Page 160 - DMGT519_Conflict Management and Negotiation Skills

Conflict Management and Negotiation Skills

Notes
Did u know? The Adjustment Function
Attitudes often help people to adjust to their work environment. Well-treated employees
tend to develop a positive attitude towards their job, management and the organization in
general while berated and ill treated organizational members develop a negative attitude.
In other words, attitudes help employees adjust to their environment and form a basis for
future behaviour.

8.2 Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment

Job satisfaction is a very important aspect into the amount of work and time a person is willing
to put into a job. The five measurements to insure job satisfaction are: pay, the work itself,
promotion opportunities, supervision, and coworkers. Different aspects are more important to
different types of people. Managers in an organization can you different methods to test job
satisfaction. Two possible ways are the Job Descriptive Index (JDI) or the Minnesota Satisfaction
Questionnaire (MSQ). There is a common thought that satisfied employees are more productive
workers. Whether satisfied employees have better performance, or employees with good
performance will have satisfaction, there has been no proven links between the two. There are
plenty of high performers who are not satisfied with their jobs to prove these theories to be true.
Rewards that are contingent on performance can also enhance satisfaction in a job. When a
person goes above and beyond their call of duty to help a coworker out, it can be called an
Organizational Citizenship Behavior (or OCB; see Bommer, Miles, and Grover 2003). “Social
information processing is predicated on the notion that people form ideas based on information
drawn from their immediate environment, and the behavior of coworkers is a very salient
component of an employee’s environment. Therefore, observing frequent citizenship episodes
with in a workgroup is likely to lead to attitudes that such OCB is normal and appropriate.
Consequently, the individual is likely to replicate this ‘normal’ behavior.” This is according to
an article in the Journal of Organizational Behavior. This shows that people learn from their
environments. Culture also has a big part to play in job satisfaction. People from different parts
of the world may have a different view on the importance of work compared to family. In
America, people tend to have their jobs as a central part of their life, as to Koreans who put
family first.

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Caution Prior commitment when people feel a commitment towards a particular course of
action that have already been agreed upon and thus it becomes difficult for them to change
or accept the new ways of functioning.

Self Assessment

Fill in the blanks:
1. .................................. commitments are what will influence a person to remain at a job.
2. ..................................is a very important aspect into the amount of work and time a person
is willing to put into a job
3. ..................................values are different behaviors that are used to achieve a goal
4. .................................. behavior is conducting ones self in a way that is common with a
certain set of values whether personal or institutional.

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