COURSE CODE – MBDS 5025
COURSE NAME – Organizational Behaviour
Catalog Description
People play pivotal roles in providing organizations with the edge to not only survive but to
thrive amidst the stiff global competition that pervades the business world in the 21st
Century. Thus, people are a precious resource in any organization, and if well nurtured and
led, will form cornerstone upon which success can be build. The increasingly competitive and
demanding business environment has created new challenges for organizations wherein
understanding and managing people’s behaviour has been one of the most crucial factors.
To stay ahead of the competition, it is imperative that organization leverage on their people
by developing a committed, confident, loyal, hardworking, motivated, engaged and resilient
workforce. In order to achieve these, managers and leaders must first understand behaviour in
organizations and understand how people perceive things, what shapes their attitudes, drive
their behaviour and motivate them and how to motivate them to strive for both personal and
organizational goals. Organizational behavior is the study of how individual and groups
impact the behaviour within an organization. As managers or as employees, students will
encounter issues ranging from the individual level to the group level and the organizational
level, and they will need to be aware of how these areas fit into their working life. Topics in
this course include understanding individual differences, personality, attitude, motivating and
leading employees, working in effective groups, ethics and conflict management, among
others which would help the students to gain insight about the individual’s personality,
attitude, motivation, learning, perception and group dynamics to become effective
management professional.
Text Books
1. Robbins P. Stephen, Judge A. Timothy and Vohra, Niharika (2016). Organizational
Behaviour, 14th edition, Pearson Education.
Reference Books
1. Nelson L. Debra, Quick, J. C. and Khandelwal, P. (2011). Organizational Behavior -.
Cengage Learning.
2. Luthans, Fred (2008). Organizational Behavior. Tata Mc.Graw Hill, India.
3. Steven McShane; Mary Von Glinow (2014). Organizational Behavior, 7th Edition,
Tata Mc Graw Hill, India.
Online Resources
1. https://www.16personalities.com/free-personality-test
2. Are leaders born (yes) or do they become great (no)? www.debate.org
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgUCyWhJf6s&vl=en (Emotional Intelligence)
CO Course outcomes (COs)
CO1 Illustrate the foundation and models of human behavior in the organizations
with the understanding of individual personality and perceptual process.
CO2 Interpret and illustrate how individual influence organizational events and how
events within an organization influence individual’s learning, attitude and
emotional stability.
CO3 Examine and prescribe which of the motivational theories would be the most
effective in enhancing employee productivity at workplace.
CO4 Illustrate the behavioural patterns and interpersonal skills required at individual
and group levels for building high-performing teams and choosing best
techniques for managing conflicts in the organization.
CO5 Relate the role of leaders for developing organization culture differentiating
from power dynamics.
Course Content
Unit I: Foundation of Organizational and Individual Behaviour 8 lecture hours
Foundations and Importance of Organization Behavior of OB; Contemporary Organizational
Behavior; Subsequent Phases of Hawthorne studies; Predecessors of OB; Future Perspectives
of OB; Emerging Challenges in OB; Exercise – Discuss the challenges for managers in
designing a new organization to discuss OB and the Manager’s Job; Personality: Definition
and Nature; Determinants of Personality – Nature vs. Nature; Personality Traits – Big Five
Model; Attributes of Personality Relevant to OB - Self-Esteem, Self-Monitoring, Locus of
Control, Type A and Type B, Machiavellianism.
Case Study: Is there a price for being too nice. Pg 166-167 (Robbins et.al.);
Person Perception for Judging others like stereotyping, fundamental attribution error, etc.;
Robbins et.al.; Concept of Perception; Factors influencing Perceptions; Perceptual Process;
Attribution theory- distinctiveness, consistency & consensus, attribution biases
Unit II: Individual Learning, Attitude and Stress Management 7 lecture
hours
Relationship between Attitude and Behavior; Formation of attitudes (ABC model); Job
Attitudes – Job satisfaction, organizational commitment and involvement and its outcomes;
Case Study: Bounty Hunters. Robbins et al, pg. 94; Pattern of Human Learning –Nature &
Process; Classical Conditioning Theory; Reinforcement or Operant Conditioning Theory and
Learning; Social learning theory; Application of learning principles in organizational context
for shaping behavior and individual motivation; Emotional Intelligence and Importance of
handling emotions effectively; Organizational stress: meaning, types and its causes, Stress
management strategies
Experiential Exercise: Measuring Stress. OB – K. Aswathappa, pg 339;
HBR Article: The Set-Up-to-Fail Syndrome: How boss create their own poor performers
(March-April, 1998, www.hbr.org.)
Unit III: Motivation at the Workplace 5 lecture hours
Motivation and work Behaviour, Theory X and Y, Maslow’s Need Hierarchy Theory;
Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory and its implication for learning and performance; Vroom’s
expectancy theory: Concept and Application;
Case Study: Engstrom Auto Mirror Plant: Motivating in Good Times and Bad (HBS, 2175,
2008);
Equity theory, Implication at workplace;
Case Study: Repairing Job that fail to satisfy. Robbins et.al., pg. 638-641.
Unit IV: Group Development and Conflict Management 8 lecture hours
Defining and Classifying Groups; Stages of Group Formation; Groups vs. teams and Group
properties (Roles and Norms); Understanding Work Teams – Problem solving, cross-
functional, virtual and self-managed; Group decision making – group think and group shift,
Nominal group Technique, Brainstorming, Delphi technique; Importance of Interpersonal
Relationships at Workplace with the help of Johari Window;
Case Study: A Boss is a Boss – or is She. OB, Parika & Gupta, Pg. 254;
Importance of Interpersonal Relationships at Workplace with the help of Johari Window;
Conflict - Meaning and Sources; Types of Conflict; Process of Conflict and Conflict
Management Styles; Strategies for Resolving Conflict;
Integrative Case for Group and Conflict: What’s New with Google’s Team and Leaders
(Book: OB by Moorhead and Griffin, Pg. 331-333).
Unit V: Power, Leadership and Organizational Culture 12 lecture
hours
Case Study: GE’s Controversial Leader. OB – K Aswathappa, pg. 494.
Nature of Leadership; Early Approaches to Leadership: University of Michigan Studies;
Leadership Theories: Path-goal theory Hersey Blanchard Theory ; Inspirational Approaches
to Leadership – Charismatic, Transformation and Transactional and their Implications;
Modern Perspective on Leadership, Alternatives to Leadership; Group Discussion: Emerging
Issues in Leadership; Power – Definition and sources; Contrasting Power and Leadership;
Five bases of power: Coercive, legitimate, reward, expert and referent;
Case Study: Did Toyota’s Culture causes its problems? Robbins et.al. Pg 577;
Culture – definition, Creating and sustaining culture; Functions and effects of Organizational
culture, Leader’s Role in Shaping and Reinforcing Culture
