Module 2 bba hbo

Module 2
- Prof. Pankhuri jain
Individual behaviour

What are attitudes?
 Primarily a way of being set towards or against
something.
 Mental state of readiness organized through
experiences influencing dynamically or directly the
individual’s response to all objects and situations with
which it is related.
 Tendency to respond positively or negatively towards
a person, situation , object or idea.
 Denotes the organization in an individual of his
feelings, beliefs and predispositions to behave as he
does.
 It is learned during the course of development and
occurrence of various experiences.
 Attitudes are evaluative statements or judgments
concerning objects, people, or events.

Components of attitudes(ABC
theory)
 Attitudes can also be defined on the basis of its
components :
1. Cognitive component(informational) - Consists of
person’s beliefs, perceptions and stereotypes
about the object.
2. Affective component (emotional) – involves
emotion experienced towards the object eg :
love or hatred.
3. Behavioral component – tendency to react
towards the object in a certain manner.

Sources of attitudes
1. Direct Personal Experience: A person’s direct
experience with the attitude object determines
his attitude towards it. The personal experience
of an individual, whether it is favourable or
unfavourable, will affect his attitude deeply.
These attitudes which are based on personal
experience are difficult to change.
2. Association: Sometimes an individual comes
across a new attitude object which may be
associated with an old attitude object. In such a
case, the attitude towards the old attitude object
may be transferred towards the new attitude
object.

3. Family and Peer Groups: Attitudes like values are
acquired from parents, teachers and peer group
members. In our early years, we begin modeling our
attitudes after those we admire, respect or may be
even fear. We observe the way our family and
friends behave and we shape our attitudes and
behaviour to align with theirs. We do so even
without being told to do so and even without having
direct experience. Similarly, attitudes are acquired
from peer groups in colleges and organisations.
4. Economic Status and Occupations:The economic
status and occupational position of the individual
also affect his attitude formation. Our socio-
economic background influences our present and

5. Mass Communications: Attitudes are
generally less stable as compared to values.
Advertising messages for example, attempt to
alter the attitude of the people toward a certain
product or service.
6. Needs: Because needs differ and also vary over
time, people can develop different attitudes
toward the same object at different points in
their life.
7. Selective perception: We have seen that
people operate on their personal interpretation
of reality. Therefore the way people interpret
information about products stores and so on,
affects their attitudes.

8. Personality : It is another factor influencing
how people process their direct experiences
with objects. How aggressive passive
introverted extroverted and so on that people
are will affect the attitudes they form.

Cognitive dissonance theory
 Cognitive dissonance refers to a situation
involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs or
behaviors. This produces a feeling of discomfort
leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes,
beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and
restore balance, etc.

According to cognitive dissonance theory, there is a tendency
for individuals to seek consistency among their cognitions
(i.e., beliefs, opinions). When there is an inconsistency
between attitudes or behaviors (dissonance), something
must change to eliminate the dissonance.
 Change our behavior.
 Justify our behavior by changing the conflicting
cognition.
 Justify our behavior by adding new cognitions.
To release the tension we can take
one of three actions:

Organization related attitudes
1. Job Satisfaction : When people speak of employee
attitudes, they usually mean job satisfaction, which
describes a positive feeling about a job, resulting
from an evaluation of its characteristics. A person
with a high level of job satisfaction holds positive
feelings about his or her job, while a person with a
low level holds negative feelings.
Dimensions of job satisfaction :
 It is an emotional response to a job situation . It cannot be
seen , it can only be inferred.
 Often determined by how well outcomes meet or exceed
expectations.
 It represents several related attitudes.

Job satisfaction
Dimensions used for measuring job satisfaction :
1. The work itself – extent to which job provides the
individual with interesting tasks , opportunities for
learning and responsibilities.
2. Pay – amount of financial remuneration and degree to
which this is viewed as equitable.
3. Promotion opportunities- chances for advancement in
organization.
4. Supervision – ability of supervisor to provide technical
assistance and behavioral support.
5. Coworkers – the degree to which fellow workers are
technically proficient and socially supportive.

Outcomes of job satisfaction
Performance
TurnoverAbsenteeism

2. Job Involvement : Related to job satisfaction is job
involvement, which measures the degree to which
people identify psychologically with their job and
consider their perceived performance level important to
self-worth. Employees with a high level of job
involvement strongly identify with and really care about
the kind of work they do. High levels of both job involvement
and psychological empowerment are positively related to
organizational citizenship and job performance. 14 High job
involvement is also related to reduced absences and lower
resignation rates.
3. Organizational Commitment :In organizational
commitment, an employee identifies with a particular
organization and its goals and wishes to remain a
member. Most research has focused on emotional
attachment to an organization and belief in its values as
the “gold standard” for employee commitment.

 Organizational commitment… : A review of 27
studies suggested the relationship between
commitment and performance is strongest for
new employees and considerably weaker for
more experienced employees. Interestingly,
research indicates that employees who feel
their employers fail to keep promises to them
feel less committed, and these reductions in
commitment, in turn, lead to lower levels of
creative performance.

4. Perceived Organizational Support (POS) : It is the
degree to which employees believe the organization
values their contribution and cares about their well-
being (for example, an employee believes his
organization would accommodate him if he had a
child care problem or would forgive an honest
mistake on his part). Research shows that people
perceive their organization as supportive when
rewards are deemed fair, when employees have a
voice in decisions, and when they see their
supervisors as supportive. 22 Employees with
strong POS perceptions have been found more
likely to have higher levels of organizational
citizenship behaviors, lower levels of tardiness, and

5. Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) :
It is a person's voluntary commitment within an
organization or company that is not part of his
or her contractual tasks. Organ's definition of
OCB includes three critical aspects that are
central to this construct:
 First, OCBs are thought of as discretionary
behaviors, which are not part of the job description,
and are performed by the employee as a result of
personal choice.
 Second, OCBs go above and beyond that which is
an enforceable requirement of the job description.
 Finally, OCBs contribute positively to overall
organizational effectiveness.

Personality
 "Personality" is a and organized set of characteristics
possessed by a person that uniquely influences their
environment, cognitions, emotions, motivations,
and behaviors in various situations. The word "personality"
originates from the Latin persona, which means mask.
 It is the dynamic organization within the individual of those
psychophysical systems that determine his unique
adjustment to his environment.
 It is the total sum of ways in which an individual reacts to
and interacts with person. In other words, personality is
composed of external appearance and traits, inner
awareness of self, person situation interaction. Therefore,
personality affects in the work setting, group productivity
and organizational culture. Managers need to measure
and estimate their behavior in organization and treat
accordingly.

Determinants of personality
1. Environment: Personality is bye-product of the
society. from the moment of the birth till death ,
the human organisms lives in a social situation ,
in an environment where he has to interact with
other people to fulfill the basic needs of life.his
personality develop out of social interaction
therefore environmental determinants have
tremendous impact upon the growth of
personality. Personality varies with cultures ,
social conditions and other situational
factors.The environment is classified into 3
types :

Environment
1. Natural environment - It refers to physical and
geographical environment in which the child is
born and grows . The physique of a person is
influenced by the geographical environment.
2. Cultural environment – I t has the maximum
influence . People acquire different ways of life ,
develop different traits and qualities when they are
reared in a typical culture. Thus , personality
varies with varying cultures and social conditions.
3. Social environment – It is said that “behavior is a
function of the person and his environment “.
Personality is formed by interaction between a
person’s biological factors and parents and other
social stimuli.

2. Heredity : Heredity refers to those factors that
were determined at conception . Physical stature,
facial attractiveness, sex, temperament, muscle
composition and reflexes, energy level, and
biological rhythms are characteristics that are
considered to be inherent from one’s parents. The
heredity approach argues that the ultimate
explanation of an individual's personality is the
molecular structure of the genes, located in the
chromosomes. Research on animals has showed
that both physical and psychological characteristics
can be transmitted through heredity. But research
on human beings is in adequate to support this view
point. However, psychologists and geneticists have
accepted the fact that heredity plays an important
role in one's personality.

3. Situation : An individual's personality, while
generally stable and consistent, does change in
different situations. The different demands of
different situations call forth different aspects of
one's personality. According to Milgram
"Situation exerts an important press on the
individual. It exercises constraints and may
provide push. In certain circumstances it is not
so much the kind of person a man is, as the
kind of situation in which he is placed that
determines his actions".

Characteristics of personality
1. Unique set - Personality refer the unique set of characteristics of
individual. It is different from one personal to other.
2. Relatively stable - Personality is relatively stable as it is found
almost same look, interaction or behave throughout the period.
3. Whole person - Personality is composed with physical as well as
mental qualities. It is the concept of complete i.e. whole individual
defining total concept.
4. Describing person - Personality is concerned with factors within
people that causes to behave to do. It explains the structure of
person. It expresses the ways of reacting and interacting with
others.
5. Situation specific - Personality is situation specific as it can be
varied with environmental settings. It is concerned with person-
situation interaction.
6. Partially inherited - Personality is partially inherited and is partially
shaped with environment. This can be developed with interacting,
with environment i.e. experience of individual.

Personality Traits Influencing
Organizational Behavior
1. Machiavellianism: This personality trait of
Machiavellianism also known as Mach is named
after Niccolo Machiavelli, who wrote in the 16th
century on how to gain and use power. It is the
personality dimension measuring the degree to
which an individual is pragmatic, maintains
emotional distance, and believes that end can justify
means. An individual high in Machiavellianism is
pragmatic, maintains emotional distance, etc. The
characteristics of high MACH employers are as
follows:
(i) A Mach man is pragmatic, maintains emotional
distance and believes that ends can justify means.
(ii) A high Mach man manipulates more, wins more, are
persuaded less and persuade others more than the
low machs.

The characteristics of high MACH
employers…
(iii) High Mach people flourish when they interact face to
face with others rather than indirectly.
(iv) These people are successful when the situation has
a minimum number of rules and regulations.
(v) High Mach man has high self confidence and high
self esteem. They are cool and calculating and have
no hesitation using others or taking advantage of
others in order to serve their own goals.
(vi) They are not easily swayed by a sense of friendship,
trust or loyalty. They are specially successful in
exploiting structured situations and vulnerable people.
We cannot conclude that whether high machs make
good employees or not. The answer will depend upon
the type of the job and whether moral and ethical
values are considered in evaluating the performance
of a person.

2. Introversion and Extroversion: These two terms
are generally associated with the interpersonal
behaviour of an individual and his sociability.
Extroverts are gregarious and sociable individuals
while introverts are shy, quiet and retiring. It has
been observed that introverts and extroverts people
have different career orientations and require
different organisational environment to maximize
performance. Extroverts are more suitable for
positions that require considerable interaction with
others that is why managerial positions are
dominated by extroverts. Thus, we can say that to
be an extrovert is a managerial trait to be a
successful manager. On the other hand, introvert
people are more inclined to excel at tastes that
require thought and analytical skill. An extreme
introvert works best alone in a quiet office without
external interruption or influence.

3. Locus of Control: Locus of control refers to an
individual’s belief that events are either within one’s
control (Internal Locus of Control) or are determined
by forces beyond one’s control. Some people
believe that they are the masters of their own fate.
Other people see themselves as pawns of fate,
believing that whatever happens to them in their
lives is due to their luck or fate. The first type is
labeled as internals and the latter has been called
externals.
 A person with a strong internal locus of control has
more control over his own behavior. He believes
that he controls events concerning his own life and
his internal traits determine what happens in a given
situation. He believes that he is the master of his
own density. Research has shown that internally
oriented people hold jobs of higher Status, advance
more rapidly in their careers.

Locus of control
 People who rate high in externality are less
satisfied with their jobs, have higher absenteeism
rates, are more alienated from the work setting
and are less involved on jobs than are internals.
They generally prefer directive management.
Unlike, the internals, the externals are more
interested in job security and not in advancement
of careers. They don’t intend to take initiatives
,rather wait for opportunities.

4. Self Esteem: It refers to the feeling of like or dislike
for oneself.” “Self Esteem is the degree of respect a
person has for himself.” This trait varies from person
to person as people differ in the degree to which
they like or dislike each other. Individuals with high
self esteem will take more risks in job selection.
They are more likely to choose unconventional jobs
than people with low self esteem. People with low
self esteem are more susceptible to external
influence than are those with high self esteems. Low
esteems are dependent on the receipt of positive
evaluations from others. As a result they are more
likely to seek approval from others and more prone
to conform to the beliefs and behaviors of those

5. Self Monitoring: It is a personality trait that
measures an individual’s ability to adjust his or her
behaviour to external situational factors”. Self
monitoring is a personality trait which has recently
received attention. Individuals with high self
monitoring can show considerable adaptability in
adjusting their behavior to external, situational
factors. High self monitors can behave differently in
different situations. Low self monitors cannot
deviate their behavior. They tend to display their
true dispositions and attitudes in every situation;
hence, there is high behavioral consistency between
who they are and what they do. High self monitors
will be more successful in managerial positions
where individuals are required to play multiple and
even contradictory roles

6. Risk Taking: Willingness to take chances. Some
people are very conscious in nature, while the
others are impulsive. An impulsive person is a high
risk taking manager; he will make rapid decisions
and use less information in making their choices
than a very conscious and low risk taking manager.
But the research shows that the decision accuracy
is generally the same in both the groups. Some jobs
specifically demand high risk taking persons e.g. the
job of a broker in a brokerage firm. Because in this
job for effective performance rapid decisions are
required. On the other hand, some jobs are such
where risk taking may prove a major obstacle e.g.
the job of an accountant who performs auditing
activities. This job should be filled by, someone, with
low risk taking trait.

7. Personality types :

Module 2 bba hbo

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