Management and Organizational Behavior

(MGT-7301)

Lesson-4

Foundations of Individual Behavior

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 Ability
Contrary to what we were taught in school, we weren’t all created equal.
Most people are to the left or to the right of the median on some
normally distributed ability curve. For example, Everyone has strengths
and weaknesses in terms of ability that make him or her relatively superior
or inferior to others in performing certain tasks or activities. From
management’s standpoint, the issue is not whether people differ in terms
of their abilities. They clearly do. The issue is knowing how people differ
in abilities and using that knowledge to increase the likelihood that an
employee will perform his or her job well.
Ability refers to an individual’s capacity to perform the various tasks in a
job. It is a current assessment of what one can do. An individual’s overall
abilities are essentially made up of two sets of factors: intellectual and
physical. 2
 Intellectual Abilities

Intellectual abilities are abilities needed to perform mental activities

—for thinking, reasoning, and problem solving. People in most
societies place a high value on intelligence, and for good reason,
Compared to others, smart people generally earn more money and
attain higher levels of education . Smart people are also more likely to
emerge as leaders of groups. Intelligence quotient (IQ) tests, for
example, are designed to ascertain a person’s general intellectual
abilities. The seven most frequently cited dimensions making up
intellectual abilities are number aptitude, verbal comprehension,
perceptual speed, inductive reasoning, deductive reasoning, spatial
visualization, and memory. Exhibit 2-1 describes these dimensions.
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 Exhibit 2-1 Dimensions of Intellectual Ability
Dimension Description Job Example
Number Ability to do speedy and Accountant: Computing
aptitude accurate arithmetic the sales tax on a set of
items
Verbal Ability to understand what Plant manager: Following
comprehension is read or heard and the corpo-rate policies on
relationship of words to hiring
each other
Perceptual Ability to identify visual Fire investigator:
speed similarities and differences Identifying clues to support
quickly and accurately a charge of arson

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 Dimensions of Intellectual Ability
Inductive Ability to identify a logical market researcher:
reasoning sequence in a problem and Forecasting demand for a
then solve the problem product in the next time
period
Deductive Ability to use logic and Supervisor: choosing
reasoning assess the implications of an between two different
argument suggestions offered by
employees
Spatial Ability to imagine how an Interior decorator:
visualization object would look if its Redecorating an office
position in space were
changed
Memory Ability to retain and recall Sales person: Remembering
past experiences the names of customers 5
 Physical Abilities
Though the changing nature of work suggests that intellectual abilities are
becoming increasingly important for many jobs, physical abilities have
been and will remain important for successfully doing certain jobs.
Research on the requirements needed in hundreds of jobs has identified
nine basic abilities involved in the performance of physical tasks. These are
described in Exhibit below Individuals differ in the extent to which they
have each of these abilities. Not surprisingly, there is also little relationship
among them: A high score on one is no assurance of a high score on
others. High employee performance is likely to be achieved when
management has ascertained the extent to which a job requires each of
the nine abilities and then ensures that employees in that job have those
abilities.
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 Exhibit: Nine Basic Physical Abilities

Strength Factors
1.Dynamic Ability to exert muscular force repeatedly or
strength continuously over time
2. Trunk strength Ability to exert muscular strength using the
trunk (particularly abdominal) muscles
3. Static strength Ability to exert force against external objects
4. Explosive Ability to expend a maximum of energy in one
strength or a series of explosive acts

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 Exhibit: Nine Basic Physical Abilities
Flexibility Factors
5. Extent flexibility Ability to move the trunk and back muscles as
far as possible
6. Dynamic Ability to make rapid, repeated flexing
flexibility movements
Other Factors
7. Body Ability to coordinate the simultaneous actions
coordination of different parts of the body
8. Balance Ability to maintain equilibrium despite forces
pulling off balance
9. Stamina Ability to continue maximum effort requiring
prolonged effort over time
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 Biographical Characteristics

Biographical characteristics: Personal characteristics-such as age, gender,

race, and length of tenure-that are objective and easily obtained from
personnel records.
This lesson is essentially concerned with finding and analyzing the variables
that have an impact on employee productivity absence, turnover,
deviance, citizenship, and satisfaction. Many of the concepts- motivation,
power and politics or organizational culture-are hard to assess. It might be
valuable, then, to begin by looking at factors that are easily definable and
readily available- data that can be obtained, for the most part, simply from
information available in an employee’s personnel file.

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 Age

The relationship between age land job performance is likely to be an issue

of increasing importance during the next decade for at least three reasons.
First, there is a widespread belief that job performance declines with
increasing age. Regardless of whether this is true, a lot of people believe it
and act on it. Second, as noted in Chapter I, the workforce is aging. The
third reason is the retirement age.

What is the perception of older workers? Evidence indicates that

employers hold mixed feelings. They see a number of positive qualities
that older workers bring to their jobs, such as experience, judgment, a
strong work ethic, and commitment to quality.

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Older workers are also perceived as lacking flexibility and as being resistant
to new technology. And in a time when organizations are actively seeking
individuals who are adaptable and open to change, the negatives
associated with age clearly hinder he initial hiring of older workers
 

The older you get, the less likely you are to quit your job. That conclusion is
based on studies of the age-turnover relationship. As workers get older,
they have fewer alternative job opportunities; In addition, older workers
are less likely to resign than are younger workers because their long tenure
tends to provide them with higher wage rates, and more attractive pension
benefits. In general, older employees have lower rates of avoidable
absence than do younger employees. However, they have higher
rates of unavoidable absence.
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How does age affect productivity? There is a widespread belief that
productivity declines with age. It is often assumed that an individual’s
skills-particularly speed, agility, strength, and coordination—decay over
time and that prolonged job boredom and lack of intellectual stimulation
contribute to reduced productivity. The evidence, however, contradicts
that belief and those assumptions. For instance, during a 3-year period, a
large hardware chain staffed on of its stores solely with employees over 50
and compared its results with those of five stores with younger employees.
The store staffed by the over-50 employees was significantly more
productive (measured in terms of sales generated against labor costs) than
that of the other stores.

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Our final concern is the relationship between age and job
satisfaction. On this issue, the evidence is mixed. Most studies
indicate a positive association between age and satisfaction, at
least up to age 60. Other studies, however, have found a U-shaped
relationship. When the two types are separated, satisfaction tends
to continually increase among professionals as they age, whereas
it falls among non-professionals during middle age and then rises
again in the later years.

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 Gender
Few issues initiate more debates, misconceptions, and unsupported
opinions than whether women perform as well on jobs as men do.
The evidence suggests that the best place to begin is with the
recognition that there are few, if any, important differences between
men and women that will affect their job performance. There are,
for instance, no consistent male-female differences in problem-
solving ability, analytical skills, competitive drive, motivation,
sociability, or learning ability. Psychological studies have found that
women are more willing to conform to authority and that men are
more aggressive and more likely than women to have expectations
of success, but those differences are minor.
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You should operate on the assumption that there is no significant
difference in job productivity between men and women. The
research on absence, however, consistently indicates that women
have higher rates of absenteeism than men do.
 
 Race
Race is a controversial issue. It can be so contentious that it’s
tempting to avoid the topic. A complete picture of individual
differences in OB, however, would be incomplete without a
discussion of race.

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What is race ? Before we can discuss how race matters in OB, first we have to
reach some consensus about what race is, and that’s not easily done. Some
scholars argue that it’s not productive to discuss race for policy reasons (it’s a
divisive issue), for biological reasons (a large percentage of us are a mixture of
races), or for genetic and anthropological reasons (many anthropologists and
evolutionary scientists reject the concept of distinct racial categories).
 

Most people in the United States identify themselves according to a racial

group. (In contrast, in some countries, such as Brazil, people are less likely to
define themselves according to distinct racial categories.) The Department of
Education classifies individuals according to five racial categories: African
American, Native American (American Indian/Alaskan Native), Asian/Pacific
Islander, Hispanic, and white.

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 To summarize few important points about race:
First, in employment settings, there is a tendency for individuals to favor
colleagues of their own race in performance evaluations, promotion
decisions, and pay raises. Second, there are substantial racial differences in
attitudes toward affirmative action, with African Americans approving of
such programs to a greater degree than whites. Third, African Americans
generally fare worse than whites in employment decisions. For example,
African Americans receive lower ratings in employment interviews, are
paid less, and are promoted less frequently.
The major dilemma faced by employers who use mental ability tests for
selection, promotion, training, and similar personnel decisions is concern
that they may have a negative impact on racial and ethnic groups.
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 Social Group

Reservation(QUOTA) benefits are extended to certain social groups.

Reservation is a form of affirmative action whereby a percentage of seats
are reserved for individuals belonging to these categories. Preference is
given to persons belonging to categories that have been recognized as
scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, and other backward classes. Other
parameters such as religion and state of domicile are also taken into
consideration for providing such opportunities.
Reservation policies need to be understood in terms of their effect on
organizational structures, selection policies, and workplace
discrimination. However, the discussion on reservations is a very sensitive
issue and not much research has been carried out in this area.
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 Other Biographical characteristics: Tenure, Religion,
Sexual Orientation, and Gender Identity
The last set of biographical characteristic we’ll look at are tenure, religion,
and sexual orientation.
 

Tenure: With the exception of gender and racial differences, few issues are
more subject to misconceptions and speculations and speculations than
the impact of seniority on job performance.
 

Extensive reviews have been conducted of the seniority-productivity

relationship. If we define seniority as time on a particular job, we can say
that the most recent evidence demonstrates a positive relationship
between seniority and job productivity. so tenure, expressed as work
experience, appears to be a good predictor of employee productivity.

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The research relating tenure to absence is quite straightforward. Studies
consistently demonstrate seniority to be negatively related to
absenteeism. In fact, in terms of both frequency of absence and total days
lost at work, tenure is the single most important explanatory variable.
 

Tenure is also a potent variable in explaining turnover. The longer a person

is in a job, the less likely he or she is to quit. Moreover, consistent with
research which suggests that past behavior is the best predictor of future
behavior, evidence indicates that tenure on an employee’s previous job is a
powerful predictor of that employee’s future turnover.

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The evidence indicates that tenure and job satisfaction are positively
related . In fact, when age and tenure are treated separately, tenure
appears to be a more consistent and stable predictor of job satisfaction
than is chronological age.
 

Religion: Religion is a touchy subject. Not only do religious and on religious

people question each other’s belief systems, often people of different
religious faiths conflict. As demonstrated by the war in Iraq and the past
conflict in Northern Ireland, there are often violent differences among
sects of the same religion. In most countries, the law prohibits employers
form discrimination against employees based on their religion, with very
few exceptions. However, that doesn’t mean religion is a non-issue in OB.

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Perhaps the greatest religious issue in the United States today revolves
around Islam. There are nearly 2 million Muslims in the United States,
and across the world, Islam is one of the most popular religions. For the
most part, U.S. Muslims have attitudes similar to those of other U.S.
citizens (though the differences tend to be greater for younger U.S.
Muslims). Still, there are both perceived and real differences. Nearly 4
of 10 U.S. adults admit that they harbor negative feelings or prejudices
toward U.S. Muslims. Fifty-two percent believe the U.S. Muslims are
not respectful of women. We need to be careful of laying down blanket
judgments for all people belonging to a religious community because
these judgments are usually inaccurate.
 
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We need to be careful of laying down blanket judgments for all people
belonging to a religious community because these judgments are usually
inaccurate.
Sexual Orientation and Gender identity: Employers differ a lot in how they
treat sexual orientation. In most countries, the law does not prohibit
discrimination against employees based on sexual orientation , though some
countries do have anti-discrimination policies. Many employers ignore it
(practicing some version of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” military policy), some
do not hire gays, but an increasing number of employers are implementing
policies and practices protecting the rights of gays in the workplace. More
than half of the Fortune 500 companies offer domestic partner benefits for
gay couples. As for gender identity, companies are increasingly putting in
place policies to govern how their organization treats employees who change
genders (often called transgender employees). 23
IMPLICATION FOR MANAGERS

Ability Ability directly influences an employee’s level of performance.

Given management’s desire to get high-performing employees, what
can be done? First, an effective selection process will improve the fit. A
job analysis will provide information about jobs currently being done
and the abilities that individuals need to perform the jobs adequately.
Applicants can then be tested, interviewed, and evaluated on the
degree to which they possess the necessary abilities.

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Second, promotion and transfer decisions affecting individuals already in
the organization’s employ should reflect the abilities of candidates. As
with new employees, care should be taken to assess critical abilities that
incumbents will need in the job and to match those requirements with
the organization’s human resources.

Third, the fit can be improved by fine-tuning the job to better match an
incumbent’s abilities. Often, modifications can be made in the job that,
while not having a significant impact on the job’s basic activities, better
adapt it to the specific talents of a given employee. Examples would be
changing some of the equipment used or reorganizing tasks within a
group of employees.
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Any Questions!!

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