Introduction
In chapter one of the book, “Organizational Behavior” by, MeShane, Olekalns, and Travaglione, the writers give an overview on areas that the book will discuss, according to the author, organization behavior examines how individuals and teams relate with their organization and how the relationship shapes the direction taken by an organization.
According to the chapter, organizational behavior is a recent strategic management tool, established in the 1940s, with the main aim of creating value and improving a company’s competitiveness using human capital working in the organization. The chapters analyses the benefits of understanding the management strategy and discusses how it has been implemented successful in some companies.
Although the chapter appreciates that different companies have different approaches to businesses, the chapter offers a framework of operation that can be applied across the board to improve business processes through strategies recommended by OB such as organizational learning, organizational culture, and change management among others.
Ancol Pty Ltd
Ancol Pty ltd had an issue managing the human capital time management and the time they served their employer; the removal of time clock has the following consequences:
Deterioration of the spirit of team work
After the removal of time clocks and the involvement of supervisors to keep track of workforce time spent with the organization, the employees felt micro managed and the spirit and motivation to work as a team for the general good of the company deteriorated. Communication in the department changed that meant that accomplishment of departmental tasks was more difficult.
Deterioration of employees relations
When the human resources started having letter of reprimand in employees files, the employees objected the move, it built into conflict that could not have been solved by internal conflict resolution strategies and the employees opted for union resolution. When an organization has reached that stage, then the communication and business environment is certainly not favorable for high productivity, creativity and innovation by the human resources.
Changes that would minimize the likelihood of these problems occurring in the future
The problem facing the company seems to have originated from organizational culture issues and lack of well structure teams; to ensure that employees are accountable for their duties, the management should embark on creation of a positive organizational culture.
One area that should be addresses is communication between the managers and employees, it should be facilitated and made effective, and this is likely to reduce the tension in the organization and employees with work as partners to the company and not servants of the company.
Supervisors, should deviate from the traditional supervisory roles and adopt team leaders roles, they should not seem to be dictating or forcing things to the employees, they should be the people on the ground that should be connecting the employees and the management, and they should report any issues of human management to ensure they are handled effectively.
Another area that the company should look into is the effects of informal groups in the company; the change that Paul Sims had implemented had been well received not until some employees started to take advantage of the system.
When addressing informal groups, the focus should be on opinion leaders who seem to have been misguiding the team, when these people are micro-managed where they are shown the need to be ethical and have high values, virtues, and morals, they are likely to advocate for the same to the team and the problem will have been solved.