Organizational Behavior – Mid Term

ASSIGNMENT FRONT COVER mental faculty name Class 790 Organizational behaviour Assignment title mid terminal figure exam Exam Assignment deadline November 12th 2012 Effective number of words apply 1471 Table of Contents Question 1 Understanding Human Behavior is comminuted to transcriptions discuss the benefits of self military rank/self assessment as it relates to leading straight finish . 3 Question 2 Prejudice keister be hurtful and destructive discuss how you stool personally contract prejudice in your workplace please deliver an example . . 5 References and Bibliography 6 Question 1 Understanding Human Behavior is critical to organizations discuss the benefits of self evaluation/self assessment as it relates to leadership todayIn todays ever changing purlieu, organizations need to continuously change and transform, not only in order to succeed but yet just to survive. While it takes a capable manager to efficiently numeration a business in s teady-state, it takes a leader to successfully convey an organization through change (Kotter in Robbins and Judge, 2009 385). Dealing with technology, economic and mandate changes isnt new for organizations. The speed of change has however substantially increase in the last few decades as has the disruptive nature of these changes.Leaders today are faced with challenges such as globalization and instant dialogue that were not present until recently. The words and actions of leaders are broadcasted across the humans within seconds and are heard and seen by individuals who will perceive and infer them through the filter of their own values, assumptions, beliefs and expectations. In this accelerated purlieu, effective leaders need to be able to swiftly rent tr block offs and anticipate change, suit to new situations, fine-tune their actions and continuously inspire others towards the pursuit of a obligate vision.In order to do so, they need to be perceptive of the environment roughly them and detect when discrepancies between their assumptions and verity arise (Clawson, 2001 14). An example of business calamity due to the mismatch between leaders assumptions and environmental reality is Polaroid. When in 1977 Polaroid launched its instant-video intersection Polavision (an innovative instant movie camera that apply an additive process to generate color), it experienced the first of several product failures that eventually forced the company into bankruptcy.The mistake that Polaroids Leader Edwin H. soil made was to assume that the market-follows-technology approach that had been successful for the previous 40 historic period was unchangeably valid (Lefler, 2010), despite the skepticism denotative by some within the company. Simpler and cheaper videocassette establish alternatives were released at the same time by Kodak and other competitors. These non-instant products responded to markets trends smash than Polaroids ground breaking instant-vide o solution, condemning Polavision to irrelevance and Polaroid to huge losses (Giambarba, 1977).I think Polavision is the story of a self sense lack leader, failing to position his blind spots and driving the organization to failure. In my touch Mr. Land failed to question his assumption in a changing marketplace and to openly listen to others, consequently ignoring precious feedback. Had Mr. Land listened to the concerns expressed by others around him, including Polaroids president Bill McCune, things could fetch perhaps gone distinguishablely. Self evaluation is what allows individuals to identify those blind spots and weaknesses and to say measures in place to compensate them (Musselwhite, C. 2007). Through self evaluation, self cognizance is achieved. The benefits of self evaluation and self ken for a leader in todays organizations are significant. By understanding your strengths, efforts can be focused on them, hence create a greater capableness for success (Roberts at all, 2005 1). By recognizing your weaknesses you are in a better position to accept them and deal with them in effect. In the case of Polavision, Mr Lands product and technology strengths were overshadowed by his marketing weakness. For his leadership to be effective, Mr.Land should throw commissioned a market research to validate his assumption that the frequent was ready and willing to consume the product he was developing. Self sensibleness is the basis of self management and social awareness (Goleman, 2000 80). The ability to read and manage your emotions, reactions and relishings, helps seeing yourself and the world under a different light. This in turns enables you to shift your point of view and identify opportunities and solutions that were otherwise impossible to say (Covey, 1989 86). In the case of Polaroid a more socially aware Mr.Land would have valued the input of the Polavision skeptics and maybe redirected his creativity towards developing a product more in l ine with current market trends. Moreover, acknowledging your limits and not concealing them induces pull. You are perceived as human and people relate to you better. When trusted, you depart a more effective leader as people feel safe when they follow your direction. Your behavior remains consistent in different situations and the influence of the environment on your actions is weakened. You develop charisma. You become authentic (George, B. et all, 2007 7).Self evaluation implies asking for feedback and actively listening to what you hear. As you learn from asking questions, people around you also feel more comfortable doing so. This ignites a unadulterated learning circle that drives personal growth. The biggest asset of organizations is their human capital. An engaged, motivated and impeccable human capital is the engine behind organizations success. In particular, by developing an environment where it is OK to ask questions, to challenge status-quo, to try new things and t o consume mistakes, novelty forces are unleashed (Musselwhite, C. , 2007).Conclusion Self Evaluation develops self awareness. Self awareness promotes personal growth and enables behaviors that are associated with charismatic leadership. Charisma is what inspires others to follow the leader. They trust her, share her vision and feel empowered and motivated to work towards a common goal. Charisma is a crucial element of effective leadership, but it is often not sufficient to drive organizations, particularly large ones, to sustainable success (Nadler and Tushman, 1990 85). Self awareness developed through self evaluation, allows a leader to also understand and address this.By recognizing her limits, a self aware leader will develop an organizational structure that complements her strengths and, through alignment, effectively works towards the set vision. The or so prominent benefits of self assessment for leaders today in my opinion are therefore the enablement of charismatic and i nstitutional leadership, both of which are necessary to effectively guide an organization. Question 2 Prejudice can be hurtful and destructive discuss how you can personally reduce prejudice in your workplace please provide an examplePrejudice (prior judgment1) implies forming an opinion about the personality traits, expected behavior, skills and capability of a person, without that opinion being backed by empirical evidence. These pre-formed opinions are often real strong, deriving from values and beliefs that are deeply embedded in our psyche. As such they are hard to remove. We may even unconsciously abjure evidence negating the pre-judgment in a self affirming effort to confirm our assumptions. The end result is a diminished ability to appreciate the full throw off of qualities and the potential of the impacted individual.Prejudice and the corresponding discriminatory behavior, including institutional prejudice, are study issues for organizations today. Increasing cultural diversity in the workforce and the global tip over of markets require organizations to actively strive for integration rather than assimilation or differentiation (Thomas & Ely, 1996 1). In my opinion, the onus of promoting an effort in that direction lies broadly on managers. As a manager I have a moral and professional duty to address prejudice in my organization and I have taken specific steps in that sense.I started with doing self-contemplation to identify my own prejudices. I focused on my upbringing who were the most influential figures in my childhood? What messaging did I receive from them and from the environment around me? What stereotypes derived from this? Being of white, catholic and Italian origin, I could immediately identify how anything outside of that archetype, was subject to some degree of prejudice, even if involuntarily. The good word is that Prejudice is externally sourced and since it s learned, it can be unlearned (Clawson, J.G. & Smith, B. , 1990 5-6) . I then realized that most likely everyone in my work environment have similar preconceptions. For example, some people talk to me with the typical Italian-American maffia accent from The Sopranos2 probably thinking it is hilarious. It doesnt bother me, but I can definitely see how it could be bothersome to other Italians. I made treasure of these realizations and determined that these are ignorance-based preconceptions that can be inflexible by increasing inter-cultural knowledge.I therefore resolved to take steps to come along people from different backgrounds and cultures to interact with each other. For example, recently I include two international team members (Bryan the reporting manager who is Chinese and Manish the systems analyst who is Indian) in a 4 person project team based in the US Midwest, dealing with the integration of systems and processes from our Companys modish acquisition. I personally facilitated the first few meetings and encouraged open enfolding by li stening to and publicly valuing everyones contribution.I then assigned tasks in a way that required interaction and cooperation. The effort paid off and the team succeeded. The system and process integration was completed in rule book time, with wide consensus and to the smallest details. References and Bibliography Books Robbins, S. P. & Judge, T. A. (2009). Organizational Behavior. 13th Edition. naked as a jaybird Jersey Pearson Prentice Hall. Covey, S. R. (1989). The 7 habits of highly effective people. USA Free Press. Internet Resources Lefler, P. (2010). Polavision Polaroids disruptive innovation failure. WebpageAvailable from http//www. spruancegroup. com/blog/bid/32860/Polavision-Polaroid-s-disruptive-innovation-failure Accessed on Wednesday, November seventh 2012. Giambarba, P. (1977). Webpage Available from http//en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Polavision Accessed on Wednesday, November 7th 2012. Musselwhite, C. (2007). Self Awareness and the Effective Leader. Webpage Available from http//www. inc. com/resources/leadership/articles/20071001/musselwhite. html Accessed on Wednesday, November 7th 2012. The Online Etymology Dictionary, word search prejudice. WebpageAvailable from http//www. etymonline. com/index. php? term=prejudice Accessed on Thursday, November eighth 2012. Wikipedia, word search the sopranos. Webpage Available from http//en. wikipedia. org/wiki/The_Sopranos Accessed on Friday, November 9th 2012. Journal Articles and Written score Material Roberts, L. M. , Spreitzer, G. , Dutton, J. , Quinn, R. , Heaphy, E. , and Barker, B. (2005), How to Play to Your Strenghts, Harvard Business Review, January 2005. Goleman, D, (2000), leadership that gets results, Harvard Business Review, March-April 2000. Clawson, J. G. 2001) UVA-OB-0652 Leadership and Intelligence, Charlottesville University of Virginia Darden schoolhouse Foundation. George, B. , Sims, P. , McLean, A. N. , and Mayer, D. (2007), Discovering Your Authentic Leadership, Harvard Business R eview, February 2007. Nadler, D. A. , Tushman, M. L. , (1990) CMR-024 Beyond the Charismatic Leader Leadership and Organizational Change, California Management Review, Harvard Business School Publishing. Clawson, J. G. & Smith, B. (1990) UVA-OB-0381 Prejudice in Organizations, Charlottesville University of Virginia Darden School Foundation. Thomas, D. A. Ely, R. J. (1996), Making Differences Matter, Harvard Business Review, September-October 1996. 1 See the Online Etymology Dictionary (http//www. etymonline. com/index. php? term=prejudice) 2 From Wikipedia (http//en. wikipedia. org/wiki/The_Sopranos) The Sopranos is an American television drama created by David Chase that revolves around the New Jersey-based Italian-American mobster Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) and the difficulties he faces as he tries to balance the impertinent requirements of his home life and the criminal organization he heads.