Organizational B-logging

Organizational Behavior: The study of individual behavior and group dynamics in organizations. 

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THIS IS THE LAST POST OF THIS BLOG!! To get the full experience, go to the very first post and then backtrack towards this one.  Ironically, saved first impressions for last! 

Have a wonderful summer!!

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Proactive Personality: Seize The Day!!

What better time than now to start reading that book?

          Or start learning that new hobby you have wanted to for years?

Or

    Maybe

         To take up that side business or get fit?

Someone with a proactive personality would see right now--having to stay home-- as an opportunity to do all those things that they haven’t had time for up until now. Without having a proactive personality, individuals could not hope to see let alone act on the opportunities they have in front of them. 

I took on shipt because it is getting a lot of orders right now, and held virtual grand openings for my network marketing business, and have been taking time out of my day to exercise.  Therefore, I have a proactive personality.

Do you? 

Take this fun little quiz to find out more about how proactive you are (DISCLAIMER: This is just a fun activity. It may or may not be completely accurate). 

https://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/story.php?title=mti3mty2nq2zsq 

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Learn to self-monitor!! By self-monitoring, you can adjust your behavior to best practices used by others within whatever organization you work for. Trust me, I know: I talk about 3 workplaces in this!!

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Reflective Listening “Tips & Tricks” for the  Current Virtual World

Almost everyone I know has used a zoom or bluejeans video platform in the past month.  However!! There is a right and wrong way to listen on a video call. Even if it is not face to face, you still have to keep your reflective listening skills up. 

So... Let’s learn about reflective listening on video calls!!

--> Keep your video on - I know we do not always want to show our barely-brushed hair or messy room, but when your video is on, you’re more likely to listen and less likely to get distracted. 

--> Nod your head, or lean in, and look engaged - A few nonverbal gestures can go a long way to show that you are listening to the speaker in the video. 

--> Ask questions!!! - Even if your audio is off, you can ask questions in the chats during the calls. When someone asks for questions and no one on the call has any, it begs the question: was everyone actually listening?

There are many more things you can do, but these are just some of the top things. Remember, just because you aren’t interacting in person doesn’t mean you can stop listening!!

[organizationalbehavior101]

How many decisions do you make in a day? Probably a whole lot more than you think. 

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Stereotyping, Projection, and Selective Perception | A Divided Nation

I really do not enjoy getting political, but in light of everything going on, I feel this is relevant. 

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve seen people on social media refer to others as “the right” or “the left” when talking about values and ideas. I want to stress one thing. These people are stereotyping. Furthermore, those who believe everyone in their party holds the same exact values are projecting onto others. 

It goes without saying that not everyone who considers themselves a republican or everyone that considers themselves a democrat have exactly the same views and values. However, when an individual’s views are skewed so far one way or the other, they tend to only notice the things that already fall in line with their presumed beliefs about others-- in other words, selective perception encourages the stereotyping behavior. 

Why is this a problem? Lately I have seen people claim that “all democrats want communism and revocation of rights” and “all republicans don’t care if their family dies as long as the economy is okay” and that is clearly a dangerous thought process. Those who are projecting seem to think everyone in their political party is handling these circumstances properly. Both situations are not ideal. 

This is a time where we need to unite, but stereotyping, projecting, and selective perception are clouding our mind and keeping us in the dark. 

[organizationalbehavior101]

Types of Interpersonal Power: Harry Potter vs Voldemort

You can’t have a complete series of fictional concept analysis posts without involving Harry Potter, right?... right? Anyway... 

It goes without saying that power is a pretty big concept in the book/movie series. The main antagonist alone, Voldemort, is practically obsessed with power. Today lets look at Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort and what types of power they hold throughout the series. 

Before we start, I want to list the 5 types of power: Reward, Coercive, Referent, Legitimate, and Expert

Harry Potter

Harry Potter, the “Boy Who Lived”, has reverent power simply from his past alone. Beginning in the first book, he had strangers looking up to and admiring him for “killing the dark lord” when he was just a baby, and only coming out of it with a scar on his head. As the books progress, Harry’s referent power remains through the entire series, although it gradually becomes more due to his own character and ability rather than what happened when he was a baby. 

Lord Voldemort

In some respects, as the leader of the death eaters, Voldemort holds legitimate power. However, if you actually see how his own followers act around him, his power is LARGELY coercive more than anything. He threatens his own followers frequently and stresses that they will die unless they follow him. Were it not for his coercive power, he never would have created such a disaster as he did in the series. 

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Communication is SUPER important, now more than ever. Learn what methods of communication you should use, shouldn’t use, and why right now with the current circumstances. 

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Positive & Negative Effects in the world Today

People typically fall into one of two categories: those with the positive effect, and those with the negative effect. Being an essential worker as well as a frequent visitor of social media, I’ve seen both in abundance. Here’s just a few examples: 

Positive effect

I do grocery delivery. Just today, one of my customers told me “At least I get to hang out with my family all day”, and gave an amazing tip. Later, after I got home, my mother informed me that (even though work has been made a LOT harder), that she is just grateful to not be laid off. Both of these show the positive effect in action. The customer could have complained about having to stay home, and my mom could have been upset with her new work schedule, but both of them chose to focus on the positives. 

Negative Effect

As my fellow USA residents are probably aware, the unemployment system has not been efficient in these circumstances with the pandemic. A few days ago, I saw a facebook post from someone which stated, “Why am I waiting over a week for my application when some people just applied and are receiving funds??? This is ridiculous and I feel cheated.” This is the negative effect in action. This person could have been happy that some people are receiving funds and rationalized that she will soon as well, but instead, she complained that others were getting money before her. 

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Is your self-image one of confidence or insecurity? Self-esteem can impact everything from who you date and how you dress, to your career success and overall happiness. Find out if you need to build your self-esteem with this test.

How high would you say you value yourself?? Take this test to see where you are in terms of self esteem. This term simply relates to your feelings of self-worth.  I took this test myself and got: 50/100

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PsyToolkit: Run psychological studies online.

Do you believe you can achieve goals and complete tasks in and outside the workplace?? Depending on your answer, you might have high or low self-efficacy.  This term relates to how much you believe in your ability to do something.  Take this test! I got a 28! (DISCLAIMER! This is just a demo of the GSE survey. Take the full survey for more accurate results!)

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As a business owner, I find myself getting into “group” situations all the time. Here is one example of that, but outlining the 5 Stages of Group Development!

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Cognitive Dissonance and the Stay at Home Order

Most people, at least to some level, think of themselves as a law abiding citizen.  At the moment, many states have a Stay at Home order in place to combat the Covid-19 Pandemic.  If everyone is a citizen who listens to rules imposed by the government, then why is it that people actively act against the orders? In one term, this can be defined as...

Cognitive Dissonance.

This phenomenon occurs all the time. Think back to the last time you were driving. Did you go the speed limit the entire time?? Well... you probably did not. That is also cognitive dissonance. Another example, specifically in the workplace, would be a chef who knows all the rules and techniques of food preparation but cuts corners on processes to get food out faster (even when they care about consistency in the restaurant). 

Back to the topic of the stay at home orders:many people are still having friends over or going out in groups. This is not because they don’t care about rules, but rather, for the same reason one might choose to drive over the speed limit: they, personally, think that (in their circumstances) this course of action is acceptable and preferable. 

People who are not as disciplined in following the order are experiencing cognitive dissonance. 

[organizationalbehavior101]

Leadership in Naruto: Formal and Informal

Here’s a link to brush up on Naruto, for those who do not know what that is! SO-- leadership, both formal AND informal, is present everywhere in this wonderful (but VERY long) series. For this post, I’ll be breaking the behavior of certain leaders in the show into two categories: Formal, and informal. For this post, lets compare two characters: Lady Tsunade and Naruto Uzumaki.  Tsunade Much of Lady Tsunade’s leadership can be categorized as formal. Formal leadership is centered around the appointing of someone to some formal position that gives them authority and influence. Tsunade, due to being one of the Sannin (a very skilled ninja, in short), was appointed to be the leader of the Hidden Leaf Village. Due to this position, she has influence over many of the ninja in the village as well as all other residents. People (for the most part) listen to her because she is the leader. Her influence comes from authority granted by a formal position of power. Therefore, it is formal.  Naruto Uzumaki  Although Naruto is a bit of a hyperactive knucklehead, he is seen influencing others throughout the entirety of the show. Naruto’s leadership is informal, meaning that his influence is not from some position of authority, but rather unofficially granted by the people whom he leads. One such example is in Naruto: Shippuden, when a new member named Sai is introduced. Naruto’s talk of bonds and friendship made Sai decide to no longer follow his prior orders, but to instead follow Naruto and the rest of the team. Naruto leads by influencing people into wanting him to lead. From day one, he was never in a position of authority. Therefore, his leadership is informal. 

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A work experience I had today had me thinking about motivation. The result? You guys get a video of me talking about it.  Enjoy!

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Free personality test - take it to find out why our readers say that this personality test is so accurate, “it's a little bit creepy.” No registration required!

Hey guys! Here’s a link to my FAVORITE personality test, the Myers-Briggs personality test. This is a version of the test that was developed to measure Carl Jung’s theory of individual differences! The test has 4 components:  E/I: This measures whether you are an extrovert or an introvert N/S: This measures whether you gather information mostly from intuition or from observation.  F/T: This measures whether your thoughts or feelings are the driving force behind your actions and behaviors. 

P/J: This measures whether you like things to remain open and flexible or settled and structured.  Try it out for yourself! I am an INFJ!

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SMART Goal for This Semester... actually, no, STRETCH goal.

If you’ve ever taken a management class or are a business major of any kind, you have probably heard of a smart goal. This is super relevant right now as a lot of people are going into final exam week in the near future! This type of goal is characterized as follows: Specific Measurable Attainable Reasonable Timebound A smart goal helps the one setting that goal to actually MAKE the goal and carry it out bit by bit through action steps. Want an example??? Here’s one of my smart goals!  My goal: I want to finish my research paper on Entrepreneurship and the Business Cycle by April 30th. 

Lets take that piece by piece. 

Specific: finish my research paper

measurable: ONE research paper

attainable: Yeah! I have already done a significant amount of it and the rough draft is almost complete

reasonable: It’s definitely possible. I just need to spend a decent amount of time on it. 

Timebound: Finish by April 30th.  Now... as I was writing this, I was thinking “actually, I want to get all my things out of the way.” I decided to make a stretch goal, which is basically a smart goal taken juuuust a little bit farther.  My stretch goal: I want to finish my research paper, this blog, AND my financial management budget by April 30th.  Notice how instead of just the research paper, now this includes all 3 final projects for the semester. That is why it’s a stretch goal.  Make your own SMART goals and stretch goals! Send them into my inbox or keep them to yourself, but make them! You got this!