COMMERCE 1BA3: Organizational Behaviour Flashcards

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering Modules 1 to 4 of COMMERCE 1BA3, including Introduction to OB, Management Schools, Personality and Intelligence, Values and Attitudes, and Perception and Attribution.

Organizational Behaviour (OB)

The attitudes and behaviours of individuals and groups in organizations (studied at Micro, Meso, and Macro levels).

The 3 P’s

Profit, People, Planet.

Levels of Study (MMM)

Micro (individual), Meso (group/team), and Macro (organization).

Internal Consulting

Acting as a manager within an organization confronting any internal 1BA3 topic.

External Consulting

Being hired by an organization from the outside to provide expert advice on 1BA3 topics.

Organization

Social inventions for accomplishing common goals through group effort.

Teel’s Thermostat Analogy

6-step problem solving: 1. Understand where you are, 2. Where do you want to be, 3. Close the gap, 4. Execute change, 5. Measure change, 6. Start again.

Fundamental Equation ($S + T = R$)

Situation + Thinking = Response, mapped to Micro, Meso, and Macro levels.

Stress Formula ($Dp > Rp = SD$)

Perceived Demand greater than Perceived Resources results in Stress (Distress).

3 Symptoms of Distress

Physiological (headaches, organs), Psychological (sadness, worry, anxiety), and Behavioral (racing thoughts, sleep changes, nicotine).

Classical / Traditional Management (School 1)

Centralized decision-making, silo management, strict rules, and high specialization (Max Weber's Bureaucracy & Frederick Taylor's Scientific Management).

Human Relations Management (School 2)

Focus on psychological and social processes; features the Hawthorne Studies (Hawthorne Effect), Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and McGregor’s Theory Y.

Human Resources Management (School 3)

Participative management, workplace democracy, autonomy, collective responsibility, gain-sharing, and Total Quality Management (TQM).

Continuous Perspective Management (School 4)

Contingency/Systems approach where management style depends entirely on the situation using Situational Sensing (Assess, Think, Behave).

Ability

What a person is capable of doing (core competencies and skills).

Personality

The relatively stable set of psychological characteristics that influence how an individual interacts with their environment.

Interactionist Perspective

Behaviour is a function of both personality (disposition) and the external environment (situation).

Cognitive Intelligence (IQ)

Capacity to learn and process cognitive information like reading comprehension, mathematical, and spatial patterns.

Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

Ability to accurately identify, understand, and manage emotions in oneself and others; comprises Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, and Relationship Management.

Cultural Intelligence (CQ)

A person’s capability to function effectively in culturally diverse situations (Strategy, Knowledge, Motivation, Behavior).

Big Five Personality Traits (OCEAN)

Openness to experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Emotional Stability (Neuroticism).

Locus of Control

Belief about whether one's behaviour is controlled by internal forces (self-driven) or external forces (fate, luck, others).

Self-Monitoring

Degree to which people observe and regulate how they appear and behave in social settings.

Self-Esteem

General feeling of self-worth and self-evaluation.

Positive and Negative Affectivity

Emotional disposition predicting optimistic (half-full) versus pessimistic (half-empty) outlooks.

Proactive Personality

Disposition to take initiative, make improvements, and turn problems into opportunities rather than waiting.

Self-Efficacy

An individual’s belief in their capacity to execute behaviors necessary to produce specific performance outcomes.

Core Values

Broad, enduring, deeply held, and non-negotiable beliefs about what is important in life.

Work Centrality

Whether people live to work or work to live.

Power Distance (Hofstede)

The extent to which unequal distribution of power is accepted (Large vs. Small).

Uncertainty Avoidance (Hofstede)

The extent to which people are uncomfortable with uncertainty and ambiguous situations.

Attitude

A fairly stable evaluative tendency to respond consistently to a specific object, situation, person, or category.

Job Satisfaction

A collection of attitudes that workers hold about their jobs (includes facet satisfaction and overall satisfaction).

Organizational Citizenship Behaviours (OCBs)

Voluntary employee actions that go above and beyond core job duties to help the organization and coworkers.

Counterproductive Work Behaviours (CWBs)

Voluntary employee behaviors that harm or intend to harm the organization and its stakeholders.

Affective Commitment

Organizational commitment based on emotional attachment, identification, and involvement.

Continuance Commitment

Organizational commitment based on the perceived costs or penalties of leaving the company.

Normative Commitment

Organizational commitment based on ideology, duty, or a feeling of obligation to stay.

Perception

The process of interpreting sensory messages to provide order and meaning to the environment.

Fundamental Attribution Error

Tendency to overemphasize internal (dispositional) explanations for someone's behaviour at the expense of situational factors.

Actor-Observer Effect

Propensity for actors and observers to view the causes of the actor’s behaviour differently.

Self-Serving Bias

Tendency to take personal credit for successful outcomes and deny responsibility for failures.

Stereotyping

Attributing general characteristics of a group to an individual member of that group.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Occurs when expectations about another person cause that person to act in a way consistent with those expectations.

Halo / Horn Effect

Allowing a single positive (halo) or negative (horn) trait to influence overall general impressions of a person.

Projection

The tendency for perceivers to attribute their own thoughts and feelings to others.

Social Identity Theory

People form perceptions of themselves and others based on personal characteristics and social category memberships.

Bruner’s Model of Perceptual Process / Attribution Cues

Evaluating performance over time using Consistency Cues (regularly occurs?), Consensus Cues (everyone does it?), and Distinctiveness Cues (specific to one situation?).