertively, not aggressively.
+ Personal skills such as emotion regulation and perspective taking.
+ Group-level agreements and processes for managing conflict efficiently and effectively.
 - Conflict is often associated with fear and avoidance, but this doesn’t need to be the case. Groups can
improve their ability to resolve conflict if members develop psychological flexibility, allowing them to be
open, aware and connected to their purpose and the workability of their behaviours.
- Healthy conflict is conflict that is resolved quickly and fairly.

10. Negotiation:
- Successful negotiation usually requires compromise from both sides. Both parties must gain something,
and both parties must lose something.
- The necessity for negotiation arises because neither party will be able to get everything they want.
Knowing that there must be concessions, each party in the negotiation is required to adopt an attitude of
understanding that they must get the best deal possible in a way which is acceptable to the other party.
- Negotiation processes have three basic phases:
+ Exchanging information: Establishing what is being negotiated on what basis.
+ Bargaining: The act of making concessions and having concessions made to you.
+ Closing: Formalizing the terms upon which the concessions have been made.

11. 7 Principles for Effective Negotiaton:

- Know what you are trying to accomplish: What are the minimum acceptable outcomes on your side?
- Develop a game plan first: Establish where you have (and lack) leverage and bargaining power and how
you can utilize this leverage.
- Understand your counterpart: Establish where they have (and lack) leverage and bargaining power, and
their minimum acceptable outcomes.
- Aim for a “win-win”: Negotiation doesn’t have to be zero-sum. If both parties achieve their outcomes,
long-term relationships becomes possible.
- Be patient: Wait for your counterpart to respond.
- Don’t tolerate bad faith negotiations.
- Exercise caution when pursuing a “win-lose” negotiation.

12. The Need For Flexible Leadership Styles in Conflict and Negotiation:
- Emotionally intelligent leadership does not mean being a nice leader all the time. Sometimes, leaders that
are truly high in EI know when to employ leadership approaches that can seem (or actually are) dissonant.
- This is particularly true during conflict and/or negotiation scenarios. Leaders need to accept that they are
not trying to win a popularity contest, and that because some parties are going to lose a conflict or
negotiation, they have to be willing to adopt the most appropriate leadership style for the particular conflict
or negotiation – regardless of how it might temporarily affect their reputation in the organization.
- Leaders need to move past cultural differences in conflict engagement or avoidance. High- vs low-context
cultural ideas are now outdated.
 Session 10: Organizational Structure and Culture (514 + 546)

1. Centralization vs Decentralization:
- How few or many individuals have the authority and responsibility to make decisions and spearhead
organizational direction.
+ Advantages of high centralization include clarity in decision-making, streamlined implementation
of policies and initiatives, and control over the strategic direction of the organization.
+ Disadvantages of high centralization include limited opportunities for employees to provide
feedback, the slow speed of bureaucracy, and a higher risk of inflexibility.
+ Advantages of high decentralization include quick decision and response times, better ability to
expand the organization, greater leveraging of skill specialization, increased employee
empowerment and morale, practical connection between compensation and responsibility, and
better use of lower and middle management.
+ Disadvantages of high decentralization include coordination difficulties, increased administrative
costs due to effort duplication and overlap, operational incongruity through misapplied autonomy,
departmental siloing, and over-reliance on divisional or departmental managers.

2. 4 Aspects of Managerial Complexity to Determine Optimal Spans of Control:

- Time allocation: How much actual time is the manager spending on her or his own work versus time spent
managing others?
- Process standardization: How standard and formally structured is the work process?
- Work variety: How similar or different is the work of individual direct reports?
- Team skills required: How much experience and training do team members’ jobs require? How
independent are the direct reports?

3. Types of Organizational Structures:

- Hierarchy (top-down): Upper leadership sets strategy; management plans execution; employees are
assigned tasks and make no decisions.
- Bottom-up structure: Employees provide input; organization-wide collaboration; entire chain of command
responsible for tasks and decisions.
- Functional structure: Similar to a hierarchy, but focuses on function.
- Divisional structure: Employees are organized into divisions (based on e.g. geographic location/market;
product) that have decision control over their own resources.
- Matrix structure: Employees are spread across multiple functions; working in one department while having
responsibilities in another. Structures differ as a result of organizational size, strategy, technology, and
environment.

4. How Different Structures Affect Behaviour:

 - In hierarchical and functional structures, employees become highly proficient and efficient in their roles,
but demonstrate little creativity and individual initiative.
- In bottom-up structures, employees demonstrate high creativity and initiative, as well as enthusiasm, but
low efficiency. The lack of specialization and standardization can also affect morale and engagement.
- In divisional structures, each team has to behave like its own self-contained business unit, and this brings
out previously-unrealized leadership talents and potential in team members.
- In matrix structures, because there are competing divisional and functional considerations, there is a built-
in potential for conflict and territorialism.

5. Strong and Weak Organizational Culture:

6. Organizational Culture vs Climate:

- Organizational culture is based around the values “on paper” that are shared within the organization. These
values can include innovation and risk-taking; attention to detail; outcome orientation; people orientation;
team orientation; aggressiveness; stability.
- Organizational climate is about whether these values are actually perceived and experienced by employees
“on the ground”.
- There can be a disconnect between culture and climate. Cultures can be based on shared values in theory,
while those values are not actually perceived or experienced by employees in practice.
- It is extremely difficult to maintain a strong organizational culture when there is a negative organizational
climate.

7. How to Build a Strong and Positive Culture:

- Explicitly define values: People want to believe that they are part of something meaningful, that they are
contributing to a common purpose.
- Be authentic: Your purpose and values will only create a solid foundation for culture if you truly believe
them. The process must be genuine.
- Actively listen and seek feedback constantly (get an impression of the climate).
 - Build psychological safety and flexibility: Foster trust and ensure that your actions are in line with your
organization's values.
- Accept mistakes, and learn from them.
- Monitor trends: Organizations are never static, and neither is the process of updating culture.

8. Global Implications For Organizational Culture:

- Values don’t always neatly translate from one national or cultural context to another. (e.g. perspectives on
conflict).
- Different countries also have different perspectives on ethics, and these differential ethical perspectives can
alter the degree to which values are embraced, culture is strengthened, and climate is positively
experienced.
- This can have particular implications when it concerns a multi-national corporation (MNC) with multiple
global offices or locations.
- MNCs that may be headquartered in countries where e.g. aggressiveness is valued, but also have regional
offices where aggressiveness is not only not valued, but is culturally repudiated (consider e.g. USA vs
Vietnam).

9. The Authority to Self-Govern:

- Organizations must be free to manage their own affairs, which also means freedom to establish their own
values, create their own cultures, and evolve their own climates.
- This authority to self-govern also requires the freedom to establish the right organizational structure for
their own specific needs/requirements.
- The organization must have full authority to manage its own affairs without excessive interference from the
outside. “Authority” can mean the power or right to give orders, make decisions, and enforce obedience
(i.e. structure + culture). But it can also mean the capacity and power to author the organization's own
experience of that structure and culture (i.e. climate).

10. Collaborative Relations with Other Groups:

- Teams and organizations do not exist in a vacuum: they have fundamental relationships with other teams
and other organizations.
- The key to the effectiveness of the Prosocial process is that it not only helps small groups work well
internally, but it helps groups work well with other groups, and organizations with other organizations.
- If your team or organization has become prosocial enough to function as a unit, then it should be able to
work with like-minded groups and organizations.
- Many organizations that we usually think of as a single entity, such as a corporation, government, hospital,
or school, are already a collection of groups with as much potential for managing intergroup relations as
intergroup relations.
 Session 11: Human Resource Management

1. Selection and Recruitment:

- One of the primary roles of Human Resource Management (HRM) is recruiting applicants and selecting
suitable candidates for new or existing positions within an organization.
- Initially, HRM will assess applications and conduct basic background checks in order to establish a
minimally-qualified pool of potential candidates.
- Thereafter, HRM will conduct job interviews, administer psychometric tests, and perform reference checks
on potential candidates. They may also have candidates perform job simulation tests or longer-form
interviews.
- After following these processes, HRM will have a short-list of suitable candidates. Ideally, this number
should be as low as possible.
- Finally, HRM may administer drug tests or medical tests to candidates.

2. Training:
- HRM is responsible for administering initial job orientations and other forms of on-the-job training.
- Training responsibilities can range from very rudimentary skills training through to more complex training
such as interpersonal skills training, ethics and civility training, and problem-solving training.
- Training methods vary depending on what the organization does and what is expected of the person being
trained. Many job trainings involve a combination of in-person apprenticing with a senior manager;
computer- or simulation-based training; and various off-hours educational programmes.
- Training, in and of itself, can have limited efficacy. Its effectiveness is highly contingent on the actual
person that is being trained (i.e. their personality, level of motivation, general abilities, etc.)

3. Coaching and Mentoring:

- In modern organizations, training has become increasingly supplanted by coaching and mentoring.
Coaching in particular has become a significant part of the modern HRM repertoire.
- Mentoring involves the employee “shadowing” a senior member of the organization (a “mentor”) who
works intensively with them to build their skills, confidence, and suitability for progression within the
organization.
- Coaching is a more applied and systematic approach to developing employees than mentoring. It used to be
exclusively utilized for senior managers, but more and more organizations are now making coaching
available to junior “rank and file” employees.
- Training is about introducing new skills to an employee. Coaching is about refining and enhancing skills
that the employee already possesses.

4. Employee Development:
 - Taken together, training and coaching are both features of employee development. This has become
arguably the most important area of concern for modern HRM.
- Turnover rates in modern organizations have been steadily increasing, while tenure rates have been steadily
decreasing.
- Employee development is essential for retaining high-quality employees who show potential in their job
and who provide value to their organizations.
- By developing employees through continued coaching and training, employees are more likely to be
motivated to stay with the organization, and to continue progressing through the ranks – which allows the
organization to continue to benefit from their talents and experience.

5. Performance Evaluations:
- Regular performance evaluations are necessary to ensure that the behaviours, traits, and competencies of
employees are aligned with the staffing, promotional, and remunerative demands of the organization.
- They are also necessary to ensure that these organizational demands are aligned with the developmental
needs of the employees themselves.
- 360° performance evaluations are the most reliable form of evaluation; soliciting feedback from superiors,
peers, and subordinates alike.
- The best performance evaluations are methodologically comprehensive; entailing combinations of written
analyses, behavioural scales, critical incident reports, and comparative measures.
- Performance evaluations should be explicitly connected to reward allocations in a way that is clear and
meaningful to the employee.

6. Feedback:
- Formal performance evaluations alone are not sufficiently responsive or frequent to be useful in developing
and motivating an employee or meeting the ongoing employee needs of the organization.
- Employees will be more quick to improve deficient areas of their performance (or maintain or build on
strong areas of their performance) if they receive consistent, timely, and detailed feedback from their
leaders.
 - Giving feedback can be a tricky process, and can make employees defensive or even resentful when the
feedback is negative.
- But this doesn’t need to be the case: giving feedback in a thoughtful, sensitive manner simply requires that
leaders are mindful, emotionally intelligent, and practice active listening (feedback should go both ways!).

7. Managing Work-Life Conflict and Balance:

- Successful organizations are those that are sensitive to the competing extracurricular demands of their
employees.
- It is HRM’s responsibility to ensure that employees are able to manage conflicts between their job and their
domestic/non-work responsibilities.
- Employees that have balance in their lives are more focused, disciplined, motivated, and productive than
those without such balance.
- Remember, sometimes “life gets in the way.” HRM needs to recognize that employees are not just
employees; they are human beings (parents, children, friends, teammates, associates, contemporaries).
- HRM policies and practices to accommodate work-life balance can include: flexible scheduling; paid
parental leave and childcare provision; corporate wellness initiatives; and a workplace culture which
promotes balance.

8. Sustainable Leadership Change and Development:

- When leaders are given the opportunity and support from HRM to focus on other areas of their lives, they
become better leaders.
- Remember the connection between Emotional Intelligence (EI) and leadership: EI must be developed
outside the workplace as well as within it in order for it to be truly sustainable.
- “Life is the laboratory for learning.” (Primal Leadership, p. 129)
- Modern HRM recognizes that in order for leaders to develop, they need to structure their development like
athletes: a lot of time practicing, and a little time performing – rather than vice versa, as with many leaders.

9. Building an Action Learning Culture:

- Leadership development cannot be the mandate of HRM alone. Even with their domain expertise and
contributions to the strategy of the organization, HRM’s involvement by itself cannot drive the changes in
behaviour or culture required for sustainable leadership development.
- HRM and leadership need to work together to build an action learning culture: A culture based on adopting
an experimental, iterative mindset to day-to-day work activities. This requires a willingness to embrace
failure, as well as a recognition that there will always be opportunities to adapt and improve.
- This can be achieved by getting buy-in from senior leadership to set an example themselves; cultivating a
growth mindset where everyone wants to keep learning; and encouraging risk-taking among all employees.
 Session 12: Organizational Change & Stress Management

1. Forces for Change:

- Change in organizational life is relentless and unstoppable.
- “Adapt or die.”
- The constant, unyielding nature of change didn’t begin with COVID-19, and it will not end with COVID-
19 – the pandemic has simply revealed the nature of change in a more stark and obvious way than many
people had previously recognized.
- Some changes are planned, but many are imposed or unbidden.

2. Resistance to Change:
- Change is difficult for people to accept and for organizations to absorb.
- Individual sources of resistance to change can include: habit; security; economic factors; a fear of the
unknown; and selective information processing.
- Organizational sources can include: structural inertia; limited focus of change; inertia due to group norms;
threats to established experts and authorities; and threats to established power relationships.
- Resistance to change can be overcome through: education and communication; universal participation;
systems of support and commitment; the development of positive relationships; fairness in implementing
change; recruiting and selecting people who are willing and open to change itself; and coercion and
manipulation.

3. 4 Principles of Change Management:

 - Understand change: Why does the change need to happen? What will the benefits be to the organization?
How will it positively and negatively impact upon and affect people? What is needed from people in the
organization in order to effect the change?
- Plan change: How will you secure support and buy-in for the change (especially from high-level
leadership)? Who is best-positioned to implement the change (internal or external actors)? What will the
best case scenario look like in practice, realistically speaking?
- Implement change: What process or framework will you use? (e.g. Kotter’s 8-Step Change Implementation
Plan; Action Research).
- Communicate change: How will people be aware of the change, know the change, desire the change, be
able to change, and sustain change?

4. Organizational Development (OD):

- Organizational Development (OD) is a comprehensive approach to transforming organizational
effectiveness and the wellbeing of people in tandem. It is extremely common within many modern
organizations.
- OD is based on five principle underlying values:
1. Respect for people
2. Trust and support
3. Power equalization and abandonment of hierarchical control
4. Open confrontation of problems
5. Universal and democratic participation
- Appreciative Inquiry is a specific form of OD based on identifying strengths within organizations first and
foremost, rather than emphasizing problems that require solutions. AI has substantial evidentiary support.

5. Building Cultures of Change:

- Stimulating a culture of innovation: Innovative cultures reward experimentation and trying new things.
They embrace failure as a learning device (“you win or you learn”). They have multiple “champions” of
ideas within the organization who promote the value and usefulness of a particular idea, and who seek and
encourage support and buy-in from people throughout the organization.
- Creating a learning organization:
1. Developing a shared vision that everyone in the culture subscribes to.
2. Discarding old routines and ways of doing the job when they prove to be useless.
3. Viewing all processes, activities, functions, and interactions within the organization as
fundamentally interrelated.
4. Communicating openly without fear of reprisal or threat to employment.
5. Subordinating self-interest to the collective objectives of the organization.

6. Stress:
 - Stress is the health epidemic of the 21st century, according to the World Health Organization.

7. But Stress is Not Always Bad!:

- Low-to-moderate levels of stress stimulate the body and increase its ability to react. Individuals can then
perform their tasks better, more intensely, or more quickly.
- Being free of stress all the time isn’t good for our growth and development, and may negatively affect our
mental health.
- Humans evolved for thousands of years under conditions of great stress.
- Business and leadership aren’t supposed to be easy! They can provide you with an opportunity to embrace
challenges and adversity, and to experience discomfort so that you can develop the right coping skills.

8. Struggle is Better Than Stress:

- “Comfort zones are prisons.”
- “Lean just beyond your edge.”
- Doing challenging things that make you struggle will prepare you better to deal with stress in your life.
- If your work is challenging, that is a good thing. If it is stressful, that is not a good thing.

9. How Can We Manage Stress?:

Individual Approaches: Organizational Approaches:

- Get enough restful sleep, eat - Goal setting: Setting specific and challenging goals for
healthy food, and stay employees can reduce stress and provide motivation.
 physically fit.
- Strong time management
- Make lists of required tasks
- Prioritize activities by urgency
and importance
- Schedule activities according
to priorities
- Do the hardest tasks when you
are most alert and productive
- Avoid electronic distractions
(especially social media)
- Relaxation techniques (e.g.
meditation; breathing
practices)
- Have a strong social support
network
- Selection and placement: “The right person for this kind of
job stress.”
- Training: Individuals can be developed to cope better with
stress.
- Redesigning jobs: e.g. Creating jobs with more autonomy
and freedom for some employees, and more structure and
routine for other employees.
- Increasing employee involvement: By allowing employees
to participate in the decisions that directly affect their job
performance, management can reduce their stress.
- Organizational communication: Reduces uncertainty and
improves clarity.
- Sabbaticals, vacations, and paid leave: Time away from the
job gives employees an opportunity to refresh their minds,
which will make them less stressed in the long-term.
- Wellness programmes: Company initiatives to improve
employee health.

10. Burnout:
- Burnout is the result of chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.“ (World Health
Organisation)
- More and more young Vietnamese professionals are suffering from the effects of burnout.
- If your employees are experiencing stress to the point of burnout, then your organization has failed them
and will fail itself.