Directorate of Distance Education

Swami Vivekanand subharti University

Name : BALAMURUGAN K
Enrollment No : CR2312390033
Course : Master of Business administration
Course Code : MBA-104

Course Title : Organizational Behavior

Assignment No. : MBA-104/2023
Contact no : 9813092362
E-mail : BALAMURUGANIOCL@GMAIL.COM
 Directorate of Distance
Education Swami Vivekanand
Subharti University
I Year

Course Code: MBA-104

Course Title: Organizational Behavior

Assignment No. :MBA104/2023

Maximum Marks : 30

Attempt any 5 questions from the given 10

questions. All questions carry equal marks.

Q1. What is meant by Halo effect? Explain.

Q2. Define political behavior. Why is politics a fact of life in organizations?

Q3. How do organizational cultures develop? What four steps commonly occur?

Q4. How can the perceptual skills be enhanced?

Q5. Generalize personality and O.B. What are the factors which determine the
extent of the incoherence?

Q6. Explain contingency approach.

Q7. State Maslow's Need Theory. Also write the characteristics of Self

Actualizing people.

Q8. Discuss how Theory X and Theory Y manages approach motivation.

Q9. Compare among the three modes of resolving inter-group

conflict

. Q10. Discuss the three ways reflected in operationalism.

Q1. What is meant by Halo effect? Explain.

The halo effect is a term for a consumer's favoritism toward a line of products due to
positive experiences with other products by this maker. The halo effect is correlated
to brand strength, brand loyalty, and contributes to brand equity.
The halo effect occurs when our overall positive impression of a person, product, or
brand is based on a single characteristic. If our first impression is positive, the
subsequent judgments we make will be colored by this first impression.

What is the halo effect?

The halo effect is a form of cognitive bias—a heuristic (or mental shortcut) that
causes us to make snap judgments. In other words, the halo effect leads us to
consider only one aspect of a person or a product in order to form a general opinion.

Snap judgments like these can help us navigate the world more seamlessly and
make decisions faster, but they also put us at risk of poor decision-making.

When the halo effect is at play, a general evaluation of a person, or an evaluation of

an aspect of their personality, influences how we view other, unrelated aspects of
their personality. For example, if we consider someone to be attractive, we are more
likely to assign them other positive qualities, such as intelligence, kindness, or
honesty.

Overreliance on our first impressions can lead to poor decision-making, since we are
unable to consider all the facts available to us. A positive first impression can be
misleading. For example, when you find out your co-worker went to a prestigious
university, you might assume they are more skilled than they actually are.

Like other forms of heuristics, the halo effect is unconscious and not intentional.
Because it clouds our judgment, the halo effect can be a source of research bias.

Halo and horn effect

While the halo effect refers to positive evaluations, a similar spill over effect occurs
when a negative first impression warps our perception.

The horn effect is the tendency for a negative impression made in one context to
influence our judgment in another. This means that we focus only on negative
qualities and exclude any positive ones.

Halo effect example

The halo effect is often used as a persuasion technique in marketing.

Example: Halo effect and consumer psychology Suppose you are at the
supermarket, trying to pick a snack. You see two granola bars, and one is labeled as
organic. As you are health-conscious, you go for the organic one, thinking that it’s
the better choice.
In reality, just because a product says it’s organic or has organic ingredients doesn’t
mean it’s healthier. If you read the package, you would see that the organic bar is
still high in sugar.

The halo effect influences how consumers judge the quality of products based upon
a single product feature. By assigning a positive characteristic to their product,
brands can influence customers’ perception of the overall quality of the product.
The halo effect can also explain brand loyalty and brand reputation.

Example: Halo effect and brand reputation Your favorite technology brand releases a
new smartphone. Because you are very satisfied with a laptop by the same brand
that you bought a few years ago, you maintain that its other products must also be
reliable and of high quality.
After a few weeks, customers start complaining about the smartphone’s battery.
Even so, you think that it’s still a good brand, and this is just an exception.

A favourable experience with a company’s product creates a halo that casts the
company as a whole in a positive light. This prior good reputation protects the
company in times of crisis (for example, when a new product turns out to be a flop)
and deflects some of the reputational damage.

Conversely, if several products fail, a negative halo (a horn effect) is created around
the brand, which can be very difficult to overcome.

How to minimize the halo effect

Although you can’t entirely avoid cognitive biases like the halo effect, there are a few
tips that can help you minimize its impact:

 Bear in mind that everyone is prone to biased thinking. Keep reminding

yourself that first impressions are not always right and can lead us to
misjudge others.
 Slow down your thinking process. We are more likely to fall for the halo effect
when emotional or intuitive thinking takes over. Instead, make sure you have
clear evidence for your evaluations. For example, in the context of
performance reviews, supervisors use a list of criteria and objective data to
ensure that they are evaluating each employee fairly.
 Seek input from others, particularly from a “devil’s advocate” or someone
neutral to the situation. Talk to someone who isn’t afraid to disagree with you
and is neutral when it comes to the person or subject at hand. Compare their
opinions to your own to see if they recognize the same qualities in a person
that you do
 Q2. Define political behavior. Why is politics a fact of life
in organization

Political behavior refers to the personal interest of the people in the business
activities. It also shows the power that people use to make their position in the
organization. The political behavior of each individual is different. It is a special form
of human activity.

Power and politics are inextricably interwoven with the fabric of an organization’s life.
In any organization, at any given moment, a number of people are seeking to gain
and use power to achieve their own ends. This pursuit of power is political
behaviour Organizational politics refers to the activities carried out by people to
acquire, enhance and use power and other resources to obtain their preferred
outcomes in a situation where there is uncertainly or disagreement.

One great organizational scholar, Tushman defined politics, ‘as the structure and
process of the use of authority and power to affect definition of goals, directions and
the other major parameters of the organization. Decisions are not made in rational or
formal way but rather through compromise accommodation and bargaining.’

Techniques of Organizational Politics

The most commonly used techniques of political behaviour in organizations are:

 One technique of political behavior is to control the dissemination of critical

information to others. The more critical the information and fewer the people who
have it, the stronger is political power base of those who possess these information.
 Controlling lines of communication is another political technique related to the
flow of information. People who have some control over lines of communication can
yield considerable political power. For example, the secretary may have
considerable power in deciding who sees the boss and who does not at a given time.
She may use this power in favoring those whom she likes and frustrating those
against whom she may have it grudge.
 Controlling the agenda also gives a person power over information. The person
who controls a meeting’s agenda, for instance, may consistently put a particular item
last on the list and then take up time so that meeting adjourns before considering the
item.
 The opinions of outside experts and consultants often curry much weight in
organizations and many consultants can be swayed by political interests.
Consultants know who is paying them and even honest consultants are likely to give
opinions consistent with those of their employer. Hence, hiring an outside consultant
can be a clever political move.
 Game playing can range from fairly innocent to very manipulative. It involves people
doing something insincere, but not outright illegal or unethical to gain political ends.
For instance, a manager who does not want to answer a committee’s tough
 questions may, for instance, avoid meeting by going out of the town on the day of
meeting.
 Image building is creating positive impression reflected by the personality,
appearance and style. Some of the factors that enhance a preferred image consist of
being well dressed, having a pleasant smile, being attractive, honest, sociable and
loyal to the organizational interests. In addition, always project an image of
competence and self-assurance.
 Building coalitions or alliance is another technique of gaining political power. It is
necessary to have the alliance with the right people. Coalition building can become
simply a matter of quid pro quo, ie. I will support you if you will support me.

Managing Organizational Politics

Though it is virtually impossible to eliminate political behaviour in organizations, it is

possible to reduce it, if a manager understands the reasons for it and the techniques
of political behaviour. Politics when carried to the extreme can damage morale,
create enemies, destroy loyalty, damper co-operative spirit and much time and
energy is spent planning attacks and counter attacks which are detrimental to
organizational health. Accordingly, combating organizational politics must be
undertaken by the top management and some of the steps that can be undertaken
are: open communication, reduction of uncertainty and creating awareness.

Open communication can reduce the political activity if all employees know how
and why an organization allocates resources, the employees will be likely to put their
energy into meeting the stated criteria for gelling resources rather than into political
activity. If the organization is open about why it made particular decision, then
employees will he less likely to think that the decisions were political and less likely
to use political techniques to try to influence the next decision.

Uncertainty in the form of ambiguous goals and changes that affect the organization
tends to increase the use of political activity. Reducing such uncertainty can,
therefore, reduce the political behaviour. Open communication is one of the ways an
organization can reduce uncertainty. For instance, laying down clear criteria and
making it transparent to the employees who will be laid off, in case of lay off the
organization can reduce political behaviour.
 Q3.How do organizational cultures develop? What four steps commonly

Key ways to improve organizational culture include:

1. Connect employee work to a purpose.
2. Create positive employee experiences.
3. Be transparent and authentic.
4. Schedule regular and meaningful 1:1s.
5. Encourage frequent employee recognition.

Four Steps to Building a Strong Company Culture

 Know the Difference Between Leadership and Management. Effective culture starts
with effective leadership. ...
 Recognize the Role Culture Plays in Your Organization. ...
 Preach what you practice. ...
 Master the Different Styles of Communication.

Know the Difference between Leadership and Management

Effective culture starts with effective leadership. In the early days of a company,
however, when a first-time founder is likely wearing many different hats, it can be
hard to know what great leadership actually means in practice. Most young founders
have corporate work experience, so they know what it means to report to a manager.
Often, they assume they understand what being a leader entails—that management
and leadership are one and the same. However, they could not be more different.

Management is about efficacy, taking something that exists and making it more
efficient. Leadership is about change, taking people in a new direction. Where
management is about control, leadership is about influence. Where management
aims to incrementally move people towards an objective, leadership can be
disruptive, even revolutionary. Leadership is about breaking the status quo and
knowing when and how to break it.

In my experience, no one really works “for” anyone else; we all work for ourselves.
As a leader, I cannot motivate the people on my team. What I can do, what my focus
needs to be, is to create an environment that inspires them to motivate themselves.

Countless books have been written on how to become a more effective leader. In my
experience, however, here are three important aspects of leadership that can be
easy to overlook, especially for first-time founders:

 Be a storyteller. Storytelling is among the most important skills a leader

can possess—and one that rarely shows up in traditional business
education. Whether for fund-raising, acquiring customers, recruiting
employees, or inspiring staff, there is no better way to connect with other
 human beings than with stories. As an investor, I listen to pitches every
day. The ones that capture my imagination, that elicit empathy, that force
me to put myself in someone else’s shoes—those are often the pitches
that resonate most.

 Use the bully pulpit that comes with being CEO. It can take years and
multiple mistakes for some first-time founders to realize just how closely
people listen to every word coming out of their mouths. That can feel
uncomfortable when you are not used to that level of scrutiny, but it can
also be incredibly empowering. When you praise an employee, especially
in front of other employees, it means something. With this in mind, praise
should be public as much as possible, while any kind of constructive
feedback should always be private. The only person you should ever
publicly criticize is yourself. Along those lines…

 Don’t be afraid to be vulnerable. A leader’s ability to be vulnerable with

his or her team can be incredibly valuable, but it is a skill seldom
practiced. Most leaders believe that showing any sign of weakness is the
kiss of death. There are times, however, when showing vulnerability
conveys authenticity and a shared humanity. It can be tempting to want to
pretend you know the answer to everything. Being able to say, “I don’t
know,” however, can play a crucial role in cultivating a healthy culture—
and in avoiding costly mistakes. You want your direct reports to be open
with you about their own unknowns and concerns. When you are willing
to show vulnerability, everyone else knows it is safe to let their guard
down sometimes. That is what builds a cohesive team.

2. Recognize the Role Culture Plays in Your Organization

“Culture” can feel like a nebulous concept, but it has a concrete meaning: the shared
values of an organization. Good or bad, the values embodied in a company’s culture
will act as a guiding light for how people handle everything from a new customer to a
crisis response. A company with a strong, well-established culture becomes a self-
policing organism. No one has to keep looking over employees’ shoulders, because
that set of shared values guides them to make the right decision.

It is important to formalize an organization’s culture when it reaches a critical mass.

When a company has grown to about 20 employees—when it has developed clearly
defined organizational functions and opinion leaders in key areas have emerged—
that is the right time to codify the organization’s collective value system. Why then?
Because the company is now at a key transition point. There is one set of employees
who has been with the founder from the start. They feel a sense of ownership for
what has been collectively built, and they are willing to do whatever it takes to make
the business successful. Typically, these “first-wave” startup employees do not care
about titles or roles. They know that if the company succeeds, they can expect a
large, potentially life-changing windfall.

At approximately 20 employees, however, you are now adding a second wave of

employees. These second-wave employees typically do not have the same
expectations of personally reaping the spoils of the company’s success. All of a
sudden then, title becomes important. Role becomes important. Delineating their
fiefdom becomes important. If you are not careful, that second wave of employees
can create a micro-culture that is very different from what the organization has had
up to now. Before they sign on then, you should make sure that the company’s
culture and values are codified in a formal statement. You should be able to tell new
people, “This is how we do things here.”

Two of the most important lessons I have learned about codifying culture include:

 Work collaboratively. Corporations are not democracies, but a culture

statement is a decision that must be made collectively. If an employee
gives a new hire your culture statement with an eye roll, it is probably
because that statement was a top-down, ego-driven edict from the CEO.
Instead, co-author your culture statement with the other key stakeholders
in the company. Talk through what’s unique and important about your
culture. Nail down your culture statement in a concrete, formalized way.
As you do, you will not only build stronger buy-in. In my experience, you
will also benefit from the lessons your colleagues have learned from their
own prior roles about what works—and what does not—in defining an
organization’s culture.

 Be specific. It can be easy for culture statements to become lists of

buzzwords and vague ideas that ultimately have little relation to reality. In
one of my prior startups for example, the company’s culture statement
noted that urgency should be a core part of the organization’s culture. But
what does “urgency” mean in practice? A colleague from that startup who
had joined me in my new venture noted that people worked 80 hour or
more per week to try to demonstrate “urgency.” No one really understood
what kind of behavior was expected of them. So, together, we came up
with a better way to express what we wanted our culture to embody: Do
today what you could put off until tomorrow. Now, everyone had a
concrete sense of the culture we were collectively trying to build.

3. Preach what you practice

Everyone knows the adage, “practice what you preach.” For a leader, it is just as
important to preach what you practice. Sometimes, the most important thing
founders can do is to evangelize and reinforce the culture they are building. In one of
the start-ups I led, I would spend part of every weekly all-hands meeting talking
through one element of our culture statement. Here, I would exercise my storytelling
muscles by sharing real-world examples of employees who epitomized our
organization’s values.
4. Master the Different Styles of Communication

You may have noticed a common theme in these examples of strong leadership and
culture: effective communication. As a leader, communication is always your first and
most important job. To do it well, you should understand the three basic types of
communication. Each serves a different purpose, and should be deployed in different
contexts. They are:

 One-to-Many: Use this mode to create awareness and disseminate

information: This is what we are doing, these are our key initiatives, etc.
When done right, however, one-to-many communication also reinforces
your accountability to your team. Think about it as less handing down
edicts, more like reporting to your board. Through your actions, you are
telling your people, “I work for you, and I am accountable to you.” To that
end, I would often ask my executives to give regular status reports to the
entire team.

 Many-to-Many: This type of communication is the discussion floor, the

venue for facilitating constructive conflict. A well-debated decision is often
a good one, so you want to create a forum where people feel free to
question and discuss. One individual will always be empowered to make
the decision and be accountable for it, but they should not do it in a
vacuum. The goal is for your people to not just be aware of a decision,
but to buy in and feel invested in its success. That only happens when
everyone has a chance to share their issues, objections, comments, and
suggestions.

 One-to-One: One-to-one communication is exactly what it sounds like:

engaging an employee in a personal way. Here, the goal is to build trust
and commitment. You are showing that you care about this person as an
individual. You understand their goals and challenges, and you intend to
be an ally to help them succeed.

Take the Next Step on Your Leadership Journey

This list is not comprehensive. There is far more that goes into building an effective
culture, and many other questions you will need to answer to ensure your
organization is growing in the most effective way. However, thinking deeply about
the culture you are building—even just recognizing that this question deserves your
serious attention—is an excellent start.

In my next blog, we will consider another angle: the different situational leadership
styles, and when and how to invoke them. If you are a first-time CEO of a new
company, your journey as a leader is just beginning. By being intentional in the steps
you take along the way, you stand a much better chance of reaching the destination
you envision.
Q4. How can the perceptual skills be enhanced?

Perceptual skills can be enhanced through various techniques and exercises. Here
are some strategies to improve perceptual skills: Visual exercises: Engage in
activities that challenge your visual perception, such as puzzles, mazes, and visual
memory games.

seven important strategies for improving perceptual skills,

o Knowing Oneself Accurately,
o Emphatize with Others,
o Having a Positive Attitude,
o Positive Impression Formation,
o Communicating Openly,
o Comparing One’s Perception with that of Others,
o Improving Diversity Management Programmes.

1. Knowing Oneself Accurately:

One of the powerful ways to minimize perceptual distortions is to know yourself. One
should be aware of his or her values, beliefs and prejudices. People normally
misperceive others because they fail to perceive themselves accurately. The more
accurately a person understands himself, the more accurately he can perceive
others. The concept of Johari window must be applied by people so as to increase
awareness about self and others.

2. Emphatize with Others:

Empathy refers to a person’s ability to understand and be sensitive to the feelings of
others. Empathy is a natural phenomenon and develops within an individual by itself.
However, empathy skills can also be developed over a passage of time by proper
feedback system and by close interaction and working. By emphasizing with other
person, one can perceive the other individual more aptly.

3. Have a Positive Attitude:

Attitudes have a strong and long lasting effect on perception. If one holds a negative
attitude towards someone or something, our perception is undoubtedly going to be
distorted. We should make effort to have a positive attitude and should not let our
personal biases to crop in and hinder the perceptual powers.

4. Postpone Impression Formation:

It is a natural tendency of the human beings to form impression about something or
someone very quickly. Just in a meeting or two we draw conclusion about someone.
Forming judgments with such limited information is very wrong. A much better
strategy is to postpone the impression formation until more information about the
individual and the situation is collected.

5. Communicating Openly:
Much of misperception in an organisation arises due to inadequate communication
or one way communication. Utmost care should be taken, so that the message
reaches the right person, at the right time and in the right manner.
6. Comparing One’s Perceptions with that of Others:
Another useful strategy to reduce perceptual errors is to compare one’s own
perception with the perception of the other person about the same object. By sharing
perceptions we come across different point of views and potentially gain a much
better understanding of the situation and the object.

7. Introducing Diversity Management Programs:

If we talk of today’s organisations, they are very much diverse and heterogeneous.
The workforce is so diverse with language differences, religious differences and
cultural differences that it becomes really hard to make the employees work together
in an effective manner. The biggest challenge in front of the management in to
minimize perceptual bias and benefit from such diversity.

For this purpose, an important strategy it to use training programs which may help in
communicating the value of diversity on one hand and help the participants acquaint
with one another and provide them room to mix with one another with different
backgrounds. These training programs mainly increase the employees, awareness
of difference and thus help in minimizing perceptual biases and distortions.
To include we can say that successful managers understand the importance of
perception on behaviour and they act accordingly. They are aware of perceptual
distortions and they know that perceptual differences are likely to exist in any
situation. As a result they try to make decisions and take action with a true
understanding of the work situation as it is viewed by all persons concerned.

Q6. Explain contingency approach.

The contingency approach to management is based on the idea that there is no

single best way to manage. Contingency refers to the immediate contingent
circumstances. Effective organizations must tailor their planning, organizing, leading,
and controlling to their particular circumstances.

Contingency Approach to Management

The contingency approach to management is based on the idea that there is no

single best way to manage. Contingency refers to the immediate contingent
circumstances. Effective organizations must tailor their planning, organizing, leading,
and controlling to their particular circumstances. In other words, managers should
identify the conditions of a task, the requirements of the management job, and
people involved as parts of a complete management situation. The leaders must
then work to integrate all these facets into a solution that is most appropriate for a
specific circumstance.

The contingency approach to management assumes that there is no universal

answer to many questions because organizations, people, and situations vary and
change over time. Often there is no one right answer when managers ask: “What is
the right thing to do? Should we have a mechanistic or an organic structure? A
 functional or divisional structure? Wide or narrow spans of management? Tall or flat
organizational structures? Simple or complex control and coordination mechanisms?
Should we be centralized or decentralized? Should we use task or people oriented
leadership styles? What motivational approaches and incentive programs should we
use?” Thus, the answer depends on a complex variety of critical environmental and
internal contingencies.

The contingency theory is similar to situation theory in that there is an assumption

that no simple way is always right. Situation theory, however, focuses more on the
behaviors that the leader should use. The contingency theory takes a broader view
that includes contingent factors about leader capability and also includes other
variables within the situation.

Factors that influence the contingency theory are numerous. These include the
following:

 The size of the organization

 How the firm adapts itself to its environment
 Differences among resources and operations activities
 Assumption of managers about employees
 Strategies
 Technologies being used