Workplace Conflicts and Rational Choice Theory Research Paper

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Workplace conflicts are an inevitable and integral part of working in a team. However, when pushed too far, conflicts become the blocks that contribute to the company’s regress. Because of the lack of cultural tolerance and gender equality in the workplace setting in question, the newcomer managed to abuse his powers, and the conflict between Michael and harineros has been blown to drastic proportions.

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Seeing how the newcomer’s behavior, which has turned the entire workplace upside down, tearing the very fabric of the corporate values of the employees, was the result of Michael’s personal choice, the situation described above can be considered through the lens of the rational choice theory. When viewed as an ethical dilemma, which was posed to Michael, the choice between leaving the working process the way it was and, therefore, having the production values at the same low level as they were, and concentrating the decision-making process in his hands, thus, both upgrading the process quality and his position. Although the principles, which the work of the migrant labor force used to be based on, did not affect the job of the supervisor in any way, Michael still deprived harineros of the function that made their jobs worthwhile for them.

It was obvious that with the new responsibility, which Michael acquired by ripping harineros, he could elevate himself in both his eyes and the eyes of the company managers. The given choice does not comply with any of the existing moral principles, there can be no argument about it; however, as the recent redefinitions of the rational choice theory explain, it should not, since the RTC “does not aim to explain what a rational person will do in a particular situation” (Hechter and Kanazawa 2); instead, it helps understand what factors a particular choice of a person was induced by, financial rewards and recognition being the key factors in the given case. The principle of social control should be mentioned regarding the given situation. Michael is attempting at changing the company rules to take control over the situation, since he has also been labeled as Mexican by the employees and, thus, loses his authority among them. Thus, Michael exercises his right as a manager to take social control over the harineros, which leads to Michael abusing his power.

When it comes to defining the source of conflict, however, one must mention that the issue in question, i.e., the ability of harineros to make choices concerning their work, stems from their convictions rather from their pursuit of monetary reward. Michael, on the contrary, considers the responsibility of managing the work process a means to gain more money. Therefore, the given case is a clear-cut example of cultural relativism, i.e., the perception of an aspect of a job through different cultural lenses.

Another theory that the situation described in the case study can be analyzed with is the conflict theory (Hirschi 53). A very obvious pick for the given case study, a conflict theory will help define the root causes of the conflict within the given environment, as well as the answers to the specified issues. To be more exact, it will be reasonable to apply the basic concept of the role conflict (DeWitte and Baillen 348) in the given case. The choice of the RCT as another means to consider the case study in question was predetermined by the fact that the shift in roles of the personnel seems to be the root cause of the conflict. Before Michael approved the decision-making function as the one belonging to the manager, but not a harinero, the latter considered their position as that of a considerable impact. As a result, the role of harineros was rather significant.

With the redefinition of responsibilities and leaving the decision-making process of the manager, the harineros’ role within the context of an organization was shrunken considerably, which triggered a role conflict. Therefore, to solve the situation in question, it will be required to make the role of the harineros more significant, either by providing them with the responsibilities that they used to have or with new yet nonetheless significant responsibilities. It can be assumed that by shaping the company’s organizational culture (Tambur and Vadi 755), one can re-arrange how the company’s managers build their relationships with employees, therefore, allowing the harineros to be more tolerant towards Michael, who is only getting used to being a manager, helping Michael mend his ways and provide harineros with the advantages that they used to have, shaping the attitude of the Americans in the organization towards the Mexican employees, and providing more room for female empowerment within the organizational setting.

Finally, the issue of female labor and gender discrimination, which occurs in the organization in question regularly, and which no one seems to be doing anything about, is worth pointing at. According to what the case study says, at present, male workers make most of the employees, yet the most difficult jobs, which presuppose physical labor and demand great strength, are occupied by women. Therefore, it can be assumed that part, the lack of justice, which can be observed in the given workplace setting can be the result of intolerance within the organization.

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By the feminist theory principles, it will be required to introduce the principles of equality, starting with gender equality concepts, into the given workplace setting, to improve the current situation and return the functions that the migrant workers consider defining for their status to the harinero employees. It could be argued that gender equality and racial issues are not linked that close; however, when looking into the issue, one will find out that both gender profiling and racial discrimination stem from the same lack of tolerance. Therefore, the fight against prejudices must be aimed at defeating both gender and race issues. Regarding the aforementioned issue, the problem of stereotyping (Elsaid and Elsaid 81) must be voiced; as it has been stressed above, the prejudice (Hatchell and Aveling 356) against Mexicans and women, which are blossoming in the company, have led to drastic results, the current conflict between Michael and harineros being the key negative effect, and women as the only staff members to be employed in hard labor being the most despicable one.

Even though the current situation regarding the harineros’ role in the company, as well as the role of female employees, seems deplorable, it can be assumed that, with the introduction of the key principles of equality into the workplace setting, the major issues, like the female workers and harineros discrimination, will be dealt with. With the introduction of new principles, which will help the company staff reconsider their racial and gender prejudice, it will be possible to provide the company staff with new moral principles based on equality to adhere to, as well as shape the organizational behavior of the workers. Once the key principles of proper organizational behavior are introduced into the current workplace setting, considerable improvements in the attitude of Michael towards harineros, harineros towards their job, and the male population of the company towards the employed female workers can be expected.

Works Cited

DeWitte, Hans and Elfi Baillen. “Why Is Organizational Change Related to Workplace Bullying? Role Conflict and Job Security as Mediators.”Economic and Industrial Democracy 20.2 (2009), 348–371. Print.

Elsaid, Abdel Moneim and Eahab Elsaid. “Sex Stereotyping Managerial Positions: A Cross-Cultural Comparison between Egypt and USA.” Gender in Management 27.2 (2012), 81.

Hatchell, Helen and Nado Aveling. “Those Same Old Prejudice? Gender Experiences in the Science Workplace.” Journal of Workplace Rights 13.4 (2008), 355–375. Print.

Hechter, Michael and Satoshi Kanazawa. “Sociological Rational Choice Theory.” Annual review of Psychology 23 (1997), 191–214. Print.

Hirschi, Thomas. “Key Idea: Hirschi’s Social Bond/Social Control Theory.” Causes of Delinquency. Ed. Thomas Hirschi. Berkeley: University of California Press. Print.

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Tambur, Merle and Maaja Vadi. “Workplace Bullying and Organizational Culture in a Post-Transitional Country.” International Journal of Manpower 33.7 (2012), 754–768. Print.

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IvyPanda. 2021. "Workplace Conflicts and Rational Choice Theory." January 21, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/workplace-conflicts-and-rational-choice-theory/.

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