3-Individual Attitude & Behaviour

Lecture
3
Individual Attitude
and Behaviour
Hamdard University
Individual Attitude and Behaviour
Learning Objectives
2
After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the

following:
1) Identify the major work attitudes that affect work

behaviors.
2) List the key set of behaviors that matter for organizational

performance.
3) Understand cross-cultural differences in job attitudes and

behaviors at work.
Organizational Behaviour
3
People Come First: The Case of SAS

4
 More than 90% of the top 100 companies on the Fortune-500 list
are using software developed by SAS(Statistical Analysis System)
Institute Inc., the world’s largest privately held software
company, for their business intelligence and analytical needs.
 SAS has over 10,000 employees worldwide, operate in over 100

countries, and reported $2.31 billion in revenue in 2009 (their 33rd
consecutive year of growth and profitability ).
 The company is quick to attribute their success to the

performance and loyalty of their workforce. This is directly
correlated with how they treat their employees.

5
 SAS (Statistical Analysis System)has perfected the art of

employee management. It has been ranked on Fortune
magazine’s best places to work list every year since the list was
first published.
 Employees seem to genuinely enjoy working at SAS and are

unusually attached to the company, resulting in a turnover rate
that is less than 4% in an industry where 20% is the norm.
 When Google designed their own legendary campus in

California, they visited the SAS campus to get ideas.

6
 SAS does well is giving its employees opportunities to

work on interesting and challenging projects.
 SAS makes an effort to concentrate its business in the
areas of analytics, which add the most value and help
organizations best analyze disparate data for decision
making, creating opportunities for SAS workers to be
challenged.
 SAS removes obstacles for employees. Equipment,
policies, rules, and meetings that could impede
productivity are eliminated.

7
 SAS wants to eliminate stressors and anything that

dissatisfies from people’s lives.
 To keep employees healthy and fit, there are

 Athletic fields; a full gym
 A swimming pool; and tennis, basketball
 Racquet ball courts on campus
 SAS offers free on-site health care for employees

 Covers dependents at their fully staffed primary medical care
center
 Offers unlimited sick leave

8
 The company understands that employees have a

life and encourages employees to work reasonable
hours and then go home to their families.
 Famous motto in the company is, “If you are working

for more than 8 hours, you are just adding bugs.”
 SAS is truly one of the industry leaders in leveraging

its treatment of people for continued business
success.
Work Attitudes
9
Work Attitudes
10
 Our behavior at work often depends on how we feel about being there.
How people behave depends on understanding their work attitudes.
 An attitude refers to our opinions, beliefs, and feelings about aspects of

our environment.
 We have attitudes toward

 the food we eat
 People we interact with
 Courses we take
 and various other things
 At work, two particular job attitudes have the greatest potential to

influence how we behave. These are job satisfaction and organizational
commitment.
Work Attitudes
11
 Job satisfaction refers to the feelings people have toward their job.
Job satisfaction is probably the most important job attitude.
 Organizational commitment is the emotional attachment people

have toward the company they work for.
 There is a high degree of overlap between job satisfaction and

organizational commitment, because things that make us happy with
our job often make us more committed to the company as well.
 Companies believe that these attitudes are worth tracking because

they are often associated with important outcomes such as
performance, helping others, absenteeism, and turnover.
Work Attitudes
How strong is the attitude-behavior link?

12
 First of all, it depends on the attitude in question.
 Your attitudes toward your colleagues may influence

whether you actually help them on a project, but they
may not be a good predictor of whether you will quit
your job.
 Second, it is worth noting that attitudes are more

strongly related to intentions to behave in a certain way,
rather than actual behaviors.
Work Attitudes
13
When you are dissatisfied with your job, you

may have the intention to leave.
 Whether you will actually leave is a different story!

Your leaving will depend on many factors
 such as availability of alternative jobs in the market
 your employability in a different company
 and sacrifices you have to make while changing jobs
 Attitudes give us hints about how a person might behave,

 it is important to remember that behavior is also strongly
influenced by situational constraints.
OB Toolbox: How can you be Happier at Work?
14
 Have a positive attitude about it. Your personality is a big part of

your happiness.
 If you are always looking for the negative side of everything, you will find it.
 A good fit with the job and company is important to your happiness.
This starts with knowing yourself:
 What do you want from the job?
 What do you enjoy doing?
 Be honest with yourself and do a self-assessment.
 Get accurate information about the job and the company. Ask
detailed questions about what life is like in this company.
 Do your research: Read about the company, and use your social network to
understand the company’s culture.
15
 Develop good relationships at work. Make friends. Try to get a

mentor.
 Approach a person you admire and attempt to build a relationship with
this person.
 An experienced mentor can be a great help in navigating life at a company.
 Your social network can help you weather the bad days and provide you
emotional and instrumental support during your time at the company as
well as afterward.
 Pay is important, but job characteristics matter more to your job

satisfaction. Don’t sacrifice the job itself for a little bit more money.
 When choosing a job, look at the level of challenge, and the potential of
the job to make you engaged.
16
 Be proactive in managing organizational life. If the job

is stressful,
 cope with it by effective time management and
 having a good social network,
 as well as being proactive in getting to the source of stress.
 If you do not have enough direction, ask for it!
 Know when to leave. If the job makes you unhappy

over an extended period of time and there is little hope
of solving the problems, it may be time to look
elsewhere.
What Causes Positive Work Attitudes?

17
What makes you satisfied with your job

and develop commitment to your company?
 Research shows that people pay attention to several aspects of

their work environment,
 including how they are treated,
 the relationships they form with colleagues and managers,
 and the actual work they perform.
 We will now summarize the factors that show consistent

relations with job satisfaction and organizational commitment.

18
• Personality
• Person–Environment Fit
• Job Characteristics
• Psychological Contract Job Satisfaction
• Organizational Justice Organization Commitment
• Relationships at Work
• Stress
• Work – Life Balance

19
 Personality
 Person–Environment Fit
 Job Characteristics
 Psychological Contract
 Organizational Justice
 Relationships at Work
 Stress
 Work – Life Balance
Personality
20
Can assessing the work environment fully explain

how satisfied we are on the job?
 Interestingly, some experts have shown that job satisfaction is not

purely environmental and is partially due to our personality.
 Some people have a disposition to be happy in life and at work
regardless of environmental factors.
 People who have a positive affective disposition (those who have a
tendency to experience positive moods more often) tend to be more
satisfied with their jobs and more committed to their companies.
 While those who have a negative disposition tend to be less
satisfied and less committed.
Person–Environment Fit
21
 The fit between what we bring to our work environment

and the environmental demands influences our work
attitudes.
 Therefore, person–job fit and person–organization fit are

positively related to job satisfaction and commitment.
 When our abilities match job demands and our values

match company values, we tend to be more satisfied with
our job and more committed to the company we work for.
Job Characteristics
22
 The presence of certain characteristics on the job seems to make

employees more satisfied and more committed.
 Using a variety of skills

 having autonomy at work
 receiving feedback on the job
 and performing a significant task
 are some job characteristics that are related to satisfaction and
commitment.
 Some people expect their jobs to help them build new skills and improve
as an employee.
 These people tend to be more satisfied when their jobs have these
characteristics.
Psychological Contract
23
 After accepting a job, people come to work with a set of

expectations.
 They have an understanding of their responsibilities and

rights. In other words, they have a psychological contract
with the company.
 Psychological contract is an unwritten understanding about

what the employee will bring to the work environment and
what the company will provide in exchange.
Psychological Contract
24
 When people do not get what they expect, they experience a

psychological contract breach, which leads to low job satisfaction and
commitment.
 Suppose you were told before being hired that the company has
friendly environment. After one week you realized that is otherwise
(not friendly).
 You are likely to experience a breach in your psychological contract

and be dissatisfied.
 One way of preventing such problems is for companies to provide

realistic job previews to their employees.
Organizational Justice (fairness)

25
 A strong influence over our satisfaction level

is how fairly we are treated.
 People pay attention to the fairness of

 Company policies and procedures
 Treatment from supervisors
 Salary and other rewards they receive
Relationships at Work
26
 Two strong predictors of our happiness at work and commitment to

the company are our relationships with coworkers and managers.
 Important factors our happiness at work

 People we interact with, their degree of kindness,
 Level of social acceptance in our work group
 Whether we are treated with respect
 Research also shows that our relationship with our manager, are
critically important to our job satisfaction and organizational
commitment.
 how considerate the our manager is,
 whether we build a trust-based relationship with our manager
Relationships at Work
27
 When our manager and upper management listen to us, care about
us, and value our opinions, we tend to feel good at work.
 Even small actions may show employees that the management cares
about them.
Example: Hotel Carlton in San Francisco was recently taken over by a

new management group.
 One of the small things the new management did created dramatic results.
 In response to an employee attitude survey, they replaced the old vacuum
cleaners housekeepers were using and established a policy of replacing
them every year.
 This simple act of listening to employee problems and taking action went a
long way to making employees feel that the management cares about
them.
Stress
28
 Not surprisingly, the amount of stress present in our

job is related to our satisfaction and commitment.
 Following are all stressors that make people

dissatisfied.
 Experiencing role ambiguity (vagueness in relation to what
our responsibilities are)
 Role conflict (facing contradictory demands at work)
 Organizational politics
 Worrying about the security of our job
Work–Life Balance
29
 In modern times, more employees expect to lead balanced

lives, pursue hobbies, and spend more time with their children
while at the same time continuing to succeed at work.
 The notion of work–family conflict is one cause of job
dissatisfaction.
 When work life interferes with family life, we are more
stressed and unhappy with our jobs.
 Research shows that policies that help employees achieve a
balance between their work and personal lives, are related to
higher job satisfaction.
Consequences of Positive Work Attitudes

30
Why do we care about the job satisfaction and

organizational commitment of employees?
What behaviors would you expect to see from

someone who has more positive work attitudes?
 It seems that happy workers have an inclination to be

more engaged at work.
 They may want to perform better
 They may be more motivated
Work Behaviors
31
Work Behaviors
32
 One of the important objectives of the field of organizational behavior

is to understand why people behave the way they do.
 We will focus on four work behaviors:

 Job performance,
 Organizational citizenship behaviors,
 Absenteeism,
 Turnover
 These are not the only behaviors OB is concerned about, but

understanding what is meant by these terms and understanding the
major influences over each type of behavior will give you more clarity
about analyzing the behaviors of others in the workplace.
Work Behaviors
33
Research findings about the causes of each type of behavior in the following figure.
Job Performance Citizenship Absenteeism Turnover

General mental How we are Health problem Poor
abilities treated at work Performance
How we are Personality Work/life work attitudes
treated at work balance issues
Stress Positive work work attitudes Stress
attitudes
Positive work Age of the Age of the Personality
attitude employee employee
Personality Age & tenure of
the employee
Work Behaviors
34
 Job Performance (Appraisal)

 Organizational Citizenship Behaviors
 Absenteeism
 Turnover
Work Behaviors
Job Performance (Appraisal)

35
 Job performance, or in-role performance, refers to the

performance level on factors included in the job
description.
 For each job, the content of job performance may differ.
 Measures of job performance include

 Quality and quantity of work performed by the employee
 Accuracy and speed with which the job is performed
 Overall effectiveness of the person performing the job
Work Behaviors
Job Performance (Appraisal)

36
 In many companies,
 Job performance determines whether a person is
promoted
 Rewarded with pay raises
 Given additional responsibilities
 or fired from the job
 Therefore, job performance is tracked and observed in

many organizations and is one of the main outcomes
studied in the field of organizational behavior.
Work Behaviors
Job Performance
37
 What are major Predictors of Job Performance?

 Under which conditions do people perform well ?
 What are the characteristics of high performers?
 It seems that the most powerful influence over our job performance is
our general mental ability, or cognitive abilities.
 Our reasoning abilities
 verbal and numerical skills
 analytical skills
 and overall intelligence level seems to be important across most situations.
 It seems that general mental ability starts influencing us early in life; it

is strongly correlated with measures of academic success.
Work Behaviors
Job Performance
38
Following the quality of treatment, the stress we

experience determines our performance level.
 When we experience high levels of stress, our mental energies

are drained.
 Instead of focusing on the task at hand, we start concentrating
on the stressor and become distracted trying to cope with it.
 Because our attention and energies are diverted to deal with
stress, our performance suffers.
 Having role ambiguity and experiencing conflicting role
demands are related to lower performance.
When we are satisfied with the job, we may perform better
Work Behaviors
Organizational Citizenship Behaviors

39
 Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) are voluntary

behaviors employees performs to help others and benefit the
organization.
 Examples of Organizational citizenship behaviors

 Helping a new co-worker understand how things work in company
 Volunteering to organize the company picnic
 Providing suggestions to management about how to improve
business processes
 These behaviors contribute to the smooth operation of

business.
Work Behaviors

40
What are the major predictors of citizenship behaviors?
 Unlike performance, citizenship behaviors do not depend so much

on one’s abilities.
 Job performance, to a large extent, depends on our general mental
abilities.
 When you add the education, skills, knowledge, and abilities that are
needed to perform well, the role of motivation in performance
becomes more limited.
 As a result, someone being motivated will not necessarily translate
into a person performing well.
 For citizenship behaviors, the motivation-behavior link is clearer.
We help others around us if we feel motivated to do so.
Work Behaviors

41
 Our personality is yet another explanation for why we perform

citizenship behaviors. Personality is a modest predictor of actual job
performance but a much better predictor of citizenship.
 Job attitudes are also moderately related to citizenship behaviors.
 People who are happier at work, those who are more committed to
their companies, and those who have overall positive attitudes
toward their work situation tend to perform citizenship behaviors
more often than others.
 When people are unhappy, they tend to be disengaged from their

jobs and rarely go beyond the minimum that is expected of them.
Work Behaviors
Absenteeism
42
 Absenteeism refers to unscheduled absences from work.
 Absenteeism is costly to companies because of its unpredictable

nature.
 When an employee has an unscheduled absence from work,

companies struggle to find replacement workers at the last
minute.
 This may involve hiring contingent workers, having other

employees work overtime, or scrambling to cover for an absent
coworker.
Work Behaviors
Absenteeism
43
What causes absenteeism?
 First we need to look at the type of absenteeism.
 Some absenteeism is unavoidable and is related to health

reasons.
 For example, reasons such as lower back pain, migraines,

accidents on or off the job, or acute stress are important
reasons for absenteeism.
Work Behaviors
Absenteeism
44
 Health-related absenteeism is costly, but dealing with

such absenteeism by using organizational policies
penalizing absenteeism is both unreasonable and unfair.
 A sick employee who shows up at work will infect

coworkers and will not be productive.
 Instead, companies are finding that programs aimed at

keeping workers healthy are effective in dealing with
this type of absenteeism.
Work Behaviors
Absenteeism
45
 Common reasons for unscheduled absences

 Staying home to care for a sick child
 or relative, attending the wedding of a friend
 or relative, or skipping work to study for an exam
 Having a single paid time off policy would allow workers to
balance work and life, and allow companies to avoid
unscheduled absences.
 Some companies such as IBM got rid of sick leave

altogether and instead allow employees to take as much
time as they need, as long as their work gets done.
OB Toolbox: Dealing with late Co-workers
46
 Try to get to the root cause and find out what is making your coworker
unhappy. Often, lateness is an extension of dissatisfaction one feels toward
the job or tasks at hand.
 If there are ways in which you can solve these issues, such as by giving the person
more responsibility or listening to the opinions of the person and showing more
respect, you can minimize lateness.
 Make sure that lateness does not go without any negative consequences.
Do not ignore it, and do not remain silent.
 Mention carefully and constructively that one person’s lateness slows down
everyone.
 Make an effort to schedule meetings around everyone’s schedules. When

scheduling, emphasize the importance of everyone’s being there on time
and pick a time when everyone can comfortably attend.
OB Toolbox: Dealing with late Co-workers
47
 When people are late, be sure to ask them to compensate, such as by doing
extra work.
 Negative consequences tend to discourage future lateness.
 Shortly before the meeting starts, send everyone a reminder. Yes, you are
dealing with adults and they should keep their own schedules, but some
people’s schedules may be busier than others, and some are better at keeping
track of their time.
 Reminders may ensure that they arrive on time.
 Reward timeliness. When everyone shows up on time, verbally recognize the

effort everyone made to be there on time.
 Be on time yourself! Creating a culture of timeliness within your group requires

everyone’s effort, including yours.
Work Behaviors
Turnover
48
 Turnover refers to an employee leaving an organization.

 Employee turnover has potentially harmful consequences, such
as poor customer service and poor companywide performance.
 When employees leave, their jobs still need to be performed by
someone, so companies spend time recruiting, hiring, and
training new employees, all the while suffering from lower
productivity. Yet, not all turnover is bad.
 Turnover is particularly a problem when high-performing
employees leave, while a poor performer’s turnover may actually
give the company a chance to improve productivity and morale.
Work Behaviors
Turnover
49
Why do employees leave?

 An employee’s performance level is an important reason. People
who perform poorly are actually more likely to leave.
 These people may be fired or be encouraged to quit, or they may
quit because of their fear of being fired.
 If a company has pay-for-performance systems, poor performers
will find that they are not earning much, owing to their
substandard performance.
 This pay discrepancy gives poor performers an extra incentive to
leave.
Work Behaviors
Turnover
50
 Work attitudes are often the primary culprit in why people leave.
 When workers are unhappy at work, and when they are not attached
to their companies, they are more likely to leave.
 Loving the things they do, being happy with the opportunities for
advancement within the company, and being happy about pay are all
aspects of work attitudes relating to turnover.
 When employees are unhappy, they might have the intention to

leave and may start looking for a job, but their ability to actually
leave will depend on many factors such as their employability and
the condition of the job market.
OB Toolbox: Tips for leaving Job Gracefully
51
 Don’t quit on an impulse. We all have bad days and feel the temptation
to walk away from the job right away. Yet, this is unproductive for your
own career. Plan your exit in advance, loo for a better job over an
extended period of time, and leave when the moment is right.
 Don’t quit too often. While trading jobs in an upward fashion is good,
leaving one place and getting another job that is just like the previous
one in pay, responsibilities, and position does not help you move forward
in your career, and makes you look like a quitter. Companies are often
wary of hiring job hoppers.
 When you decide to leave, tell your boss first, and be nice. Don’t discuss
all the things your manager may have done wrong. Explain your reasons
without blaming anyone and frame it as an issue of poor job fit.
OB Toolbox: Tips for leaving Job Gracefully
52
 Do not badmouth your employer. It is best not to bash the organization you are
leaving in front of coworkers. Do not tell them how happy you are to be quitting or
how much better your new job looks. There is really no point in making any
remaining employees feel bad.
 Guard your professional reputation. You must realize that the world is a small
place. People know others and tales of unprofessional behavior travel quickly to
unlikely places.
 Finish your ongoing work and don’t leave your team in a bad spot. Right before a
major deadline is probably a bad time to quit. Offer to stay at least 2 weeks to finish
your work, and to help hire and train your replacement.
 Don’t steal from the company! Give back all office supplies, keys, ID cards, and
other materials. Don’t give them any reason to blemish their memory of you. Who
knows…you may even want to come back one day.
That is all

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Lecture

After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the

1) Identify the major work attitudes that affect work

2) List the key set of behaviors that matter for organizational

3) Understand cross-cultural differences in job attitudes and

People Come First: The Case of SAS

 SAS has over 10,000 employees worldwide, operate in over 100

 The company is quick to attribute their success to the

People Come First: The Case of SAS

 SAS (Statistical Analysis System)has perfected the art of

 Employees seem to genuinely enjoy working at SAS and are

 When Google designed their own legendary campus in

People Come First: The Case of SAS

 SAS does well is giving its employees opportunities to

People Come First: The Case of SAS

 SAS wants to eliminate stressors and anything that

 To keep employees healthy and fit, there are

 SAS offers free on-site health care for employees

People Come First: The Case of SAS

 The company understands that employees have a

 Famous motto in the company is, “If you are working

 SAS is truly one of the industry leaders in leveraging

 An attitude refers to our opinions, beliefs, and feelings about aspects of

 We have attitudes toward

 At work, two particular job attitudes have the greatest potential to

 Organizational commitment is the emotional attachment people

 There is a high degree of overlap between job satisfaction and

 Companies believe that these attitudes are worth tracking because

How strong is the attitude-behavior link?

 First of all, it depends on the attitude in question.

 Your attitudes toward your colleagues may influence

 Second, it is worth noting that attitudes are more

When you are dissatisfied with your job, you

 Whether you will actually leave is a different story!

 Attitudes give us hints about how a person might behave,

 Have a positive attitude about it. Your personality is a big part of

 Develop good relationships at work. Make friends. Try to get a

 Pay is important, but job characteristics matter more to your job

 Be proactive in managing organizational life. If the job

 Know when to leave. If the job makes you unhappy

What Causes Positive Work Attitudes?

What makes you satisfied with your job

 Research shows that people pay attention to several aspects of

 We will now summarize the factors that show consistent

What Causes Positive Work Attitudes?

What Causes Positive Work Attitudes?

 Work – Life Balance

Can assessing the work environment fully explain

 Interestingly, some experts have shown that job satisfaction is not

 The fit between what we bring to our work environment

 Therefore, person–job fit and person–organization fit are

 When our abilities match job demands and our values

 The presence of certain characteristics on the job seems to make

 Using a variety of skills

 After accepting a job, people come to work with a set of

 They have an understanding of their responsibilities and

 Psychological contract is an unwritten understanding about

 When people do not get what they expect, they experience a

 You are likely to experience a breach in your psychological contract

 One way of preventing such problems is for companies to provide