Starter Question
 Think of the worst job you have ever had. What made
that job so bad?
 Think of the best job you have ever had. What made
that job so good?
Basic Elements of Organizational Behavior
Organizational behavior (OB) tries to understand, explain,
and improve the attitudes and behaviors of individuals
and groups in organizations.
Organizational development (OD) is a subset of OB that
develops plans for and reinforces organizational
strategies, structures, and processes for improving an
organization's effectiveness.
Change agent is the person who
implements the organization
development effort(s). He/she
acts as guides and trainers for
the change process.
OB/OD Foundations
Theories and concepts in OB are drawn from a wide variety
of disciplines
 Industrial and organizational psychology
Job performance and individual characteristics
 Social psychology
Satisfaction, emotions, and team processes
 Sociology
Team characteristics and organizational structure
 Economics
Motivation, learning, and decision making
 Communication
Fidelity, listening, feedback and climate
OD Practitioners As “Organizational Doctors"
OD practitioners are "organizational doctors" who try to
improve the effectiveness of people and organizations by:
 Establishing relationships with key personnel in the
organization (aka, entering)
 Researching and evaluating systems in the organization to
understand dysfunctions and/or goals (aka, diagnosing)
 Identifying approaches to improve effectiveness of the
organization and its people (aka, interventions)
 Applying approaches to improve effectiveness (aka, planned
change)
 Evaluating the ongoing effectiveness of the approaches and
their results (aka, assessment)
What Is Studied
OB/OD study and try to influence the following:
 Organizational change
 Causes, acceptance, implementing, organization structure
 Organizational culture
 Assessing, changing, reinforcing, developing
 Empowerment
 Decision making, input, reward systems
 Human capital
 Hiring, downsizing, intake, performance evaluation
 Organizational commitment
 Job satisfaction, retention, turn over/churn
 Jobs
 Task analysis, certification, ramp up, development