Introduction

Effective leadership is an important ingredient in the success and performance of an organization. Organizations develop cultures, norms, and values that form their organizational identity and behavior. The consequence of a poor leadership approach in an organization is poor performance and poor service delivery. Leadership is closely linked to organizational behavior. Therefore, effective leadership can influence the performance of the organization through positive use of influence and power to create good organizational culture and behavior. This analysis therefore, seeks to explore various organization behavior aspects about organizations and determine their influence on performance. To put this analysis into perspective, this analysis focuses on Brakemore Corporation, a leading player in the car industry that is based in the United Kingdom. The corporation is in the verge of being sold to an international buyer who intends to manage it differently as its employees are used to. The analysis will evaluate various organizational behavioral aspects such as; the influence of culture, power and politics on the behavior of others in organizational context; evaluate how to motivate teams and individuals to achieve organizational goals; to demonstrate how to effectively corporate with others and applying the various organization behavior philosophies and concepts to given business situations (Kantola, Pg. 67).

The influence of culture, power and politics on the behavior of others in the organization

Organization culture, power and politics have adverse effects on the employees of the organization both at individual or group level. The effects of these aspects on individuals and organizations as a whole are discussed as follows.

Organization culture entails the ideologies, beliefs, principles and values that guide the people in the organization. Organization culture is very critical in shaping individual and corporate behavior as it determines the direction of action and thinking for individuals and the organization as a whole. Organization culture is determined by the rituals that the business conducts, the values, beliefs, norms, language and means above others. Because of this, organization culture identifies the organization for what it is, what it does and the way it does its operations and activities. Therefore, organization culture gives individuals and the organization as a whole a sense of identity. Organization culture also enhances individual employees to stay committed to the course taken by the organization. It helps individual employees to stay committed to the organization’s vision and mission. Hence, this helps the corporation as a whole to work towards its goals. Because of this, organization culture reinforces and clarifies the standards of organization behavior. Culture determines the manner in which employees interact with each other while at their place of work. Culture also enhances a good relationship at the workplace and it presents some guidelines that are pre-defined that guide employees and give them direction. For the people from outside the organization, it distinguishes one organization from the other. It also brings people from different backgrounds to a common platform. Cultural influence is based on organizational power, roles, tasks and personalities. Cultural influence can be weak or strong depending on an organization. There are different types of organization cultures that include clan culture whereby people in the organization share a lot and live like an extended family. There are also hierarchical cultures whereby people are formal and are guided by procedures. Other organizations have adhocracy culture whereby the organization is dynamic, creative an entrepreneurial (Robbins, et al. Pg. 47).

Organization power also has significant influence on individual and the organization as a whole. Power pushes people in the organization to produce the desired results. Organization power influences people to act according to the wishes or demands of those with power. The influence of power in the organization is diverse and its implications on organization behavior come in many forms. These forms include; obedience, resistance, compliance, commitment and conformity. To some people in the organization, they resist power by not doing as per the wishes of those influencing them. To other people, they succumb to power by going against their wishes and thus being obedient. People in organizations also comply with power when they accept the influence of power and they expect to be rewarded or punished for responding to the influence of power. Further, some people conform to power by accepting the influence of power and the need to be in the mainstream. Further, people in organization or the organization as a whole may also be committed to the influence of power by being enthusiastic and spending their energy and talent to satisfy the influences of power. The influence of power in the organization may be positive or negative and defines the performance of individuals and the organization as a whole (Organizational Behavior, Pg. 73).

Politics entails the irrational behavior of people in the organization who seek advantages that are beyond their control. Politics in the organization has both positive and negative effects. The positive implications include giving people in the organization leverage to express themselves and explore their talents. Politics also helps people in to explore other channels that are not defined in organization management and structure to address issues that affect them.  However, politics mostly has negative effects for the individuals and organizations such as reduced productivity by individuals and the organization eventually. When people engage in politics, they pay less attention to their work; they backbite, criticize and fail to achieve targets within the set timelines. Other influences of politics is that it reduces concentration, spoils the ambience, changes employee attitude, reduces motivation of employees, increases stress and leads to manipulation of information (Robbins, et al. Pg. 77).

Culture, power and politics are essential ingredients that shape organization behavior. This analysis recommends Brakemore UK to engage an adhocracy culture as it is effective for a dynamic organization where people are creative, entrepreneurial and take risks for given work situations.

Evaluation how to motivate individuals and teams to achieve a goal

Motivation entails the forces within people in organizations that give them the persistent, level and direction to accomplish the efforts expended to them. Therefore, for the organization to optimize on the motivational potential of their employees, they need to link their rewards to the performance of human resources. The new management should also respect individual differences and the diversity in the organization as well as allocate rewards in a manner that satisfies its interests and individuals. To put motivation into perspective, the analysis explores the various theories of motivation. In evaluating the organization, the analysis looks at the content theories and processes theories of motivation with a view of establishing how these theories can be applied to better motivate individuals and teams to achieve organizational goals.

Categorically, content theories are concerned with human needs and how people in organizations with different needs respond to different situations of work. On the other hand, process theories looks at how people in the organization make decisions and attach meaning to rewards and different behaviors related to work. Some of the content theories include the hierarchy of needs theory, the two factor theory, ERG theory and Acquired needs theory. On the other hand, the process theories include the expectancy theory, equity theory and goal setting theory. To help the new owners of the business to effectively motivate the employees of the organization, this analysis selects the hierarchy of needs theory by Abraham Maslow and the equity theory by Stacy Adams as a content and process theory respectively for possible application on future organizational situations.

The hierarchy of needs theory was developed by Abraham Maslow (see appendix 1) who classified human needs into low-order needs and high-order needs. The deficit principle that guides this theory is that a satisfied need never motivates the behavior of an employee or individual. The theory is also guided by the progress principle whereby needs at a level do not motivate until the preceding level has been satisfied.

In motivating the employees of the organization, this analysis makes the following proposals. Needs are grouped as physiological, safety and social needs which form the lower cadre of needs. Esteem and self-actualization needs form the upper cadre of needs. To effectively motivate and influence the behavior of people at the organization, the manager at Brakemore UK should first establish the level of satisfaction of needs for various employees and look for opportunities for satisfaction at every level.

For instance, for employees at the physiological level needs, the organization may need to do the following. Schedule work to give employees reasonable working hours, ensure physical comfort at the job and give refreshments and rest breaks. For employees seeking safety needs, the organization should ensure that the conditions for working are safe, assure job security and offer benefits and base compensation. Further, for employees seeking to satisfy their social needs, the organization should ensure that the organization has friendly co-workers, ensure customer interaction and have pleasant supervisors. For high level needs, to satisfy esteem needs the opportunities to give employees include praising and recognizing them, promoting them to high ranks and giving them responsibility for important jobs. To satisfy self-actualization needs, the opportunities to look for include giving employee’s job tasks that are challenging and those that require their creativity, making them participate in making of decisions and giving them job autonomy and flexibility (Schein, et al. Pg. 77).

On the other hand, the management of the organization may use process theories to motivate individuals and teams to achieve organizational goals. The process theories entail the approaches that address how people in organizations make decisions to work or not basing on the available rewards, their preferences and possible outcomes from the jobs. To illustrate how the organization can utilize process theories, this analysis proposes the application of equity theory of motivation. Equity theory was developed by Stacy Adams (see appendix 2) and states that people in organizations need to feel that they are being treated fairly for them to have good behaviors that enhance their performance and work towards the achievement of organizational goals. Therefore, when people feel that they are not treated equally as others in the organization, they eliminate the situation by their perceived equity or inequity. In enhancing the motivation strategies of the organization, the management should compare the personal rewards in relation to their inputs and other rewards as well as other inputs by employees to determine the perceived equality or inequality. To explore opportunities in this theory, the organization should ensure that employees are not overpaid or underpaid. This will remove perceptions such as anger and guilty respectively and thus enhance the motivational outcomes of teams and the entire organization. Other things to look at include negative consequences of equity, not underestimating sources of controversy on equity such as comparable worth and gender equity (McInerney, et al. Pg. 105).

Demonstrate an understanding of how to cooperate effectively with others

Despite the organization having individual employees, these employees form part of organizational teams that work towards achieving set goals and objectives. The ability of the organization to perform better and become successful depends on how teams are effective in cooperating to realize common goals. However, for an organization such as Brakemore UK that is the verge of changing ownership to private international owners; the teams in the organization are likely to face the following problems in the future. For example, the teams may experience change management challenges owing to the anticipated changes in the management of the firm. Some teams may be resistant to the changes that the new management may effect. Other problems include disengagement. This may be as a result of lack of proper direction or vision by the new management. As a result, the members of various teams may fail to understand their roles in the organization resulting in lack of motivation. There may also be challenges relating to talent differences as the new management may make some changes to entrench its authority which may be viewed negatively by the existing teams. Other challenges include rule uncertainty and lack of trust among others. However, to overcome these challenges, the new management of the organization may ensure effective cooperation by making use of team-building activities to create a happy and productive team. First, the new management needs to set its priorities right, concentrate its financial resources, combine expertise and knowledge and address diversity issues to achieve a bigger impact on the identified problems above. Through this, the new management can lighten the work load for its employees, reduce duplication and thus enhance cooperation through better results. The organization may also adopt new team management tools. These tools would be: having regular team meetings with agendas and sufficient time to discuss them, having job descriptions for team members and reviewing them after some time, having standard criteria for evaluation, promoting and enhancing respect among team leaders and members. The new management should also listen more to its employees and address their concerns promptly. Other strategies include using financial incentives, delegating roles and responsibilities to team members and challenging them among others. Through these strategies the various teams will effectively cooperate and thus achieve organizational goals (Miner, Pg. 32).

Conclusion

The successful management of new organizational situations depends on how effective organization management is at applying various concepts and philosophies that relate to organization behavior. However, these concepts and philosophies may have positive or negative influences on organization behavior. The concepts to address include perception, individual differences, a person as a whole, human dignity and motivated behavior. The new management of Brakemore should also strive to value every person in the organization and view the organization as a system which every part of it is significant in realizing set goals. The management should also select and apply effective team management theories to ensure that employees are motivated to work as teams for the common good of the organization.  The new management should embrace diversity management because of the diverse backgrounds of the employees of the organization going into the future. The management of the firm is recommended to utilize the Tuckman theory of team management that entails the pre-group, forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning. Using this theory, the new management will offer direction and guidance, resolve differences for members to work well with each other and support team members for personal development. The new management should look for opportunities of effective team performance in various work situations by striking a balance between the independence and interdependence of people in the organization. For instance, it should explore opportunities on how to make existing teams to work best using the following strategies. Other strategies to use include, developing strong commitments for common objectives, defining the responsibilities and roles for team members, defining communication channels and work procedures and ensuring effective decision systems and cultivating an environment that fosters good interpersonal relationships. The new management may also boost the morale of teams through things such as resources, communication, support and personalities. Finally, the management should align the culture, power and politics in the organization to ensure an improvement of the situation in the organization.

References

Kantola, Jussi. Organizational Resource Management: Theories, Methodologies, & Applications. , 2016. Internet resource.

McInerney, D M, Richard A. Walker, and Gregory A. D. Liem. Sociocultural Theories of Learning and Motivation: Looking Back, Looking Forward. Charlotte, N.C: Information Age Pub, 2011. Internet resource.

Miner, John B. Organizational Behavior 1: Essential Theories of Motivation and Leadership. , 2015. Print.

MINER, JOHN B. Role Motivation Theories. Place of publication not identified: ROUTLEDGE, 2017. Print.

Organizational Behavior. McGraw-Hill College, 2015. Print.

Robbins, Stephen P, and Tim Judge. Organizational Behavior. , 2019. Print.

Robbins, Stephen P, and Timothy A. Judge. Essentials of Organizational Behavior. , 2018. Print.

Schein, Edgar H, and Peter A. Schein. Organizational Culture and Leadership. , 2017. Internet resource.

Appendix 1: Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Theory

Appendix 2: Stacy Adam’s Equity Theory