Chapter 2

Individual Behavior
 Chapter Content

2.1 Perception and individual decision-making

2.2 Personality, Values, Attitudes and Job satisfaction
2.3 Basic motivation concepts
 2.1 Perception and individual decision-making

What is perception?
• Perception is a process by which individuals organize and interpret their
sensory impressions in order to give meaning to their environment.
• However, what we perceive can be substantially different from
objective reality.
• For example, all employees in a firm may view it as a great place to
work—favorable working conditions, interesting job assignments, good
pay, excellent benefits, understanding and responsible management—
but, as most of us know, it’s very unusual to find such agreement.
Cont’d…
• Why is perception important in the study of OB? Simply because
people’s behavior 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
• How do we explain the fact that individuals may look at the same thing yet
perceive it differently?
• A number of factors operate to shape and sometimes distort perception.
• These factors can reside in the perceiver; in the object, or target, being
perceived; or in the context of the situation in which the perception is made.
• When you look at a target and attempt to interpret what you see, your
interpretation is heavily influenced by your personal characteristics—your
attitudes, personality, motives, interests, past experiences, and
expectations.
• For instance, if you expect police officers to be authoritative or young
people to be lazy, you may perceive them as such, regardless of their actual
traits.
Cont’d…
• Characteristics of the target also affect what we perceive. Loud
people are more likely to be noticed in a group than quiet ones. So,
too, are extremely attractive or unattractive individuals.
• Because we don’t look at targets in isolation, the relationship of a
target to its background also influences perception, as does our
tendency to group close things and similar things together.
• We often perceive women, men, Whites, African Americans, Asians,
or members of any other group that has clearly distinguishable
characteristics as alike in other, unrelated ways as well.
Cont’d…
• Context matters too. The time at which we see an object or event can
influence our attention, as can location, light, heat, or any number of
situational factors.
• For example, at a nightclub on Saturday night, you may not notice a
young guest “dressed to the nines or “dressed to the highest
degree”).
• Yet that same person so attired (dressed) for your Monday morning
management class would certainly catch your attention (and that of
the rest of the class).
• Neither the perceiver nor the target has changed between Saturday
night and Monday morning, but the situation is different.
Factors that Influence Perception
Factors in the perceiver
Attitudes
• Motives
• Interests
• Experience
• Expectations
Factors in the situation
• Time Perception
• Work setting
• Social setting
Factors in the target
• Novelty
• Motion
• Sounds
• Size
• Background
• Proximity
• Similarity
Person perception: Making judgements about others
• Now we turn to the application of perception concepts most relevant
to OB— person perception, or the perceptions people form about
each other.
Attribution theory and the three determinants of attribution
• Nonliving objects such as desks, machines, and buildings are subject to
the laws of nature, but they have no beliefs, motives, or intentions.
People do.
• That’s why when we observe people, we attempt to explain why they
behave in certain ways.
• Our perception and judgment of a person’s actions, therefore, will be
significantly influenced by the assumptions we make about that
person’s internal state.
Cont’d…
• Attribution theory tries to explain the ways in which we judge people
differently, depending on the meaning we attribute to a given
behavior.
• It suggests that when we observe an individual’s behavior, we attempt
to determine whether it was internally or externally caused.
• That determination, however, depends largely on three factors:
(1) distinctiveness, (2) consensus, and (3) consistency.
• First, let’s clarify the differences between internal and external
causation, and then we’ll elaborate on each of the three determining
factors.
Cont’d…
• Internally caused behaviors are those we believe to be under the
personal control of the individual.
• Externally caused behavior is what we imagine the situation forced
the individual to do.
• For example, if one of your employees is late for work, you might
attribute that to his partying into the small hours and then
oversleeping. This is an internal attribution.
• But if you attribute lateness to an automobile accident that tied up
traffic, you are making an external attribution.
Cont’d…
• Distinctiveness refers to whether an individual displays different behaviors in
different situations.
- Is the employee who arrives late today also one who regularly “blows off”
commitments? What we want to know is whether this behavior is unusual.
- If it is, we are likely to give it an external attribution. If it’s not, we will probably
judge the behavior to be internal.
• If everyone who faces a similar situation responds in the same way, we can say the
behavior shows consensus.
- The behavior of our tardy/late employee meets this criterion if all employees who
took the same route were also late.
- From an attribution perspective, if consensus is high, you would probably give an
external attribution to the employee’s tardiness, whereas if other employees who
took the same route made it to work on time, you would attribute his lateness to
an internal cause.
Cont’d…
• Finally, an observer looks for consistency in a person’s actions.
- Does the person respond the same way over time? Coming in 10
minutes late for work is not perceived in the same way for an
employee who hasn’t been late for several months as it is for an
employee who is late two or three times a week.
- The more consistent the behavior, the more we are inclined to
attribute it to internal causes.
Cont’d…
• One of the most interesting findings from attribution theory research is
that errors or biases distort attributions.
• When we make judgments about the behavior of other people, we tend
to underestimate the influence of external factors and overestimate the
influence of internal or personal factors.
• This fundamental attribution error can explain why a sales manager is
prone to attribute the poor performance of her sales agents to laziness
rather than to the innovative product line introduced by a competitor.
• Individuals and organizations also tend to attribute their own successes
to internal factors such as ability or effort, while blaming failure on
external factors such as bad luck or unproductive co-workers.
Cont’d…
• People also tend to attribute ambiguous information as relatively
flattering and accept positive feedback while rejecting negative
feedback. This is the self-serving bias.
- For example, Researchers asked one group of people “If someone
sues you and you win the case, should he pay your legal costs?” 85
percent responded “yes.”
- Another group was asked “If you sue someone and lose the case,
should you pay his costs?” Only 44 percent answered “yes.”
Cont’d…
• The evidence on cultural differences in perception is mixed, but most
suggest there are differences across cultures in the attributions
people make.
- One study found Korean managers less likely to use the self-serving
bias—they tended to accept responsibility for group failure “because I
was not a capable leader” instead of attributing failure to group
members.
- On the other hand, Asian managers are more likely to blame
institutions or whole organizations, whereas Western observers
believe individual managers should get blame or praise.
Cont’d…
• Differences in attribution tendencies don’t mean the basic concepts
of attribution and blame completely differ across cultures, though.
• Self-serving biases may be less common in East Asian cultures, but
evidence suggests they still operate across cultures.
• Recent studies indicate Chinese managers assess blame for mistakes
using the same distinctiveness, consensus, and consistency cues
Western managers use. They also become angry and punish those
deemed responsible for failure, a reaction shown in many studies of
Western managers.
• This means the basic process of attribution applies across cultures,
but that it takes more evidence for Asian managers to conclude
someone else should be blamed.
Cont’d…
Common Shortcuts in Judging Others
• The shortcuts we use in judging others are frequently valuable: they allow us
to make accurate perceptions rapidly and provide valid data for making
predictions.
• However, they are not foolproof (guaranteed). They can and do get us into
trouble when they result in significant distortions.
• Selective Perception: Any characteristic that makes a person, an object, or an
event stand out will increase the probability we will perceive it. Why? Because
it is impossible for us to assimilate everything we see; we can take in only
certain stimuli.
• This explains why you’re more likely to notice cars like your own, or why a
boss may reprimand some people and not others doing the same thing.
Because we can’t observe everything going on about us, we engage in
selective perception.
Cont’d…
• Halo Effect: When we draw a general impression about an individual
on the basis of a single characteristic, such as intelligence, sociability,
or appearance, a halo effect is operating.
• If you’re a critic of President Obama, try listing 10 things you admire
about him. If you’re an admirer, try listing 10 things you dislike about
him. No matter which group describes you, odds are you won’t find
this an easy exercise!
• That’s the halo effect: our general views contaminate our specific
ones.
Cont’d…
• Contrast Effects:
• Evaluation of a person’s characteristics that is affected by comparisons
with other people recently encountered who rank higher or lower on the
same characteristics.
• An old saying among entertainers is “Never follow an act that has kids or
animals in it.” Why?
- Audiences love children and animals so much that you’ll look bad in
comparison.
- This example demonstrates how a contrast effect can distort perceptions.
We don’t evaluate a person in isolation. Our reaction is influenced by
other persons we have recently encountered.
Cont’d…
• In a series of job interviews, for instance, interviewers can make
distortions in any given candidate’s evaluation as a result of his or her
place in the interview schedule.
• A candidate is likely to receive a more favorable evaluation if
preceded by mediocre applicants and a less favorable evaluation if
preceded by strong applicants.
• Stereotyping: When we judge someone on the basis of our
perception of the group to which he or she belongs, we are using the
shortcut called stereotyping.
Cont’d…
Specific Applications of Shortcuts in Organizations
• People in organizations are always judging each other. Managers must
appraise their employees’ performances.
• We evaluate how much effort our co-workers are putting into their jobs.
Team members immediately “size up” a new person.
• In many cases, our judgments have important consequences for the
organization.
• Let’s look at the most obvious applications.
Employment Interview:
• Few people are hired without an interview. But interviewers make
perceptual judgments that are often inaccurate and draw early impressions
that quickly become entrenched.
Cont’d…
• Research shows we form impressions of others within a tenth of a
second, based on our first glance.
• If these first impressions are negative, they tend to be more heavily
weighted in the interview than if that same information came out
later.
• Most interviewers’ decisions change very little after the first 4 or 5
minutes of an interview.
• As a result, information elicited early in the interview carries greater
weight than does information elicited later, and a “good applicant” is
probably characterized more by the absence of unfavorable
characteristics than by the presence of favorable ones.
Cont’d…
Performance Expectations:
• People attempt to validate their perceptions of reality even when these
are faulty.
• The terms self-fulfilling prophecy and Pygmalion effect describe how an
individual’s behavior is determined by others’ expectations.
• If a manager expects big things from her people, they’re not likely to let
her down.
• Similarly, if she expects only minimal performance, they’ll likely meet
those low expectations.
• Expectations become reality. The self-fulfilling prophecy has been found
to affect the performance of students, soldiers, and even accountants.
Cont’d…
Performance Evaluation:
• Performance evaluations very much depend on the perceptual process.
• An employee’s future is closely tied to the appraisal—promotion, pay
raises, and continuation of employment are among the most obvious
outcomes.
• Although the appraisal can be objective (for example, a sales-person is
appraised on how many dollars of sales he generates in his territory),
many jobs are evaluated in subjective terms.
• Subjective evaluations, though often necessary, are problematic
because all the errors we’ve discussed thus far— selective perception,
contrast effects, halo effects, and so on—affect them.
 The link between perception and individual decision
making
• Individuals in organizations make decisions, choices from among two or more
alternatives.
• Top managers determine their organization’s goals, what products or services to offer,
how best to finance operations, or where to locate a new manufacturing plant.
• Middle- and lower-level managers set production schedules, select new employees,
and decide how to allocate pay raises.
• Nonmanagerial employees decide how much effort to put forth at work and whether
to comply with a boss’s request.
• Organizations have begun empowering their nonmanagerial employees with decision-
making authority historically reserved for managers alone.
• Individual decision making is thus an important part of organizational behavior. But
the way individuals make decisions and the quality of their choices are largely
influenced by their perceptions.
Cont’d…
• Decision making occurs as a reaction to a problem. That is, a discrepancy exists
between the current state of affairs and some desired state, requiring us to consider
alternative courses of action.
• If your car breaks down and you rely on it to get to work, you have a problem that
requires a decision on your part.
• Unfortunately, most problems don’t come neatly labeled “problem.” One person’s
problem is another person’s satisfactory state of affairs.
• So awareness that a problem exists and that a decision might or might not be
needed is a perceptual issue.
• Every decision requires us to interpret and evaluate information. We typically receive
data from multiple sources and need to screen, process, and interpret them.
• Which data are relevant to the decision, and which are not? Our perceptions will
answer that question.
Cont’d…
• We also need to develop alternatives and evaluate their strengths and
weaknesses. Again, our process will affect the final outcome.
• Finally, throughout the entire decision making process, perceptual
distortions often surface that can bias analysis and conclusions.
 2.2 Personality, Values, Attitudes and Job Satisfaction

2.2.1 Personality
• The word personality itself stems from the Latin word persona, which
refers to a theatrical mask worn by performers in order to either
project different roles or disguise their identities.
• At its most basic, personality is the characteristic patterns of thoughts,
feelings, and behaviors that make a person unique.
• It is believed that personality arises from within the individual and
remains fairly consistent throughout life.
• Example of person’s personality: Happy, sad, impatient, shy, fearful,
curious, helpful.
Cont’d…

• When you look up the meaning of the word personality in layman's

terms, you may find something like ‘that what characterizes a person’.
• In everyday life we use terms such as character, identity or
predisposition.
• Scientists use more extensive definitions of personality.
• One of these definitions, by the American psychologists Randy Larsen
and David Buss, goes something like: “personality is a stable, organized
collection of psychological traits and mechanisms in the human being
that influences his or her interactions with and modifications to the
psychological, social and physical environment surrounding them.
Cont’d…
• Key words in this definition of personality are:
Personality is stable
• Your personality does not change just from one day to another,
actually it changes hardly at all. If there are any changes these are
very limited and slow. If they occur they may be caused by
trauma/disturbance or life changing experiences.
Personality is made up of properties and mechanisms
• Personality can be divided into different components and
characteristics.
• Over time, many different classifications have been made in
personality characteristics. Literally hundreds!
Cont’d…
Personality is ever present
• Your personality is something that you always take with you, it affects
your thinking, feelings and behavior, where and with whom you are,
in any situation at any time.
• Personality helps you to adjust yourself. Your personality helps you to
"survive" and deal with the daily challenges surrounding you.
• In a sense your personality is in part psychological but also
physiological.
• Research suggests that your personality is also influenced by all kinds
of biological processes and needs.
Cont’d…
• While there are many different definitions of personality, most focus on
the pattern of behaviors and characteristics that can help predict and
explain a person's behavior.
• Personality is the relatively enduring pattern of thoughts, emotions, and
behaviors that characterize a person, along with the psychological
processes behind those characteristics.
• Personality refers to the long-standing traits and patterns that propel
individuals to consistently think, feel, and behave in specific ways. Our
personality is what makes us unique individuals.
• It is, in essence, the bundle of characteristics that make us similar to or
different from other people.
Cont’d…
• We estimate an individual’s personality by what he or she says and does, and
we infer the person’s internal states— including thoughts and emotions—from
these observable behaviors.
• Personality is the sum total of ways in which an individual reacts and interacts
with others, the measurable traits a person exhibits.
• Measuring Personality
o Helpful in hiring decisions
o Most common method: self-reporting surveys
o Observer-ratings surveys provide an independent assessment of personality
– often better predictors.
Measuring Personality
• The most important reason managers need to know how to measure
personality is useful in hiring decisions and help managers forecast
who is best for a job.
• The most common means of measuring personality is through self-
report surveys, with which individuals evaluate themselves on a
series of factors, such as “I worry a lot about the future.”
• Observer-ratings surveys provide an independent assessment of
personality. Here, a co-worker or another observer does the rating
(sometimes with the subject’s knowledge and sometimes not).
Characteristics of Personality

• What exactly makes up a personality?

• Traits and patterns of thought and emotion play important roles as
well as the following fundamental characteristics of personality:
• Consistency: There is generally a recognizable order and regularity to
behaviors. Essentially, people act in the same ways or similar ways in a
variety of situations.
• Psychological and physiological: Personality is a psychological
construct, but research suggests that it is also influenced by biological
processes and needs.
• Behaviors and actions: Personality not only influences how we move
and respond in our environment, but it also causes us to act in certain
ways.
Cont’d…
• Multiple expressions: Personality is displayed in more than just
behavior. It can also be seen in our thoughts, feelings, close
relationships, and other social interactions.
How Personality Develops

• There are a number of theories about how personality develops, and

different schools of thought in psychology influence many of these
theories.
• Some of these major perspectives on personality include the
following.
Type Theories
• Type theories are the early perspectives on personality.
• These theories suggested that there are a limited number of
"personality types" that are related to biological influences, including:
Cont’d…
• Type A: perfectionist, impatient, competitive, work-obsessed,
achievement-oriented, aggressive, stressed.
• Type B: low stress, even-tempered, flexible, creative, adaptable to
change, patient, tendency to procrastinate.
• Type C: highly conscientious, perfectionists, struggle to reveal
emotions (positive and negative)
• Type D: feelings of worry, sadness, irritability, pessimistic outlook,
negative self-talk, avoidance of social situations, lack of self-
confidence, fear of rejection, appearing gloomy, hopelessness.
Cont’d…
1. Trait Theories
• Trait theories tend to view personality as the result of internal
characteristics that are genetically based and include:
o Agreeable: cares about others, feels empathy, enjoys helping others.
o Conscientiousness: high levels of thoughtfulness, good impulse
control, goal-directed behaviors
o Eager-to-please: accommodating, passive, and conforming
o Extraversion: excitability, sociability, talkativeness, assertiveness, and
high amounts of emotional expressiveness.
o Introversion: quiet, reserved.
Cont’d…
o Neuroticism: experiences stress and dramatic shifts in mood, feels
anxious (worries about different things), gets upset easily, struggles to
bounce back after stressful events.
o Openness: very creative, open to trying new things, focuses on
tackling new challenges.
2. Psychodynamic Theories
• Psychodynamic theories of personality are heavily influenced by the
work of Sigmund Freud and emphasize the influence of the
unconscious mind on personality.
Cont’d…
3. Behavioral Theories
• Behavioral theories suggest that personality is a result of interaction
between the individual and the environment.
• Behavioral theorists study observable and measurable behaviors,
often ignoring the role of internal thoughts and feelings.
4. Humanist
• Humanist theories emphasize the importance of free will and
individual experience in developing ​a personality.
Personality Determinants
Nature vs nurture
• A frequently asked question is: "Is personality innate or acquired?"
This question is also called the nature-nurture debate. This issue has
been debated by philosophers and other scientists for centuries.
• According to John Locke (1632-1704) and his followers, the
development of personality was purely a question of 'nurture' or
education. The newborn child would be like a clean slate ("tabula
rasa"), which can be shaped as educators want it to be.
Cont’d…

• Pendants of this vision, such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778),

oppositely claimed that heredity has the most important influence on
personality.
• According to Rousseau, the development of a child follows an inner,
biological time table. As parents you do not play a role in this,
according to Rousseau.
• Most experts now agree that personality is shaped by both nature
and nurture, although the relative importance of each continues to
be debated and studied.
Cont’d…
• Nature refers to our genetic or hereditary origins— the genes that we inherit from
our parents. Studies of identical twins, particularly those separated at birth; reveal
that heredity has a very large effect on personality; up to 50 percent of variation in
behavior and 30 percent of temperament preferences can be attributed to a person’s
genetic characteristics.
• In psychology, “temperament” refers to the personality tendencies that we show at
birth (and that are therefore biologically determined).
• In other words, genetic code not only determines our eye color, skin tone, and
physical shape but also has a significant effect on our attitudes, decisions, and
behavior.
• Although personality is heavily influenced by heredity, it is also affected to some
degree by nurture —the person’s socialization, life experiences, and other forms of
interaction with the environment.
Cont’d…
• Studies have found that the stability of an individual’s personality
increases up to at least age 30 and possibly to age 50, indicating that
some personality development and change occurs when people are
young.
• The main explanation of why personality becomes more stable over
time is that people form clearer and more rigid self-concepts as they
get older.
• The executive function—the part of the brain that manages goal-
directed behavior—tries to keep our behavior consistent with our
self-concept.
Cont’d…
• As self-concept becomes clearer and more stable with age, behavior
and personality therefore also become more stable and consistent.
• The main point here is that personality is not completely determined
by heredity; life experiences, particularly early in life, also shape each
individual’s personality traits.
Cultural influences on personality
• Besides influences from the immediate environment such as
education and school, the culture in which you grow up also
influences the development of your personality.
• The distinction between individualistic and collectivistic culture is
particularly important.
Cont’d…

• In individualistic cultures, such as the US and European countries, the

emphasis is on the development of the individual.
• In collectivist cultures, such as Indonesia and Panama, much value is
attached to the group interest.
• Individualist cultures stimulate the development of qualities such as
self-confidence, independence and assertiveness; in collectivist
cultures this is particularly true of qualities such as friendliness,
modesty and loyalty.
Personality Models
• Two dominant frameworks used to describe personality:
1. Five-Factor Model of Personality
2. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI®)
3. Big Five Model

4. Five-Factor Model of Personality

• One of the most important elements of personality theory is that people possess
specific personality traits.
• Traits such as sociable, depressed, cautious, and talkative represent clusters of
thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that allow us to identify, differentiate, and
understand people.
Cont’d…
• The most widely respected model of personality traits is the five-factor
model (FFM).
• Several decades ago, personality experts identified more than 17,000
words in Roget’s thesaurus and Webster’s dictionary that describe an
individual’s personality.
• These words were aggregated into 171 clusters and then further
reduced to five abstract personality dimensions. Using more
sophisticated techniques, recent investigations identified the same five
personality dimensions.
• There are five dimensions of personality according to this model.
• These “Big Five” dimensions, represented by the handy acronym
CANOE, are described below:
Cont’d…

Conscientiousness: characterizes people who are careful,

dependable, and self-disciplined. Some scholars argue that this
dimension also includes the will to achieve.
• People with low conscientiousness tend to be careless, less thorough,
more disorganized, and irresponsible.
Agreeableness: This dimension includes the traits of being courteous,
good-natured, empathic, and caring. Some scholars prefer the label
“friendly compliance” for this dimension, with its opposite being
“hostile noncompliance.”
• People with low agreeableness tend to be uncooperative, short-
tempered, and irritable.
Cont’d…

Neuroticism: characterizes people with high levels of anxiety, hostility,

depression, and self-consciousness.
• In contrast, people with low neuroticism (high emotional stability) are
poised, secure, and calm.
Openness to experience: This dimension is the most complex and has
the least agreement among scholars. It generally refers to the extent to
which people are imaginative, creative, curious, and aesthetically
sensitive.
• Those who score low on this dimension tend to be more resistant to
change, less open to new ideas, and more conventional and fixed in their
ways.
Cont’d…
Extroversion: characterizes people who are outgoing, talkative,
sociable, and assertive.
• The opposite is introversion, which characterizes those who are quiet,
shy, and cautious.
• Extroverts get their energy from the outer world (people and things
around them), whereas introverts get their energy from the internal
world, such as personal reflection on concepts and ideas.
• Introverts do not necessarily lack social skills. Rather, they are more
inclined to direct their interests to ideas than to social events.
• Introverts feel quite comfortable being alone, whereas extroverts do
not.
Cont’d…
• These five personality dimensions are not independent of each other.
• Some experts suggest that conscientiousness, agreeableness, and low
neuroticism (high emotional stability) represent a common underlying
characteristic broadly described as “getting along”; people with these
traits are aware of and more likely to abide by rules and norms of
society.
• The other two dimensions share the common underlying factor called
“getting ahead”; people with high scores on extroversion and
openness to experience exhibit more behaviors aimed at achieving
goals, managing their environment, and advancing themselves in
teams.
Cont’d…
2. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
• Most widely used instrument in the world.
• The five-factor model of personality is the most respected and
supported in research, but it is not the most popular in practice.
• That distinction goes to Jungian personality theory, which is measured
through the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).
• Nearly a century ago, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung proposed that
personality is primarily represented by the individual’s preferences
regarding perceiving and judging information.
• Participants are classified on four axes to determine one of 16
possible personality types, such as ENTJ.
Cont’d…
• Jung explained that perceiving, which involves how people prefer to
gather information or perceive the world around them, occurs
through two competing orientations: Sensing (S) and Intuition (N).
• Sensing involves perceiving information directly through the five
senses; it relies on an organized structure to acquire factual and
preferably quantitative details. Sensing types are practical and prefer
routine and order. They focus on details.
• Intuition, on the other hand, relies more on insight and subjective
experience to see relationships among variables. Sensing types focus
on the here and now, whereas intuitive types focus more on future
possibilities. Intuitives rely on unconscious processes and look at the
“big picture.”
Cont’d…
• Jung also proposed that judging—how people process information or
make decisions based on what they have perceived—consists of two
competing processes: Thinking (T) and Feeling (F).
• People with a thinking orientation rely on rational cause-effect logic
and systematic data collection to make decisions. Thinking types use
reason and logic to handle problems.
• Those with a strong feeling orientation, on the other hand, rely on
their emotional responses to the options presented, as well as to how
those choices affect others. Feeling types rely on their personal values
and emotions.
Cont’d…
• Jung noted that along with differing in the four core processes of sensing,
intuition, thinking, and feeling, people also differ in their degrees of
extroversion-introversion, which was introduced earlier as one of the Big Five
personality traits.
o Extraverted (E)individuals are outgoing, sociable, and assertive.
o Introverts (I) are quiet and shy.
• In addition to measuring the personality traits identified by Jung, the MBTI
measures Jung’s broader categories of perceiving and judging.
• People with a perceiving orientation are open, curious, and flexible; prefer to
adapt spontaneously to events as they unfold; and prefer to keep their options
open.
• Judging types prefer order and structure and want to resolve problems quickly.
Cont’d…
o Judging types want control and prefer order and structure.
o Perceiving types are flexible and spontaneous.
• Each of the sixteen possible combinations has a name, for instance:
• Visionaries (INTJ) – original, stubborn, and driven
• Organizers (ESTJ) – realistic, logical, analytical, and businesslike
• Conceptualizer (ENTP) – entrepreneurial, innovative, individualistic,
and resourceful
• Research results on validity of MBTI is mixed:
o MBTI is a good tool for self-awareness and counseling.
o Should not be used as a selection test for job candidates.
The Big Five Model of Personality Dimensions
Extroversion • Sociable, gregarious, and assertive

Agreeableness • Good-natured, cooperative, and trusting

Conscientiousness • Responsible, dependable, persistent, and organized

• Calm, self-confident, secure under stress (positive),

Emotional Stability versus nervous, depressed, and insecure under stress
(negative)

Openness to Experience • Curious, imaginative, artistic, and sensitive

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Prentice Hall 5-60

2.2.2 Values
• Values represent basic convictions that “a specific mode of conduct or
end-state of existence is personally or socially preferable to an
opposite or converse mode of conduct or end-state of existence.
• They contain a judgmental element in that they carry an individual’s
ideas as to what is right, good, or desirable. Values have both content
and intensity attributes.
• The content attribute says a mode of conduct or end-state of existence
is important.
Cont’d…
• The intensity attribute specifies how important it is.
• When we rank an individual’s values in terms of their intensity, we
obtain that person’s value system. All of us have a hierarchy of values
that forms our value system.
• Are values fluid and flexible? Generally speaking, no.
• They tend to be relatively stable and enduring.
• A significant portion of the values we hold is established in our early
years—by parents, teachers, friends, and others.
• There is also evidence linking personality to values, implying our values
may be partly determined by our genetically transmitted traits.
Importance of Values
• Provide understanding of the attitudes, motivation, and behaviors
• Influence our perception of the world around us
• Represent interpretations of “right” and “wrong”
• Imply that some behaviors or outcomes are preferred over others

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Classifying Values – Rokeach Value Survey

• Terminal Values: Desirable end-states of existence; the goals that a

person would like to achieve during his or her lifetime.
• Instrumental Values: Preferable modes of behavior or means of achieving
one’s terminal values.
• People in same occupations or categories tend to hold similar values
o But values vary between groups
o Value differences make it difficult for groups to negotiate and may
create conflict
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2.2.3 Attitudes
Introduction
 Our behavior at work often depends on how we feel about being
there. Therefore, making sense of how people behave depends on
understanding their work attitudes.
 Attitudes are evaluative statements—either favourable or
unfavourable—about objects, people, or events. They reflect how we
feel about something. When we say “we like our job,” we are
expressing our attitude about work.
 An attitude refers to our opinions, beliefs, and feelings about aspects
of our environment.
Cont’d…
 Attitudes reflect how we feel about something. When you say “I
like my job,” you are expressing your attitude about work.
 We have attitudes toward the food we eat, people we interact
with, courses we take, and various other things.
 Attitudes: Evaluative statements or judgments concerning objects,
people, or events.
Components of attitude

Affecti The emotional or

Cogniti ve feeling segment of an
ve attitude
The opinion or belief
segment of an attitude Behavi
oral

An intention to behave in a
certain way toward
someone or something
Attitude

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3-68
Cont’d…
• As we’ve noted, although we often think cognition causes affect,
which then causes behavior, in reality these components are difficult
to separate.
 Does Behavior Always Follow from Attitudes?
• Leon Festinger – No, the reverse is sometimes true!
• Cognitive Dissonance: Any incompatibility between two or more
attitudes or between behavior and attitudes.
• Individuals seek to reduce this uncomfortable gap, or dissonance, to
reach stability and consistency
• Consistency is achieved by changing the attitudes, modifying the
behaviors, or through rationalization
• Desire to reduce dissonance depends on:
Importance of elements
Degree of individual influence
Rewards involved in dissonance

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Moderating Variables
• The most powerful moderators of the attitude-behavior relationship are:
• Importance of the attitude
• Correspondence to behavior
• Accessibility
• Existence of social pressures
• Personal and direct experience of the attitude

Attitudes Predict Behavior

Moderating Variables

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Cont’d…
 Predicting Behavior from Attitudes
• Important attitudes have a strong relationship to behavior.
• The closer the match between attitude and behavior, the stronger the
relationship:
 Specific attitudes predict specific behavior
 General attitudes predict general behavior
• The more frequently expressed an attitude, the better predictor it is.
• High social pressures reduce the relationship and may cause
dissonance.
• Attitudes based on personal experience are stronger predictors.

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2.2.4 Job Satisfaction
• At work, two particular job attitudes have the greatest
potential to influence how we behave.
• These are job satisfaction and organizational
commitment.
• Job satisfaction refers to the feelings people have toward
their job.
• If the number of studies conducted on job satisfaction is
an indicator, job satisfaction is probably the most
important job attitude.

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as 3-73

Prentice Hall
Cont’d…
Job satisfaction is:
- One of the primary job attitudes measured.
- A positive feeling about the job resulting from an evaluation of its
characteristics.
- Refers to an individual’s general attitude towards his/her job.
- Broad term involving a complex individual summation of a number of
discrete job elements.
Cont’d…
Studies indicates that the more important factors conducive to job
satisfaction are:
o Mentally challenging work
o Equitable rewards
o Supportive working conditions and
o Supportive colleagues
•How to measure job satisfaction
 Single global rating (one question/one answer) - Best
 Summation score (many questions/one average) - OK
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Cont’d…

Causes of Job Satisfaction

Review of the evidence and research has identified several factors conducive to
high levels of employee job satisfaction; some of these factors are controllable by
managers and some are not.
• Working conditions and environment factors
• Nature of Work
• Promotion Policies and Career Development Factor (Fair Policies and Practice)
• Relationship with Supervisor and Colleagues
• Compensation and benefits factors
• Caring Organization (Appreciation, recognition, etc)
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Cont’d…

• Age.
• Promotion.
• Pay influences job satisfaction only to a point.
 After about $40,000 per year (in the U.S.), there is no relationship
between amount of pay and job satisfaction.
 Money may bring happiness, but not necessarily job satisfaction.
• Personality can influence job satisfaction.
 Negative people are usually not satisfied with their jobs.
 Those with positive core self-evaluation are more satisfied with
their jobs.
Employee Responses to Dissatisfaction
Active

Exit Voice
• Behavior • Active and
directed constructive
toward attempts to
leaving the improve
organization conditions
Destructive Constructive

Neglect Loyalty
• Allowing • Passively
conditions waiting for
to worsen conditions
to improve

Passive 3-78
Cont’d…
• Exit. The exit response directs behavior toward leaving the
organization, including looking for a new position as well as
resigning.
• Voice. The voice response includes actively and constructively
attempting to improve conditions, including suggesting
improvements, discussing problems with superiors, and undertaking
some forms of union activity.

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Cont’d…
• Loyalty. The loyalty response means passively but optimistically waiting
for conditions to improve, including speaking up for the organization in
the face of external criticism and trusting the organization and its
management to “do the right thing.”
• Neglect. The neglect response passively allows conditions to worsen
and includes chronic absenteeism or lateness, reduced effort, and
increased error rate.

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Outcomes of Job Satisfaction
a) Job Performance
 Satisfied workers are more productive AND more productive workers are more
satisfied!
 The causality may run both ways.
b) Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB)
 Work attitudes are even more strongly related to organizational citizenship
behaviors.
 OCBs: are behaviors that are not part of our job but are valuable to the
organization, such as helping new employees or working voluntary overtime).
 OCB is a person's voluntary commitment within an organization or company that is
not part of his or her contractual tasks.

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as Prentice

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Hall
Cont’d…
 OCBs are individual, discretionary actions by employees that are outside
their formal job description.
 Satisfaction influences OCB through perceptions of fairness.
 OCBs are voluntary behaviors employees perform to help others and
benefit the organization.
 Helping a new coworker understand how things work in your company,
volunteering to organize the company picnic, and providing suggestions
to management about how to improve business processes are some
examples of citizenship behaviors.
 These behaviors contribute to the smooth operation of business

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education, Inc. publishing as 3-82

Prentice Hall
Cont’d…

c) Customer Satisfaction
• Satisfied frontline employees increase customer satisfaction and
loyalty.
d) Absenteeism
• Absenteeism refers to unscheduled absences from work.
• Satisfied employees are moderately less likely to miss work.
• Satisfied and committed people are absent less frequently and for
shorter duration, are likely to stay with a company longer, and
demonstrate less aggression at work.
Cont’d…
e) Turnover
 Turnover refers to an employee leaving an organization.
 Employee turnover has potentially harmful consequences, such as
poor customer service and poor
 Satisfied employees are less likely to quit.
 Many moderating variables in this relationship.
o Economic environment and tenure
o Organizational actions taken to retain high performers and to
weed out lower performers
Cont’d…
f) Workplace Deviance
 Dissatisfied workers are more likely to unionize, abuse substances,
steal, be tardy/delayed, and withdraw.
 Despite the overwhelming evidence of the impact of job
satisfaction on the bottom line, most managers are either
unconcerned about or overestimate worker satisfaction.
Summary and Managerial Implications

• Managers should watch employee attitudes:

 They give warnings of potential problems
 They influence behavior
• Managers should try to increase job satisfaction and generate
positive job attitudes
 Reduces costs by lowering turnover, absenteeism, tardiness,
theft, and increasing OCB
• Focus on the intrinsic parts of the job: make work challenging and
interesting
 Pay is not enough
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2.3 Basic motivation concepts

 Defining motivation
 Characteristics of motivation
 Types of motivation
 Theories of motivation
Reflection:
What is motivation?
Do you motivate your employees? why?
What mechanisms do you use to motivate employees?
What improvements did you observe as a result?

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Defining Motivation

 Motivation is the result of the interaction between the individual

and the situation.
 Motivation is the processes that account for an individual’s
intensity, direction, and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal
– specifically, an organizational goal.
• Three key elements:
 Intensity – how hard a person tries
 Direction – effort that is channeled toward, and
consistent with, organizational goals
 Persistence – how long a person can maintain effort
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Cont’d…
• Motivation is anything that energizes behavior, gives direction to
behavior, and underlies the tendency to persist.
• Work motivation: a person’s desire to work hard and work well-to
the arousal, direction, and persistence of effort in work settings.
• The job of leaders in the work place is to get things done through
people. To do this, leaders should be able to motivate employees.
Characteristics of motivation
• Motivation is unending process.
• Motivation is a psychological concept.
• Motivation is total and not partial.
• Motivation may be financial or non-financial.
• Motivation is determined by human needs
• Motivation cannot be applied to a frustrated person.
• Motivation may be positive or negative.
• Goals are motivators.

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Types of motivation

• Intrinsic motivation: behavior performed for its own sake.

o motivation comes from performing the work
o stemming directly from job performance itself
• Extrinsic motivation: behavior performed to acquire rewards.
o motivation source is the consequence of an action/given by others
o part of job situation

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Theories of motivation
The Content/Need Theories of Motivation
1. Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
2. Alderfer’s ERG Theory
3. Frederic Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory
4. Douglas McGregor- Theory X and Theory Y
5. Acquired – Needs Theory (David McClelland)
The Process Theory of Motivation
• Equity theory

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1. The Content/Need Theories of Motivation
•Define motivation in terms of need satisfaction.
•Focus on the assumption that individuals are motivated by the
desire to fulfill inner needs.
•Needs reflect either physiological or psychological deficiencies.
•According to content theories, motivation can be treated as a
need-satisfying process.
•Leaders should try to:
◦determine what needs a worker is trying to satisfy on the job
◦ ensure that a worker can satisfy his or her needs by engaging in
behaviors that contribute to organizational effectiveness.
•It suggest the manager’s job is to create a work environment that
responds positively to individual needs.
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Maslow’s Theory of Motivation
• In 1943, Maslow wrote five fundamental human needs and their
hierarchical nature.
• Maslow stated that individuals have five needs which he arranged
in a hierarchy from the most basic level to the highest:
physiological, safety, belongingness and love, esteem, and self-
actualization.
• The lower the needs in the hierarchy, the more fundamental they
are and the more a person will tend to abandon the higher needs in
order to pay attention to sufficiently meet the lower needs.

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Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Fulfillment off the Job Need Hierarchy Fulfillment on the Job

Education, religion,hobbies Self-Actualization Opportunities for training,

personal growth Needs advancement, growth, and creativity
Approval of family, friends, Recognition, high status,
Esteem Needs
community increased responsibilities
Family, friends, community Work groups, clients,coworkers,
Belongingness Needs
groups supervisors
Freedom from war, pollution,
Safety Needs Safe work,fringe benefits, job security
violence

Food, water, shelter Physiological Needs Heat, air, base salary

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How do these needs affect human behavior?

• Two principles:
• The deficit principle holds that a satisfied need is not a motivator
of behavior
• The progression principle holds that a need at one level does not
become activated until the next lower level need is already
satisfied

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98
Cont’d…

Reflection
• Do you think that hierarchy of needs theory conform to the actual
needs structure?
• Discuss the practical implications of Maslow’s need hierarchy of
motivation for contemporary leaders.

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2. ERG Theory
• Proposed by Clayton Alderfer
• Builds on Maslow’s work
• Collapses Maslow’s five needs categories into three: Existence needs,
Relatedness needs, and Growth needs.
• ERG identified only three orders of human needs
• People sometimes activate their higher level needs before they have
completely satisfied all their lower level needs.
• Frustration-Regression principle
o Satisfaction-progression principle is not always true.

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12 CHAPTER 6 The Nature of Work Motivation

Alderfer’s ERG Theory

• Existence Needs: Basic needs for human
survival such as the need for food, water,
clothing, shelter, and a secure and safe
environment.
• Relatedness Needs: The needs to have good
interpersonal relations, to share thoughts and
feelings, and to have open two-way
communication.
• Growth Needs: The needs for self-
development and creative and productive
work.
Copyright © 2002 Prentice-Hall 101
3. Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory
Two factors:
The satisfier factors (Motivators) - things relating to the nature of the job
itself (intrinsic to the work itself)
◦ their presence will motivate and satisfy people
◦ the absence of these factors will not necessarily de-motivate or cause
dissatisfaction
The hygiene (dis-satisfiers) factors - things relating more to the work
setting
◦ they are extrinsic to work itself
◦ these factors do not motivate, nor will their presence cause job
satisfaction
◦ their absence, however will cause dissatisfaction

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cont’d…
• The two factor theory remains a useful reminder that there are two
important aspects of all jobs:
• Job content (intrinsic)-what people do in terms of job tasks, and
• Job context (extrinsic)- the work setting in which they do it.
• Herzberg’s advice to leaders are:
• Always correct poor context to eliminate actual or potential sources
of job dissatisfaction, and
• Be sure to build satisfier factors into job content to maximize
opportunities for job satisfaction.

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4. Theory X and Y of McGregor
Theory X and theory Y each represent different ways in which
leaders view employees.
Theory X:
◦ Theory X believes that employees are lazy, and uncooperative
◦ The average human being has an inherent dislike for work,
wishes to avoid responsibility
◦ Most people must be controlled, directed, and threatened with
punishment

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Cont’d …
Theory Y:
◦ Theory Y believes that subordinates work hard, are cooperative, and
have positive attitudes.
◦ Control and the threat of punishment are not the only means for
bringing out effort toward organizational objectives.
◦ Commitment is a function of rewards associated with achievement
◦ The average human being learns, under proper conditions, not only to
accept but also to seek responsibility

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Process Theories of motivation

• Process theories of motivation try to explain how goal-oriented

behavior is started, directed, sustained, and stopped.
• Regardless of how the content of motivation is classified, supervisors
need to understand how to manage it, in themselves and others.
• There are three major process theories of motivation: the expectancy
theory of Victor Vroom, the equity theory of J. Stacy Adams, and
reinforcement theory, popularized by B. F. Skinner.
1. Equity Theory
◦ Focuses on individuals’ perceptions of how fairly they are treated compared
with others.
◦ Motivated to seek social equity in the rewards they expect
◦ A process theory about work motivation that focuses on workers’
perceptions of the fairness of their work outcomes and inputs.
◦ According to equity theory, what is important to motivation is the way a
worker perceives his or her outcome/input ratio compared to that of another
person/referent.
◦ Outcome/input ratio is the relationship between what a worker gets from a
job (outcome) and what the worker contributes to the job (input).

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