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0:26
Hello friends, a very warm welcome to to this new course, advanced course in organizational behavior. This course is an important application in the field of psychology for managers, for scholars, and OB professionals. When I am saying about introduction to organizational behavior, in this module, we are going to discuss about that how an individual, when working at personal and professional level and at group level as well as organizational level,
1:04
how he becomes efficient enough to integrate his own personal resources effectively to achieve his individual goals and organizational goals. In nutshell, this subject as organizational behavior will help individual to understand the interplay or the interface between job, between work, and as an individual. So before getting into more detail about this field of psychology that is organizational behavior,
1:36
I will briefly discuss that what exactly it is, how this discipline can be defined in a very appropriate manner, what are its applications and how it has evolved since its conception and how it is playing a major role in managing organizations. That is introduction to organizational behavior.
1:57
We are well versed with our day-to-day life experiences that how we can understand human behavior based on his facial expressions, based on his body language, based on his tone, based on his words that he used to communicate any message. And we tend to generally generalize what the person has the intention. But the point is that the generalization is actually very unsystematic in nature.
2:24
When we are talking about understanding human behavior at work, then we require some streamlining of an individual's understanding in a very systematic and rational manner. How are we going to do that? So there comes the interplay or major role of organizational behavior—how an individual's behavior at work can be understood, modified, or developed for a major goal in different directions. Now, these different directions are in terms of knowledge, skills, and abilities.
2:58
Now, this kind of understanding has to be systematic in nature, and how the systematic routine of understanding human behavior at work comes under the area that is organizational behavior. So we can define organizational behavior as the study of human behavior in organizational settings. It is the interface between human behavior and the organization. That is, it is an interplay.
3:24
It is an interface where the background is the organization, and in the picture is the individual or group of people who are working toward a common goal. Therefore, organizational behavior is actually a discipline where we understand human behavior at work at three levels. The first is the micro level, which is the individual level, which entails an individual's own attitudes, personality, preferences, and lifestyle.
3:55
It can be studied at the meso level, that is, the group level, where people interact with different other members of the group—how they tend to interact with what kind of behavior they adopt while maintaining interpersonal relationships with the other members of the group. They tend to understand each other and in what manner. And most importantly, when they experience any conflict, they face any conflict, and how they tend to resolve those conflicts.
4:20
Now, this also entails decision-making or leadership. And the third level is the organizational level, which is the macro level. It talks about the organizational systems. It talks about the structure. It talks about the design. It talks about the different departments where every organization or department is working to achieve a common goal. For instance, I would say that any organization that launches any product in the market,
4:49
This calls for a combination of different kinds of people to achieve the common goal, such as marketing, sales, manufacturing, and finance. When all these specializations work together at the individual, organizational, and group levels, because there is a team working with different specializations toward the common goal, which is to launch a particular product. Now, all three levels are working in synchronization: the micro level, meso level, and macro level. This is organizational behavior.
5:22
There comes the role of organizational behavior because it is not only about how the product has to be launched. When people are working together at the individual, group, and organizational levels, then how individual behavior affects the achievement of the goal. Thus, we can say that OB applies the knowledge gained about individuals, groups, and the effects of structure and behavior to make organizations work more effectively.
5:51
Here, 'effectively' has a very deep meaning in terms of how well you perform the job or work with the organization, and in what manner we use resources so efficiently that we achieve goals collectively. So, this is how we define organizational performance.
6:10
At the same time, what are the different situations where OB comes into play? There are different situations and applications of OB in various arenas within organizations. So, OB is connected with employment-related situations and emphasizes behavior related to concerns such as jobs, work, absenteeism, employment turnover, productivity, human performance, and management. If we talk about a job, it refers to an individual's role or the tasks they perform in their position.
6:44
It is about work—specialized or skilled tasks that an individual performs as an employee. It is absenteeism—perhaps the job is very boring, and the person tries to escape from work. They will not show up for work. That is absenteeism. It can be employment turnover when the person is dissatisfied with their job—perhaps due to salary or relationships with coworkers. This leads to turnover, where the person intends to leave the job or resigns.
7:17
Or it can be productivity, human performance, and management. It is about how you perform the job, how you quantify your work, and the quality of your performance. It also includes some other core topics that is motivation, leader behavior and power, interpersonal communication, group structure and process, attitude development and perception, change process, conflict and negotiation, work design, consulting, counterproductive work behavior and decision making.
7:48
Motivation as a term implies that how the leader can motivate the employees towards the common goal while giving them more incentives while performing a good job. It can be about the environment. It can be about certain factors that an individual would require to perform the job in a very efficient manner. It is about leader behavior and power. Who has been appointed as a leader, selected as a leader?
8:13
What kind of leadership style the person would adopt to manage human behavior or behavior of the employees towards the common goal? Direct them, tell them the strategy and how to perform the job. Now, along with leadership comes the power as well. Then how the power has been used by the leader to motivate employees? The other is interpersonal communication. It can be about the hierarchy.
8:37
It can be about the type of kind of communication that floats within the organization in order to communicate any particular information. It can be unilateral. It can be vertical. It can be horizontal. But the idea is, the more the information flows within the organization in a very lucid manner, the fewer the communication gaps. Group structure and process.
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How the groups, how the teams have been formed based on the objective, based on the goal of the organization, and how people are coming together with different expertise, knowledge, abilities, and skills to perform the job. Now, on what basis the group will be structured—in terms of the leader, in terms of decision-making, in terms of power, and in terms of the roles that any individual would play to meet the common goal. It can be attitude development and perception.
9:28
It is about changing the perception, modifying the perception, modifying the attitude in terms of preferences, in terms of likes and dislikes of an individual—how an individual perceives his job and the environment. The more positive the working environment is, the more positive the attitude will be, which is something very bilateral in nature. The other is the change process. According to the marketing situation, according to globalization, how an organization is launching different products.
10:00
But before launching, how that change can be better modified within individuals and groups to enhance performance. That means it is a kind of training that any organization can impart. To any individual employee or at the group level to modify their performance through training programs, like on-the-job or off-the-job training, and then performing the new task in a very novel fashion.
10:29
It is about conflict and negotiations—how to resolve the conflict, how to negotiate or persuade any strategy so that it can be implemented in terms of benefits and advantages that can be imparted or handed over to the employees. It is about work design—how the job has to be designed, where an individual's task is assigned based on his abilities.
10:54
And to what extent it gives maximum satisfaction to an individual that he has performed a substantial piece of task which has contributed in organizational success. It is consulting where people tend to intervene, understand and assess the reasons of conflict among members and how those conflicts can be resolved. It can also entail that how the environment of any organization can be enhanced through induction programs or introducing new schemes which are more beneficial for any organization
11:29
It is counterproductive work behaviors to identify any untoward behavioral patterns of individuals such as bullying, theft, cybercrime, which can hamper the security of the organization or any secret of the organization and can hamper or tarnish the image of any company or organization. And the last is decision making.
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It is about leadership who takes a real decision, but even the leader has the power to grant maximum latitude to the employees to take the decision or participate in decision making process. So, these are certain core topics where organizational behavior has its maximum application to understand because when you are talking about this list of core topics, it actually deals with real human behavior, not the other tangible assets of any organization. Why?
12:25
Because employees in itself the first asset, first and the most important asset of any organization. When they are being organized effectively by the HR professionals or OB professionals, then definitely the organization will lead in the right direction. Thus, incorporating OB principles into the workplace can yield many important organizational outcomes. As I said just now that since employees. are the most important asset of any organization.
12:55
Therefore, we can say that if organization is playing an important role to understand the employee behavior in a very accurate fashion, then definitely the outcomes have to be positive. So, the first outcome can be that developing managers' interpersonal skills help organizations attract and retain high-performing employees. which is only possible when employees are highly motivated. They have to perform appropriate work or job which is well designed for them only.
13:24
They have more decision latitude. They are more trained to perform a particular task and are not indulging much in counterproductive work behaviors. Their attitude is also positive and they are engaging in more positive activities. They have strong association that exists between the quality of workplace relationships and employee job satisfaction, stress and turnover.
13:48
This is the but obvious outcome of any OB principle that whenever employee behavior is positive, then it leads to reduced level of stress among employee and the organizations. There is better relationship between the employee and the employer and there is reduced turnover. When you are happy at your work, then definitely the intention to leave the organization will also fade away. That is why it is always being said that a happy worker is a productive worker.
14:16
Positive work relationships help employees flourish. leading to improvements in job and life satisfaction, positive emotions at work and perceptions that one's work has meaning. There is more internal assessment of an individual's job by an employee itself because when a person is satisfied with a job, when an employee is satisfied with his job, he has more feeling to flourish in the sense that he is experiencing some meaning in his job because it is a best person job fit.
14:44
that he has been chosen for a particular job because of his own knowledge skills and abilities that entails that the person is happy with his job because there is best person job fit and person organization fit and there is more satisfaction why because satisfaction is a term which has spillover effect if a person is happy at work it has a spillover effect on the other domains of life and vice versa.
15:09
So that leads to life satisfaction and the person has more meaning in his job because there is more positive evaluation of oneself. The person has more increased feeling that he or she is contributing to the organization because he has some more meaning to his work. Definitely, this has more substantial understanding of the job in a very intrinsic manner that this is job what I am doing. I am contributing to the organization and I am contributing to the society.
15:40
And last, increasing the OB element in organizations can foster social responsibility awareness while training future leaders to address social issues within their organizations. It is all about understanding the understanding of right and wrong, ethical and unethical. moral and immoral when a person who is indulged or engaged in a job in a very deep manner where the person is harnessing himself with the job and finds difficulty to detach from the job
16:09
the person also understands that there has to be some awareness about understanding that what is right what is wrong what is ethical and unethical When all this kind of understanding develops within an employee, then definitely this fosters social awareness and responsibility. Now, this responsibility is in form of finance. It can be in form of environment. It can be in form of an individual level that what kind of environment a person is getting or offering or reciprocating to the organization.
16:41
So that is how when OB principles are functioning in appropriate manner or they are streamlined with the organizational principles, then it has all the positive outcomes. Next is the management and organizational behavior. When we talk about management, when we talk about organizational behavior, they work in sync. They will never work in parallel. They will always work in sync. So when we are talking about organizational behavior, then definitely comes the role of manager.
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When we are talking about employee, employee is there. Manager is also an employee. But manager is the most important designation in any organization who will play a major role. How to collectively and individually generate and integrate all the human and organizational resources in a very effective manner. That is the most important role of any manager who will make the organization successful.
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So when we are trying to elaborate on OB, it becomes pertinent to begin with briefly defining the terms manager and organization. So the place where managers work. So then let's look at the manager's job and what managers do. They have some specific roles which are unsaid, but definitely they are performing those roles in a very appropriate and elaborative manner. They are explicit in their performance that this is their job and they're doing it.
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So a manager is an individual who achieves goals through other people. Now, through other people here means that disseminating knowledge and assigning roles and jobs to other employees or co-workers will help the manager achieve the organizational goal or the broader goal. And it is primarily responsible for making decisions, allocating resources, and directing activities within the organization. So, all in all, the manager will assign roles to the employees.
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He will distribute or allocate all the important resources required to perform a particular job. And at the same time, the manager also ensures that the organization functions on a relatively continuous basis to achieve a common goal or set of goals. Now, continuous basis means that there is a cycle where everybody is working toward the goal and performing his or her role in a very streamlined fashion. Then there has to be continuity.
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If any block is created, the whole system will come to a halt. So, this is the manager's responsibility: to ensure the chain of functions continues from one point to another so that the broader goal can be achieved. By this definition, for example, manufacturing and service firms are organizations. And so are schools, hospitals, military units, retail stores, police departments, and local, state, and federal government agencies.
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All are organizations, and all such organizations are run by a particular manager designated to regulate their functioning. So, this is the interplay between the manager and the organization. They cannot exist without each other. They complement each other. They work in sync. They can never work on parallel lines. They always have to work in sync so that the objective can be achieved. Since we are talking about managers, they perform specific functions.
20:09
In those functions, the kind of job they are doing is beyond discussion. But in every organization, whichever employee is a manager, he has a specific format to perform his functions. These functions are planning, organizing, directing, and controlling. Every manager will do it, be it any organization, any industry, or any group. But definitely, a manager will perform these functions in a very unspoken manner, which the person has to adhere to.
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Initially, Henry Fayol, who is known as the father of management, defined the functions of a manager as planning, organizing, commanding, coordinating, and controlling. But recently, these functions have been condensed into four categories. They are planning, organizing, leading, and controlling.
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So planning is a function which encompasses defining an organization's goals, establishing an overall strategy for achieving those goals, and developing a comprehensive set of plans to integrate and coordinate activities. Evidence indicates that this function increases the most as managers move from lower-level to middle-level management. There is a hierarchy in every organization and at every level there is a manager
21:32
And he is performing this function in terms of planning where he is forming or formulating the goals. He is formulating the strategy that how the goal has to be achieved and who will perform which task as per the goal. So there is a comprehensive plan of delegation and then integrating those delegations or activities in a very concise manner which will evaluate that whether the organization can achieve the goal or not. So, this is planning.
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Now, this also includes not only delegation of duties, it is also about identifying and collecting all the resources which are required to achieve the goal. The other is organizing. Managers are also responsible for designing an organization structure. Who will perform the task in what manner is a different issue. And how those tasks will be performed based on the structure. That is, it includes determining what tasks are to be done, who is to do them and how the tasks are to be grouped.
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Person will come with every kind of skills, abilities and knowledge. But how that ability or competency has to be organized, that requires this function of organizing. how tasks are to be grouped and who reports to whom and where decisions are to be made. Definitely, there has to be again a hierarchy so that every role is organized and the role of communication at every level has to be streamlined. This is organizing. Even planning is there. Plan is there. Strategy is there. Who will execute?
23:08
This execution requires lot of organizing because when we are creating a hierarchy, this hierarchy is going to from top to bottom or bottom to top. In every sense, there has to be some kind of communication that who will do which kind of task, how reporting will be done. This reporting is based on complete information available so that the next plan of action can be achieved. This is organizing. The other is leading.
23:35
As the term implies, it talks about the finding the right fit in terms of leader to accomplish the task. the function entails motivating employees directing their activities selecting the the most effective communication channels and resolving the conflicts among members and who will do that here comes the main important role of a leader the group is there the group will decide who will lead the group who will motivate who will resolve the conflict who will put forth
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The interest of the group members towards their authorities so that the functioning can be very much smooth and cordial. This is the leading function of any manager. And the last is controlling. This function includes monitoring and comparing the organization's performance with previously set goals. Previous goal and the current goal and the next forward. When results are being compared, monitoring is there. Where we started, what we are doing and where we have reached.
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In all the three stages, we are comparing because this comparison has a positive intention that we have to grow further. Company started at this particular point, we have captured the market this much of percentage and following the new strategy, there will be some kind of planning and organizing that we will lead to the another level of capturing the market, maybe at a 70% from 50 to 70%.
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This is controlling. So, when this is only possible when we are monitoring the current, previous and future performances. And if there is any significant deviation or any lapses in the performance or strategy that has been formulated, then corrective actions are taken so as to improve the strategy and achieve the goal.
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Now, here, when I'm using the word strategy all in till now in my discussion, here strategy is very important word because any organization can only function when they have a strategy. Strategy to launch a product, strategy to generate the finances, strategy to market the product, strategy to retain the customers and strategy to retain the employees. So, strategy is very important which is the most important base or pillar where organizations are standing through.
25:57
So, this is the important function of controlling that is this monitoring, comparing and potentially correcting is the controlling function. So the most important functions of a manager are planning, organizing, directing, and controlling. All right. Next come management roles. These are the kinds of functions a manager plays, which we have already discussed. Next come the management roles. Even in planning, organizing, and controlling, these are the broader aspects.
26:30
But at every level, some kind of behavioral role has to be performed by the manager. It is not that controlling and everything is controlled. No, some intrinsic or implicit behavioral patterns have been identified by HR professionals, where they perform some behavioral roles at every level. They are just understood; they are reflected in their behavior, and those behaviors, when filtered, come with a comprehensive plan that these are the acceptable roles or behavioral patterns
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of any successful manager. So, in the late 1960s, Henry Mintzberg, a renowned management author, came up with his books where he explained a number of management roles that are performed by managers. And they are highly interrelated roles that a manager performs. Now, interrelated roles are so many roles. Maybe there are 10, 20, or 15 roles that a manager has to perform or can perform. But Mintzberg has classified those roles into 10 roles and another subcategories.
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They are interpersonal, informational and decisional roles. Interpersonal roles, these roles include all managers to perform duties that are ceremonial and symbolic. That every manager has to do, no matter what, what designation a manager has. But he is performing his basic duties which are symbolic, which gives him more recognition at the workplaces based on his managerial liberty or power. And this is what he is doing. And such performing roles is a figurehead role.
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All managers have a leadership role and it includes different kinds of functions that they have to perform. It can not only be restricted to controlling, designing or planning. It can be about training. It can be motivation. It can be about creating norms for the employees so that the behavior can be controlled. And the third role within the interpersonal grooming is the lesion role, where the manager solicit all the information from the outside resources to
28:39
So that the correct decision can be taken. So, in Lision role, the manager has networking and has maintained interpersonal relationship with those resources and try to solicit all the information which is prevalent outside the organization. It is not about sharing the secret of your organization. It is about becoming more aware of the outside environment and then bringing those changes within the work itself.
29:08
So, this is an interpersonal role of a manager in terms of a figurehead role, a leadership role, or a liaison role in contacting others. The informational roles are more related to collecting information from outside organizations and then controlling organizational activities. Now, this includes intuitions and learning of changes in the public environment, tastes, and what competitors may be planning, and the like. Mintzberg called this role the monitor role.
29:41
In the informational role, he is just collecting information. But in informational roles, he is using that information to bring about more changes in the workplace. So, this has more application. You have networking as a liaison officer, but here you are performing this role as an informational role—using outside information to bring more changes in the workplace.
30:08
At the same time, he is using this information to disseminate it to other people within the organization or the group that is using or spreading that information. There is dissemination of information in the form of new knowledge, where employees learn more about the outside environment and also try to represent the group by being a spokesperson and representing the organization to outsiders.
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A spokesperson of any organization can handle the media well, letting them know about any merger or acquisition that is going to happen within the organization and how the media should explain it to the public. This is the role of a spokesperson as a manager. And the third role is the decisional roles. Mintzberg identified four roles that require making choices. It is not only about choices, it is about latitude as well, decision latitude.
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The more the decision latitude, the more employees have the liberty or freedom to take decisions on their own and then implement. So this can be the role of making choices as an entrepreneur role where managers initiate and oversee new projects to improve the organization's performance. And he can be a disturbance handler where managers take corrective action in response to unforeseen problems, any uncertainty, any calamity that can happen in any organization can only be resolved.
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Any conflict can only be resolved because these are the situations where a person cannot foresee. It just comes in front of them and they have to take the lead in terms of decision, resolve those conflict or uncertain situations. This is the role of a person as a disturbance handler. And the other role can be of as a resource allocator, where managers are responsible for allocating human, physical and monetary resources. Monetary resources, generating resources for production of the products.
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It can be about finances, that how the finance can be used for purchasing better machinery for increasing manufacturing units. So this is about physical, monetary and human resources. Hiring more people so that manufacturing units can be increased, production can be increased and hiring more people to bring in more talent and abilities. Finally, managers also perform a negotiated role in which they discuss issues and bargain with other units to gain advantages for their own unit.
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So these are the roles which are very much defined based on behavioral aspect of the managers, which are very much implicit in nature, but every manager will perform accordingly. But everybody has these kind of roles to perform. This is just a concise way to understand the roles. The first role, interpersonal role. Figurehead role, it is symbolic role. And they are required to perform a number of routine duties of a legal or social nature. This is a figurehead role that one has to do it.
33:24
The leader responsible for the motivation and direction of employees. Liaison maintains a network of outside contacts who provide favors and information. That is just collecting information from the outside resources. They maintain networking. The other role is informational. That is monitor information receives a wide variety of information and serves as a nerve center of internal and external information of the organization.
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Disseminator, transmitting information that has been solicited from the outside resources and to the organization and the employees so that the strategy can be improved. And the other is spokesperson role, transmit information to outsiders on organizations, plans, policies, actions and results. As I give you the example of Merger and Acquisition and serves as an expert on organizations industry.
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And the other, as we discussed just now, decisional roles, that is the role of an entrepreneur, searches organization and environment for opportunities and initiate projects to bring about change.
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it can be about that any organization who understands the demand in the market it can be about health it can be about technology it can be about education then what kind of technology can be introduced in the market that will help them to generate more profit more capital and more capturing of the market so this is entrepreneur role of any manager the disturbance handler responsible for corrective actions when organization faces important and unexpected disturbances.
35:02
Resource allocator makes or approves significant organizational decisions. And the last is negotiator, responsible for representing the organization at major negotiations, where, for example, in any summit, or any conferences when all the organizations come together for a common discussion or common delegation and how people come to a common conclusion or decision that how it should be executed. For example, climatic change. Any organization can talk about ethicality.
35:37
Any organizations can talk about corporate social responsibilities that how environment can be saved, how any organization can contribute to the organization. So when organizations tend to bend upon on all these issues, then also comes the role of negotiator that which organization can play an important role in terms of corporate social responsibility or ethicality. OK, next comes the management skills. The roles are there. Functions are there.
36:07
But every manager also holds some skills because without skill, they cannot perform the role. They cannot even function appropriately. So, what are those skills that any manager has? The first is technical skills. It is all about the technical knowledge that any manager would pursue and persist in, and how it is being used for enhanced performance.
36:32
So, these skills encompass the ability to apply specialized knowledge or expertise, such as civil engineers or oral surgeons, and typically focus on the technical skills they have learned through extensive formal education. In a particular construction company, the manager would be a civil engineer who has expertise in constructing bridges and roads. They have their own focus and expertise and how they can be used in a very appropriate manner. This is technical skill. The other is human skills.
37:06
These skills include the ability to understand, communicate, motivate, and support other people, both individually and in groups, especially in challenging situations where more decisions have to be made so that every member is not affected by one particular decision. A manager must possess these skills to effectively understand, communicate, motivate, and support others. And the last is conceptual skills. Managers must have the mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex situations.
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Even conflicts that arise between two employees—the manager should be able to understand the real problem that exists between them. It should not be very explicit that you are right, and you are wrong. Manager should understand the perspective of both the employees. That is a conceptual skill. This task requires conceptual skills and includes decision making, identifying the problems between people and within organizations.
38:07
Develop alternative solutions and evaluate and execute those alternative solutions. These skills also include the ability to integrate new ideas with the existing process and innovate on a job. For example, any hiring procedure with the intrusion, maybe I would say invasion of technology.
38:27
In every sphere of life, even hiring process has also changed, where role of AI has played an important role when it comes to hiring and selection of appropriate employees, where the objective is that the selection should not be biased and it has to be transparent. towards a particular category of people so that there is more inclusiveness in workplaces.
38:52
So there is a change or shift in the conceptualization of the skills of managers that how the organizational process can be more modified or it can be innovative to understand and enhance organizational performances. So it is not only about people, it is also about understanding the environment, understanding the application of existing concepts and how it can be improved. As I gave with the example of AI, there are other concepts also, for example, diversity, equity and inclusiveness.
39:25
It has become a major issue in organizations and how organizations are pursuing these concepts in a very systematic manner based on equal employment opportunity policies. So this is conceptual skills. So managers need to enhance, upgrade their knowledge based on the existing environment and what other organizations are doing to move ahead and compete globally. So, these are the three skills which a manager must have that is the technical skills, human skills and the conceptual skills.
40:02
So, this is all about the introduction to organizational behavior in terms of managers—what kind of functions a manager performs, what roles they fulfill, and the skills they possess to make the organization function effectively. So, that's all for the discussion. Thank you.
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