MGMT 303 Organizational Behavior

Name

Institution Affiliation

Final Exam Questions

Question 3

Identify and discuss how prejudice and discrimination practices hurt an organization

Prejudice and discrimination in an organization adversely impacts the firm’s growth and success. The stress triggered by prejudice and discrimination as well as other forms of harassment in the workplace affects employees mentally and sometimes physically deteriorating their morale and motivation to work for the organization. Prejudice and discrimination facilitates a poor working culture where the workforce losses focus and demonstrates counterproductive conduct like reporting on work late or not completing their task on a timely basis. Consequently, the organization experiences lower productivity, and performance due to decreased employees’ motivation alongside high employee turnover.

Question 4

Identify and describe three theories of motivation

Expectancy Theory

Expectant theory postulates that a person tends to act or behave in a specific manner based on the anticipation that the action or behavior will be followed by an expected outcome as well as the attractiveness of the results to the individual.

Reinforcement Theory

Reinforcement theory states that individuals’ behavior is founded on the law of effect where individuals’ behaviors in an organization are based on the consequences.

Equity Theory

According to the equity theory, an individual’s motivation is directly linked to how the organization treats them compared to how it treats others to determine if they are treated in a corresponding manner.

Question 5

Identify and describe the three major benefits from re-defining work.

Redefining work can confer several benefits to an organization, including the following:

Creating Value. Redefining work can strengthen an organization’s competitive position by enhancing customer value and creating additional value for an organization’s internal customers, such as employees and sales revenues.

Skill Development. Redefining work enhances the capacity of employees to acquire skills faster, improve their performance levels and improves their motivation in utilizing these acquired skills.

Adapting to changes. Organizational changes such as mergers and acquisition provide an opportunity to redefine work to take advantage of the diversity of the group.

Question 7

Identify and discuss the important issues associated with trust and working work relationships.

Trusts and working relationships forms the foundation of all associations and interactions between the management and workforce when it comes to organizational performance. An organization with the capacity to establish a robust sense of trust and working relationship is capable of weathering through its challenges besides making its vision clearer. The relationship between and organization’s management and its employees is critical in the improved performance and success of any organization. Trust between an employer and employees fosters transparency, improved communication, enhanced organizational performance due to increased morale and motivation amongst the management and workforce. Moreover, trust and working relationships in an organization enable a firm to work more effectively as a team, rather than a single entity.

Question 8

Identify and describe five factors that make for a cohesive work group at an organization.

Listed below are some of the key factors affecting team cohesion in the workforce.

Passion and Attitude. Human beings usually associate more closely with other persons who share common interests or beliefs and employees are no different. Team cohesion depends on the ability to develop a common attitude towards the attainment of a common objective.

Previous group success. When team members successfully attain their objectives in one project, all members share in the victory, enhancing team cohesion.

Threats and Challenges. When team members are faced by a common threat, they put aside personal interests and unite in a bid to overcome a common obstacle, thus leading to a cohesive team.