PSYC 516
PRODUCTIVE & COUNTERPRODUCTIVE BEHAVIORS IN THE WORKPLACE
Hello, My name is Tasha Kuester and today I will be
answering questions regarding industrial/ organizational
psychology and how it relates to productive and
counterproductive behaviors in the workplace
Chapter 1
How have recent historical events affected the course of research in organizational
psychology? Give an example of an event and the resulting outcome.
Organizational psychology is the study of the behavior of individuals who work in
organizational settings. The findings are then used to help make these
organizations more effective. Unprecidented events like the terrorist attacks on
september 11th, impact organizations in a few different ways. This event
specifically, lead to the development in the area of emergency preparedness. The
attacks, and the devastation afterwards, made organizations realize the importance
of having an emergency plan in place. The death toll of this event would certainly
have been much higher if the organizations within the world trade center did not
have an emergency plan already.
The attacks signaled the start of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and led to a sustained
period of global economic recession. This highlighted the impact of unemployment
on not only individual employees but also on the organizations that need workers.
In 2008, Barak Obama was elected to the highest position in our government. This
historic event emphasized the idea that anyone, regardless of race, could achieve
positions of power within organizations. This event also lead to increased
awareness of equity and fairness within organizations. The conversation turned to
how can we hold organizations accountable for how they treat their employees as
well as employee well being. These mandates do however come at the cost of
organization’s time and resources.
Additionally, the rapid development of communications technology has impacted
the way organization operate. The ability to take work home or have work emails
sent directly to your cell phone allows more flexibility for employees as well as
boosting productivity. Unfortunately, this blurring of work/life lines has affected
individual’s ability to detatch and recover from work.
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Chapter 3
Describe the socialization process for graduate students in your program. Is the program
successful in socializing newcomers and creating job embeddedness?
Socialization begins at the recruitment phase and Liberty University does a great
job of getting out to college fairs, selling merchandise, providing information for
application, and advertising on social media. Liberty integrates Christian faith into
every field of study and they communicate that well.
Once a student is accepted, they can then encounter the school and see what the
organization is all about and what the demands of them will be. Liberty encourages
this by hosting campus events and providing course outlines so that students can
prepare ahead of time for the demands of their courses. Liberty University also has
information listed regarding the benefits of certain degrees, the courses required
for degree completion and they keep academic advisors ready to answer any and
all questions with a positive demenour.
During the Change and acquisition stage, students become comfortable in their
new role and adjust to the culture. They are able to access their course guide and
syllabus and understand their responsibilities as a Liberty student. Additionally,
Supplemental instruction is provided for more difficult courses which can be
incredibly helpful for answering questions and providing a different view of the
material.
The desired Behavioral outcomes for students in the socialization process involve
the ability to do their assignments and participate in the course, completing exams,
properly submitting hw and responding to the discussion board posts of their
fellow classmates. This must all be done timely manner but also in a way that fits
their individual lifestyle as many online students work full time or have family
obligations that prevent them from attending a traditional brick and mortor
institution.
The Effective outcome stage involves the student’s attitudes toward coursework,
their levels of motivation to complete work, and their level of involvement with
university events or social clubs. Liberty provides weekly announcements from
professors so that students can be encouraged to complete their coursework and be
motivated knowing that they are not alone on their educational journey.
Embeddedness reflects the level to which a student feels like they fit in with the
organization and others within it as well as the feeling that they would be missing
out if they left. From personal experience, I can say Liberty University is very
successful at socializing and embedding students and probably professors as well.
Chapter 4
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How can an organization reduce or prevent work-family conflict?
The work-family conflict is basically when the demands of one domain conflict
with the demands of another domain. Another way of saying this is that an
individual’s family life may interfere with their work schedule. In my case, my
youngest son goes to school at 800 but most employers expect their employees to
be at work by 7. This would be impossible for me to accomplish at this stage in my
life so this simple issue creates conflict between domains. Organizations can
reduce this friction by Understanding that people have commmitments to their
family and their life outside of work. Organizational support that is shown to
reduce this conflict can involve telecommuting, providing on site Childcare,
supervisor behavior, and organizational culture. Organizations can provide an
employee gym to reduce stress during workday. This not only enoucrages physical
and emotional well-being for all employees, it also allows them to leave right
afterwork to see their family without having to schedule something else to do.
At the management level, it is important for supervisors to acknowledge that
family concerns are normal and human. Supervisors can accommodate help and
support efforts to bring balance to their employee’s personal and professional
domains. Supportive supervisor behavior can be used to coach and encourage
employees to utilize organizational benefits to reduce stress. By Clearly stating that
utilizing these programs will not reflect poorly on their status within the
organization, employees will be more likely to participate. Supervisors can also
model the wanted behaviors that help achieve the balance. It is important for
employees to view their supervisor as a human with a family as well and that
relating to the conflict can create a sense of unity or embeddedness. Organizations
can also promote Personal coping skills by teaching and encouraging time
management among employees.
Chapter 5
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Imagine you have been asked to develop a performance assessment program for
employee development. What techniques could you use to adequately evaluate employee
performance as comprehensively as possible (think of Murphy’s list)?
Job performance referes to all the behaviors that employees engage in while at
work that contribute to organizational goals. Murphy’s model provides 4
dimensions of job performance to include task-oriented behaviors or the
performance of major tasks that are associated with the job, interpersonally
oriented behaviors that occur at work, downtime behaviors outside of work that
may affect job performance like using drugs or alcohol, and destructive or
hazardous behaviors to include safety violations, sabotage, or accidents. The
tools used to evaluate performance include paper/pencil test, job skill test, on-
site hands on test, off site hands on test, high fidelity simulation, task rating,
and global rating. There are some inherent flaws with these forms of
measurement. If a rater does not have the appropriate amount of time to conduct
an observation, the results can be biased. Additionally, if the rater does not like
the ratee, the scores can be lower than the standard. Speaking of standards, it is
also difficult to maintain internal performance standards across all raters. These
issues combined can limit the impactful information obtained from performance
ratings. To evaluate employee performance, the job and its components should
be considered. Bhevaiorally anchored rating scales can be used to evaluate
poor, average, or superiror job performance. By highlighting specific behaviors,
we can remove some of the subjectivity often seen in performance evaluations.
Individual Performance should not be the only factor being measured. It is
important to also include the performance of the team and organization to
understand the true level of individual erformance. It is beneficial to hire or
train professional raters to avoid personal biases. Task and global ratings can be
used along side paper/pencil test and job skill test to assess knowledge of job
elements.
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Chapter 6
What are some possible common organizational constraints? How could they lead to
counterproductive behaviors?
Counterproductive behaviors are volitional or intentional acts that are intended to
hard organizations or the people within them. These include theft, withdrawl,
verbal abuse of others, poor attendance, etc. Causes for this type of behavior can be
either person based or situation based but more often than not involve the
interaction of the two. Person based causes of counterproductive work behaviors
include the four personality traits of conscientiousness, trait-anger, self-control,
and narcissism. An individual who is low in conscienctiousness, meaning they
don’t care how their actions affect others and they don’t bother thinking about the
consequences of their actions can be more likely to participate in
counterproductive work behabiors. Individuals high in trait anger are more likely
to display rage behaviors and individuals with low self control display difficulties
in regulating their impulses. Individuals high in the trait of narcissism believe that
they are superior and they should be afforded special treatment so when they don’t
feel supported in this way, counterproductive behaviors can occur. Situation based
constraints involve the opportunity. If an employee is unsupervised and has much
discretion over their time at work, they may be more likely to engage in
counterproductive work behaviors. Norms play an important role in the way that
these behaviors are treated by the organization. If theft is a common occurrence
and is not punished, it is more likely to occur than at an organization where
termination and legal action is taken against employees who commit theft. Another
situational factor is environmental stress. Stress evokes emotions like anxiety,
anger and disatisfcation which have been shown to lead to counterproductive work
behaviors when the level of perceived control over stress is low. Depending on the
personality traits of the individual, they may be more prone to hyper-react to these
environmental stressors of they may be more willing to find constructive coping
methods. The final constraint is injustice or the sense of being treated unfairly by
an organization. An employee with a sense of injustice may try to get back at the
organization by engaging in counterproductive work behaviors.
Please make sure to include the following elements in your presentations:
1. Make sure that your answer to each question is at least 2 min. long
2. Make sure you answer each question both accurately and thoroughly
3. Make sure that your video is professional and easy to hear
4. Make sure that you present the information and don’t just read pre-scripted answers
Be sure to check the Productive & Counterproductive Behaviors in the Workplace Grading
Rubric before beginning this Productive & Counterproductive Behaviors in the Workplace
Assignment.
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Please see the Productive & Counterproductive Behaviors in the Workplace Resources
under the Productive & Counterproductive Behaviors in the Workplace Assignment page
on how to submit a video presentation.
Note: Your assignment will be checked for originality via the Turnitin plagiarism tool.
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