Organisational Psychology is the scientific study of human behaviour within organizations. It focuses on getting the essence of individual, group and organizational behaviour and implementing the solution of issues at work. Understanding, and progressing the individuals’ behaviours and attitudes and groups, will greatly contribute to the long-term success of the organisation. As these aspects have an influence on the organisational culture. The culture is crucial as it affects the performance of the organization which would be perceived and represented in the media. It can either drive an organization forward or can hold them back depending on how well built or poor the culture is. Therefore, discussing these factors is essential, because it effect the behaviours, organisation system and employee turnover.

Understanding the human behaviour is an important element within the organisation’s managerial success. Within every organisation exists a culture, either created with a purpose or by the circumstance. The organizational culture is closely associated with the way individuals interact with one another and achieve tasks. The origins of the culture shaping are the mission and values of the organisation; however, most organisation cultures are set from the upper management. Therefore, the environment that determines which condition it falls under is based on the management team. Research have shown that organisations with a negative atmosphere usually comes from the “top-down phenomena” (Appelbaum & Roy-Girard, 2007). The higher influential the negative person is, the more the employees will behave in the same way out of frustration making it a dysfunctional organisation (Stark, 2003; Finkelstein, 2005 in Appelbaum & Roy-Girard, 2007). Employees would react to deviance because the environment they are in supports it. What enhances this is the focus on the bottom line, as managers thrive for the short-term goals which causes them to behave in an uncivil way, hence, the negative environment.

Within a negative organisation exists subcultures. Meaning, each department within the organisation relies on the behaviour of the manager. For example, the Enron Scandal (Appelbaum & Roy-Girard, 2007). The CEO of Enron built an organization of “greedy back-stabbers” by always evaluating and rewarding, creating a toxic environment. If the focus is mostly on the profit, which means treating employees as a cost instead of an asset, it would reduce the motivation of the individual since their good performance was not recognized or appreciated. This would then affect the well-being of the employees in turn the organisation. As tyrant managers drain the mental strength, which later effects the health. This is called psychosomatics. The increase of toxic environment has become popular, thereby, movies made about horrible bosses. The rude behaviour from upper management will weaken the group effort by withholding information and would prefer to work alone, then eventually have employee turnover. A British study on managers attitudes shows the decrease in productivity, creativity and helpfulness as well as heightens their angry thoughts (Porath & Erez, 2011). Results prove that rude behaviour has an effect, even if it was not directly intended for them. Not only the employees suffer, but also the organisation suffers from the behaviour of the employees. Furthermore, both influence one another causing communication gap. Therefore, caring for the employees’ well-being will have a great impact in success within the long-term. Another factor for having negative environment is nepotism, as If the bad manager is related to the CEO it will damage the organisation. Because termination is out of the question.

Family dominated organisation is more focused on helping family members or friends than the organisation’s bottom line. They are more interested in giving good positions instead of their skills. Nonetheless, when the middle level managers inform the subordinates about how to do their work, they avoid the subordinate related to the upper management out of fear. Nepotism has a negative effect on the Human Resource Management recruitment and selection process. The reason is they lack the relevant knowledge and skills. Which corrupts the organisational fairness. This creates conflicts between the employees. This is a common issue in the Arab countries. This type of recruitment will make it difficult to attract qualified employees because of the unfairness. As Farahmand (2013) says “nepotism affects the quality of human resource in an organization as candidates are hired due to their affiliations family ties rather than their requisite skill”. The human resource department should have enough power and authority in order to help ensure employees policies are implemented without discrimination. On the other hand, nepotism has a positive side. For example, the qualified relative or friend is not able to find the right job anywhere else. Rather than being a negative effect it could be beneficial for the organisation. Therefore, the organisation needs to know how to enrich the workplace well-being. The model of Hackman and Oldham (1976) for job enrichment also suggests in order to increase motivation there needs to be job variety, task identity and significance, autonomy and feedback (Amabile, 1996).

The importance of human motivation is complex. For instance, intrinsic motivation should be at the highest during the initial creativity process (Amabile, 1996). On the other hand, not all employees are the same, each of them has different drives. There are those who get motivated by rewards. Then, there are those who love what they do and get motivated by that. Meaning, understanding how one can be motivated to get them to be creative. Once, it is understood what motivates an employee, one can use the appropriate method. In order to match employees to tasks based on both skill and interest, the combination synergy of persons and the environment is needed (Amabile, 1996). Therefore, to have a good workplace organisation, communication is essential. An organisation cannot function well without being able to communicate openly from top-down the management. Lacking effective communication in the organisation will create confusion and effect employees’ well-being. Good communication creates trust and loyalty within the organisation, and long-term success. To prevent turnover and low productivity before it takes over and disrupt the organisation, communication is needed.

This article was written by Laila Abdelhak, Ms. Business Psychology

List of References:

Appelbaum, S., & Roy-Girard, D. (2007). Toxins in the workplace: Affect on organizations and employees. ResearchGate. Retrieved from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/242349375_Toxins_in_the_workplace_Affect_on_organizations_and_employees

Amabile, T. (1996). The Motivation for Creativity in Organizations. Hbs.edu. Retrieved from: http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=13674

Bakkera, A., Schaufelib, W., Leiterc, M. and Taris, T. (2008). Work engagement: An emerging concept in occupational health psychology. Work & Stress Vol. 22, No. 3. Retrieved from: http://www.wilmarschaufeli.nl/publications/Schaufeli/301.pdf  

Farahmand, N. (2013). Impact of Nepotism on Turnover Intention and Service Recovery Performance; The Case of Private Hospitals in TRNC. Retrieved from: http://hdl.handle.net/11129/1584

Porath, C., & Erez, A. (2011). How rudeness takes its toll | The Psychologist. The British Psychological Society. Retrieved from: https://thepsychologist.bps.org.uk/volume-24/edition-7/how-rudeness-takes-its-toll

Williams, R. (2016). The Rise of Toxic Leadership and Toxic Workplaces. Psychology Today. Retrieved from: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wired-success/201601/the-rise-toxic-leadership-and-toxic-workplaces

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