Lecture 7

Question 1

Describe the Hawthorne Studies

Answer 1

Hawthorne studies claims to have solved the rational design conundrum

• Fundamentally different view of human nature
• Challenge assumptions of management

Highly influential research
Funded by GE

Objectives

• Increase efficiency
• Discover optimum conditions for workers
• Within rational paradigm
• Increase productivity
• Physical changes on worker productivity

6 Experiments:

1. Lighting – no effect
2. Breaks – no effect (increased outcome with social interaction)
3. Pay – no noticeable long term effect, had to stop
4. Separation – output dropped due to lack of team morale
5. Interviews – workers have obsessive irrational views. Importance of home environment.
6. The role of the group in determining output (bank wiring experiment)

Outcomes
- Discovered Human Relations theory
- Worker as social being
- Informal organisation
- Hawthorne effect
o Impact of observation on worker

Question 2

Explain Miller and Form’s social person

Answer 2

Miller and Form 1964

• Output determined by informal group
• The group standard reflected the culture
• Group had more impact than management
• The social being
  o People are governed by social needs rather than economic needs and self-interest
  o Primary social unit involved in all aspects of life
  o Social interaction: safety in numbers, sense of belonging
  o Shapes norms, perceptions and identity formation

Power of informal organisation

• The social organisation has more power than anything that management did
• It has social control over work habits and attitudes of the individual worker
• Major factor in the group’s productivity
• Social relations a resource for managers

Informal group is a necessary prerequisite for effective collaboration

Key findings

• Business organisation is a social system
• Employees’ satisfactions and dis-satisfactions impact productivity
• Employees are more than machines
• Want to use their own initiative

Question 3

What is power?

Answer 3

What is power?

• Influence? Control? Manipulation? Coercion?
• A marginal or central feature of organisational life?
• A possession someone has? A Result of their position in the hierarchy? Part of someone’s personal characteristics?
• No agreement on what power is

Question 4

Examples of power in action

Answer 4

Examples of power in action

Office politics
o Making sure everyone knows of your successes

Boardroom power struggles
o A member of marketing taking control of big decisions in opposition to the production manager

Information
o Secretary withholding access to the director

Role power
o Security guard preventing access to a building

Decision making
o Promotion opportunities

Worker power
o Going on strike – withdrawal of labour

Question 5

What is machiavellian politics

Answer 5

Machiavellian politics

• How power gained (and lost) by elite
• The immoral actions needed to gain power
• Need for realism (not idealism) in how people act
• Should you be loved or feared
  o The answer is that one would like to be both the one and the other; but because it is difficult to combine them , it is far safer to be feared than loved.
• Machiavellian – a shorthand for someone who is manipulative

Question 6

What are the consequences and implications of Machiavellian politics in the workplace.

Answer 6

Consequences

• Lose time
• People not truthful
• Illogical conclusions and decisions
• Back-stabbing
• Lack of trust
• Insecurity

Implications

• Competing goals, visions and ambitions
• Need for power and status
• Workplaces are competitive
• Work not always a meritocracy
• Organisations are sites of contestation
• Politics essential part of organisational life

Question 7

What are the various forms of power in a firm?

Answer 7

Executive power - set wider organisational goals
Management power - operational decisions
Worker power - specialist knowledge
Bureaucratic power - Rules and regulations
Technological power - Machines set work rate
Systematic power - social forces shape organisation

Question 8

Describe the three key theoretical perspectives on power

Answer 8

Three key theoretical perspectives on power

Power as property (of the organisational structure, or an attribute of your personality)
o Jeffrey Pfeffer
Power is a direct result of your personal characteristics and how you choose to interact with your environment
Example: social intelligence, toughness, cultivate allies, control information etc.

o French and Raven: 5 dimensions of power
Legitimate: right to command
Reward: extent can use rewards
Coercive: power to punish
Expert: knowledge
Referent: charisma that other want to emulate

Structure as power
o Steven Lukes
Power is really in the ability to set the conditions of a discussion
Power is in the ability to shape people’s desires and beliefs

Power through discipline
o Michael Foucault
Power is in the structural constraints of societal norms and practices (also relational and everywhere)
Examples include: timetables, physical space, systems of writing, confessional practices, surveillance,

Question 9

What were the implications of the Milgram experiements and the Stanford prison experiment?

Answer 9

Implications

• Willingness to accept authority
• Ordinary people follow authority even when going against their moral beliefs
• Ordinary people can become agents in a terrible destructive process
• Subservient attitude
• Role rather than personality critical
• WW2 – follow leader even when you do not think it is right