MGT2OBE Organisational Behaviour For Unfavorable Behavior Assignment

Describe about the Organisational Behaviour For Unfavorable Behavior.

Answer:

Workplace bullying

Bullying in workplace has become a major concern in the organizations. People, who are at the top, have more powers than the lower level employees and they tend to bully the employees by using the power. This is a case of abusing of powers. Due to bullying, employees become discontent and they lose productivities. Workplace bullying is the misuse of power of coercion. This is also described as the type of humiliation, degradation, unfavorable behavior and intimidation of the employees (Branch, Ramsay and Barker 2013).

The three types of powers of the managers are: reward power, coercive power and legitimate power. Reward power is used by the managers when they want to control the employees by giving them intrinsic and extrinsic rewards. This power sometimes acts as a motivational factor. However, the effectiveness of this power depends on the type of rewards given and the desire of the employee for it. Monetary bonus and incentives, promotions etc. are the tools of this type of powers (Clegg 2013).

Coercive power is mostly used in case of bullying. This is a form of unpleasant punishment. To control the employees, a manager can threaten them with ways like, withholding the salary or hike, relocating an employee, injecting the fear of firing, assigning the least important task of a project, intentionally overlooking the good performance etc. This type of power exists in every organization; however, the degree and nature vary. Sometimes, the misuse of coercive powers leads to extreme abuse or harassment of the employees.

Legitimate power is the one, which gives the right of control to the management. This inflicts the idea among the employees that the authority has the legal right to command them. This power is generated from the hierarchy of the organization. The managers have the legal power to command the subordinate employees. This also gives the right to managers to approve or deny any requests of the employees such as for transfers, change of shifts, personal leaves etc. (Clegg 2013).

In most organizations, managers apply coercive power to bully the employees. Managers tend to achieve their goals by controlling the employees. Especially, for downsizing and restructuring of the company, managers use the tactics of bullying on the employees. With the coercive power, the managers bully the employees by punishing them for unwanted actions. Sometimes, the authority also uses legitimate power to bully the employees. By showing them the legal right, they influence the employees to work as they say. Failing to do so, the employees face legal actions or punishment from the authority. A report by the Australian House of Representatives’ Education and Employment Committee says that in the past six months, 6.8% Australians were bullied in their workplaces (Branch, Ramsay and Barker 2013). The fundamental problem of this increase in the bullying is that, there is no proper law to protect the employees and mostly people do not go to the courts to challenge the employers. The gaps in other laws like workers health and safety, protecting employees’ interests, industrial relations, and employees’ compensation law also enhance the chance of bullying in the workplace.

Bullying is not a good practice in workplace. Although, the managers, in almost every organization, bully the workers by using their powers. It is essential in all the sectors that code of conduct should be developed for the managers to educate them about organizational behavior. Furthermore, there should be appropriate processes in the organization where the employees can report about any bullying incident in the workplace.

References:

Branch, S., Ramsay, S. and Barker, M., 2013. Workplace bullying, mobbing and general harassment: A review. International Journal of Management Reviews, 15(3), pp.280-299.

Clegg, S., 2013. The Theory of Power and Organization (RLE: Organizations). Routledge.