Management Techniques

Executive Summary

Through management there are many techniques to learn on how to be successful in the organization. The management techniques are important to learn, and master these techniques so that the organization gets the most that they can from the manager, and the employees. Without the knowledge of organizational behavior and how to motivate employees, understand the organizations dynamics, become a goodleader, and lastly how to communicate effectively through the virtual world, the organization will have a loss. They will not be at the top of the calibration that they could be at, and will not be getting reaching the highest performance level.

Key Management Techniques to Success

Organizational behavior is a key management technique to success in companies. It is about trying to understand people. It is about people who will find, or are looking for fulfillment in their lives and jobs through many different venues and times throughout their lives (Schermerhorn, 2005 p. 18). It is important to understand how organizational behavior works the workplace. Organizational behavior has many different techniques that aid in the success of managers like learning how to motivate employees, learning the group dynamics, understanding how to be a leader, and also how to manage diversity. Success through the workplace will depend on how to respect and how to learn the human behaviors through the techniques already listed (Schermerhorn, 2005 p. 18).

Organizational Behavior

Organizational behavior is the study of human behavior in organizations. It is a multidisciplinary field devoted to understanding individual and group behavior, interpersonal processes, and organizational dynamics. Learning about organizational behavior will help develop a better work-related understanding about me and other people. It can also expand the potential for career success in the dynamic, shifting, complex, and challenging new workplaces of today and tomorrow (Schermerhorn, 2005 p. 18).

As a manager it is important to find out how the employees will react within the organization, including groups and corporate culture since people could react differently throughout the company. For example, when I first worked for Bed Bath and Beyond, I started my employment in Iowa. The culture there was a midwestern atmosphere, be nice to everyone and be dependable. In the Midwest as a culture they push good morals, values and dependability from the employees. They usually get it to because that is how midwesteners were typically raised. I took pride in my job, and was proud of the things accomplished at my job, and I was recognized for it. So it only made me more proud of my job and pushed me harder to become the best. I then transferred to Arizona, in a large city, well outside of the midwest. My first step into the Arizona market was completely different. It is amazing how much a company culture can vary from state to state. The goals that I had learned in Iowa were completely different in Arizona. My transition was not smooth either. I kept on doing things throughout my job like I did in Iowa but was getting reprimanded. I was never sat down and explained the differences. I felt they looked down on me because I was so different, or had a different knowledge on how things should work. As seen through this example it is evident that human behavior is very unpredictable. I had thought going into Arizona everything would be the same, but through each group that I go through I need to know that each subsystem of the group will work differently and I need to be ready for that change. Through proper training my managers may have been able to manage my differences and would have been able to help me through my transition. It is key to learn how to be able to manage through the differences in the workplace.

So what is the purpose of organizational behavior? What could have helped my transition? If my managers had practiced the principles of organizational behavior they would have improved my performance by understanding my differences. They felt I should know how their group worked because I came from the same company yet they did not understand that each group has their own behaviors and cultures. The result was that I was cast aside until I adapted to the differences between the two areas.

Motivation

Motivation is a key management technique to determine success because with motivation it is achievable to make the employees excited about what they are doing, it gives them goals to meet, promotes competition, promotes satisfaction of job, and many other things, but managers are seeing this as a tall order. "In today's day in age it is found that the average worker is only using 60% of their potential on the job" (Buhler, 2003 p. 20). Obviously managers are asking themselves how to I get my employees do 110% on their job. Motivating employees is a key aspect to any job if each of my employees is doing only 60% of what they have the potential to do, then as a manager I am failing. My employees are not motivated enough to fulfill their responsibilities. Motivation is also going to vary from person to person, so a good manager is able to find what motivates his or her employees and understanding the differences among them. It could be as simple as letting them know they did a job well done, or showing them someone who is in doing a little bit better than them, laying down the employee's goals, and saying that those goals are reachable, and that he or she could be the best at the position at that point.

So what is motivation? "Motivation refers to the individual forces that account for the direction, level, and persistence of a person's effort expended at work" (Schermerhorn, 2005 p. 166). It is the ability to work hard, complete the task, and continue to do the task when things get hard. To understand one person's motivation is to understand the key components of organizations. There are many different approaches on how to understand motivation, they are the following; Herzberg's Two-factor Theory, Expectancy Theory, Equity Theory, and lastly is the Goal-setting Theory.

Herzberg Two-Factor Theory

The Herzberg two-factor theory is known as "hygiene factors" and "motivators." They portray different factors as the primary cause of satisfaction and dissatisfaction of a person's job (Schermerhorn, 2005 p. 171). Below is a graph of how the hygiene factors and motivators broken down into groups of how each affects satisfaction and dissatisfaction.

The hygiene factors are those factors in which it affects his or her dissatisfaction