Chapter 12 : Organizational Diversity Processes

Summary from Textbook:

In this chapter, the diversity in organizations is discussed, and the role they play in it. In all organizations, there are minorities in them, whether they are due to gender or colour, and they face numerous obstacles. One such obstacle is the one known as the glass ceiling, preventing minorities from moving up the management hierarchy. Due to personal reasons, occasionally women have to take extended breaks from their jobs, but upon coming back, some find that they are not welcome anymore, being treated mostly as outsiders.

Negative stereotyping and discrimination is one of the leading causes. Prejudice refers to negative attitudes towards and organization member based on his/her culture group identity, and discrimination refers to observable behaviour based on the same reasons. These stereotyping is not always overt and simplistic, and most are irrational. These can often be dangerous as they are often wrong when applied to individuals.

As a result, evidence has shown that women and ethnic minorities experience limited access to or are being excluded from informal communication networks. Due to this, minority employee networks or affinity groups have been focused on, and as a result, minorities have seen an improvement in their job satisfaction and productivity.

Another solution would be the establishment of mentor-protégé relationships, where less experienced employees were provided with support and assistance from more experienced ones.

A third aspect is tokenism, where those few people in the organizations are expected to be treated as representing their minorities, and differences are often exaggerated, or mistakes emphasized.

There are three phases established to attempt to move past these discriminations:

• First generation affirmative action- organizations only interested in achieving the bare minimum


• Second generation affirmative action- more support given to minority employees


• Multicultural organization- decisions that benefit the organizations that utilize minorities

A multicultural organization is further differentiated into 6 dimensions: acculturation, structural integration, informal integration, cultural bias, organizational identification and intergroup conflict.

There are several opportunities and advantages that managing and celebrating diversity in organizations can bring about: cost argument, resource-acquisition argument, marketing argument, creativity argument, problem-solving argument, systems flexibility argument.

The following approaches view diversity differently:

• Classical- seen as limiting the homogeneity of the workforce and detrimental to morale


• Human relations- neither encouraging nor discouraging, emphasis placed on meeting their needs


• Human resources- encouraged due to new creativity and ideas introduced


• Systems- an important avenue to adapt effectively to environment


• Cultural- organizations would be seen as important places where organizational culture intersects with national, ethnic and gender based culture


• Critical- organizations seen as the arena in which minorities must deal with the dominant class

This chapter is perhaps one of the more difficult chapters to understand, as it deals in handling the cultural diversity in the workplace, and how to utilize it effectively, as different people from different cultures provide differing opinions and ideas, and this also reflects how diversity is important outside the organization as well.

Reference:

Miller, K 2009, Organizational Communication: Approaches and Processes, 6^th edition, Belmont, CA, Wadsworth Publishing Company.

Chapter 11 : Processes of Emotion in the Workplace

There are several main emotions seen in organizations: stress, burnout and social support in organizations, and each affects the organization in its own way.

Most models view the typical workplace as a setting governed by logic and rationality; however, it has been proven that interactions between individuals within the organizations are often controlled by emotion rather than logic.

Previously, theorists looked at the concept of bounded rationality in the workplace, that looked at decision making as not being perfectly rational due to cognitive and situational limits.

Dennis Mumby and Linda Putnam, however, looked at bounded emotionality, considering emotional life as a central focus of organizational research and how it might help in understanding the workplace.

In many occupations, communication between employee and client involved emotional or affective content. Emotional labour is used to refer to workers who are expected to display certain feelings, which can be falsified, in order to satisfy organizational role expectations. Emotional work refers to the work in which employees are allowed to show their genuine emotions. These usually refer to workers who are engaged in compassionate communication, where processes such as noticing, connecting and responding are utilized.

Emotions that arise from relationships in the workplace are referred to as emotions at work, and these are a major source of organizational emotion. One of the extreme situations is the psychological abuse of others through workplace bullying.

There are several aspects of work relationships that create potential for intense emotions in organizations: the tension between the public and private in work relationships, relational networks and emotional ‘buzzing’, conflicting allegiances, emotional rights and obligations at work.

There are several rules that dictate the display of emotion: express emotions in a professional way, express emotions to improve situations, express emotions to the right people, express emotions to help individuals, do not manage emotions for personal benefit to the detriment of others, the expression of certain emotions is always inappropriate.

Stress can be referred to aspects of the workplace that are difficult to deal with, or the negative outcomes that arise from those work conditions. This can lead to burnout in the individual, causing negative psychological, physiological and organizational outcomes. Burnout can consist of three interrelated dimensions: emotional exhaustion, lack of personal accomplishment and depersonalization.

Three frequent causes of burnout are: workload, role conflict and role ambiguity. Occasionally external influences such as balancing work and home life may also lead to burnout, and may cause a negative variety of physiological, attitudinal and organizational effects on the person.

Poor communication, emotional labour, emotional contagion and emphatic concern may also contribute to burnout.

There are several methods of coping with burnout. Some are individual orientated, such as dysfunctional reactions, problem-centred coping, appraisal-centred coping and emotion-centred coping. Another method of coping is to participate in decision making, as it can reduce role conflict and role ambiguity. Social support can be given to individuals to help cope with burnout. These can involve emotional, informational and instrumental support, and can come from supervisors, co-workers, friends and family.

Emotion is considered differently by different approaches:

• Classical- seen as lowering worker productivity, but those affected tend to get replaced easily
• Human relations- dealt with through provision of emotional support or boosting of self-esteem
• Human resources- dealt through participative decision making or changes designed to enhance employee control
• Cultural- seen as an aspect of values and assumptions held by organizational members, and created through social interactions of organizational participants
• Systems- seen as sense making opportunities
• Critical- seen as an indicator of strain in the relationship between employees and owners in the organizational context

Reference:

Miller, K 2009, Organizational Communication: Approaches and Processes, 6^th edition, Belmont, CA, Wadsworth Publishing Company.

Chapter 10 : Organizational Change and Leadership Processes

Summary from Textbook:

Change is viewed as a constant and never-ending process. It is an enduring feature of organizational life, and the degree and impact may vary.

An organization may go through several phases: the start-up phase, the growth phase, the harvest phase and the decay phase. Depending on the company, such phases may be over a long period of time. Usually change within the organization is planned, in which the organization explores the need for change and possible solutions, plans for how it can be instituted, implementation of change dissemination of information, and integration of change into the operations of organization. It has also been seen that planned change involves a number of different types of change, and might be accomplished through a variety of methods. However, due to the interdependence between task, structure, culture and strategy, no change process is straightforward.

There are many reactions to organizational change, and not all of them are accepted by all parties involved. Problems such as: lack of management support, top managers forcing change, inconsistent action by key managers, unrealistic expectations, lack of meaningful participation, poor communication, unclear purpose of program and improper identification of responsibility for change could affect outcomes of the change.

There are many strategies implemented by managers to communicate about change: spray and pray, tell and sell, underscore and explore, identify and reply, withhold and uphold. Different strategies have different positives and negatives.

Sometimes, change can occur within an organization due to factors outside the management’s control. These are known as crisis, events that are unpredictable, threats that affect organizations, industries or stakeholders negatively.

There are three stages to organizational crisis: precrisis- where everyone can work together to prevent or prepare for problems, crisis- trigger that threatens the organization’s survival or reputation, postcrisis- overcoming the crisis and preparations for future.

Due to problems mentioned above, leadership within the organization is important, as one can make or break an organization depending on how effective one is, although sometimes external factors may play a part in bringing down an organization.

There are many models of leadership; one main one is the trait theory, where leaderships are based off past common traits of effective leaders, to create one model to select people with the best combination.

The second one is the style theory that was mentioned in chapter 3, where leaders were valued in terms of their concern for production and concern of people.

The third theory is the contingency theory, where leaders who focus on achieving task goals may be more effective in structured situations than leaders who focus more on relationships.

Two leadership models are the transactional leadership model, in which there is an exchange or promise between leader and follower, and the transformational leadership model, which helps followers achieve their full potential, as well as improving the leader in the process.

Communication in the leadership process is very important, and content varies with situation. The way the message is delivered is important as well, strong delivery styles, the way in which the message was framed, and the timing in which it was delivered played an important part in leadership success. This can only be done if the leader has a clear understanding of their view on reality, and their own goals for the organization and for communicating the message.

The ways in which change and leadership are viewed by different approaches can be seen below:

• Classical- change is viewed negatively unless it is controlled. Leadership is tied to management


• Human relations- change as a human process , leaders to focus on needs of workers


• Human resources- change seen as a way to harness skills and abilities of workers, skills of leaders are adapted to suit different situations


• Systems- change viewed as an outcome of chaotic systems of complex information


• Cultural- change seen as reflections of organizational values and assumptions, effective change and leadership depends on understanding prevailing cultural and subcultural believes


• Critical- planned change and leadership viewed as mechanisms in which management establishes and maintains a relationship of power and authority

This chapter highlights the importance of change and how it can affect the quality of work in a workplace. It also shows how effective leaders can either enhance the effectiveness of change, or reduce the negative effects of it. It also shows how poor communication can increase the negatives of leaving the workplace.

Reference:

Miller, K 2009, Organizational Communication: Approaches and Processes, 6^th edition, Belmont, CA, Wadsworth Publishing Company.

Week 10 Tutorial

The topic discussed in this week’s tutorial was on Decision-making processes, particularly on Rational Models of Decision Making and Alternatives to Rational Models. As my tutor Arna explained, the Rational Approach is the most commonly used in organizations today, as it is the most effective. Thus, it is important for it to be intensely discussed. One of the examples given by Arna regarded the way a kid asked her mother about how she cooks her chicken, why she always cuts it into half before putting it in the oven. The mother explained that this was due to what her mother had taught her, leading her to go back to ask her grandmother the same question in order to find out the answer. In other words, what Arna tried to explain was that things change every now and then, and we should always keep asking questions to get to the root of it, in order to obtain the best and most accurate result.

From this example given, I learnt that this gives everyone a chance in participating in the decision making process where everyone contributes by voicing out their questions and opinions. This clearly shows an advantage of participation. On the contrary, if only one person is allowed to have their say rather than everyone, the disadvantage of participation will lead to conflict in an organization. As I have learnt, in order to solve a problem, the essential characteristics that should not be missed include identifying the characteristics of a solution, and solving them with choices and taking all opinions in to consideration. Then with the closest opinions provided, finalizing the best choices by selecting the closest ones that match the characteristics that suit and benefit the organization. Another example Arna explained was about group thinking, about how some individuals may not voice their opinions as they felt pressured by other group members who dominated the group. This is when the participatory system comes into the picture, as the group will be guided where everyone stands a chance in voicing out their opinions.

The group work given in this tutorial was a preparation on a presentation where group members would have to discuss and decide on the assessment. In this group exercise, I experienced the decision making process, where each of my group members and I had a chance in voicing out our opinions and they were taken in to consideration fairly. There are 3 different stages in the decision-making process, and the example above shows the individual and group stages. Aside from this, another exercise was given to 3 leaders from different groups and the other students had the chance to observe the leaders, where each of them represented each of their groups in voicing out the final opinions of each group. What I gained from this exercise was that we should not give up on our opinions easily or let others dominate our point of view, as everyone stands a chance to fight for our own views. Besides, the leaders demonstrated the importance of discussing the topic thoroughly and settling with a more relevant points. The leaders also constantly checked the characteristics with each other throughout the meeting. One small issue that occurred in the middle of the discussion was where a misunderstanding took place. This slowed down the discussion process. Those involved should have figured out a system used in discussion beforehand and others should have guided the meeting and gathered all the views, in order to speed up the discussion process without going through miscommunication.

Chapter 9 : Conflict Management Processes

Summary from Textbook:

Conflict can be defined as the interaction of interdependent people who perceive opposition of goals, aims and values, and who see the other party as potentially interfering with the realization of these goals. Three characteristics of conflict are thus seen: incompatible goals of each person, interdependence of each person on another, and interaction between people involved.
There are several levels of organizational conflict: interpersonal conflict- between individuals, intergroup conflict- between different groups, and interorganizational conflict- between two or more organizations.

As conflicts develop and are resolved, 5 phases are seen:

• Latent conflict- in which the situation where conditions for conflict arises


• Perceived conflict- when either party believes the other is wrong


• Felt conflict- formulation of strategies and solutions of conflict


• Manifest conflict- resolving conflict


• Conflict aftermath- short and long term consequences

There are several conflict management styles:

• Avoidance- ignoring needs of both parties


• Accommodating- putting others’ needs before yours


• Competition- insisting on your needs


• Compromise- middle ground of both parties’ needs


• Collaborative- finding a solution that satisfies both parties’ needs fully

A second strategy of dealing with conflict is through bargaining or negotiation. It is often a formal activity in which parties can settle intergroup or interorganizational conflicts. Individuals usually represent the parties involved.

There are two types of bargaining that differ in goals, issues, communicative processes and outcomes:

• Distributive bargaining- focusing on maximizing own gains and minimizing losses


• Integrative bargaining- maximizing gains and benefits for both parties

A third strategy for dealing with conflict is the third-party conflict resolution. This happens when it is impossible to resolve the conflict using the first two strategies. These third parties are usually known as mediators or arbitrators. Communication is often very important to develop a solution, and there are various tactics used: directive- mediator initiating recommendations, non-directive- mediators attempt to secure information and clarify misunderstandings, procedural- mediator establishes agenda and protocol, reflexive- mediator regulating tone of interaction.

There are several factors that influence the conflict management:

• Personal factors- factors such as gender, personality, and the way an individual frames a conflict


• Relational factors- relationships between conflict parties and how it influences the interaction through which conflict is managed


• Cultural factors- aspects of organizational, national and ethnic culture that may influence conflict management

Different approaches look at conflict differently, and consider conflict management in different ways:

• Classical- conflict viewed as breakdown of communication, and is managed by third parties


• Human relations- conflict viewed negatively, and parties are encouraged to avoid conflicts or to reach a compromise


• Human resources- conflict viewed as a means for growth and development, and parties are encouraged to collaborate on solutions to satisfy everyone


• Systems- conflict viewed as cycles of activities that escalate or de-escalate.


• Cultural- conflict viewed as coming from difference in metaphors and value systems of individuals and groups


• Critical- conflicts viewed as imbalance of power

This chapter is also important, as it explains how conflicts can be resolved. Conflicts are not only seen in organizations, but also in our everyday life. Negotiation is not only on a relatively small scale between organizations or groups within it, but can be used on a large scale, for example between countries, or even the smallest scale, such as bargaining between a buyer and seller at the marketplace.

Reference:

Miller, K 2009, Organizational Communication: Approaches and Processes, 6^th edition, Belmont, CA, Wadsworth Publishing Company.

Week 9 Tutorial

This week’s tutorial mainly focused on discussing a case study regarding a church management team looking for a pastor for their church. From this discussion, what I learnt is that an interview is not mainly about you, but the organization. In an interview, we should always connect ourselves with the organization, their agenda and their goal. As an interviewee, we should always address the organization and show them how we could benefit them and help them in achieving their goals. I realized from this discussion that qualifications are not the most important element when it comes to a job interview or job hunting in general. Instead, it is the way an individual presents themselves, in other words, the person with the best performance during an interview will most likely get the job compared to others who have pages of qualifications but failed in presenting themselves to the organization. Besides, there are a few things we should consider before going for an interview. Firstly, we should always do research on the organization’s background, agenda and goals, and also the role/position we are applying for. This is to prepare us for any impromptu questions or tasks from the interviewer and also this will help us in showing the interviewer how much we understand and know about them. This can be related to the Socialization process.