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INTRODUCTION

The success of any organization is entirely dependent on the nature and the psychological preparedness of its employers.

Success in any organization is greatly affected by all its employees being able to work and function as a single unit but today’s organizations are faced with numerous problems that affect their efficiency and in the long run and even affect their existence.

Problems that range from low productivity to high levels of absenteeism hurt today’s organizations a great deal but with a manager with knowledge in organizational behavior, all these issues can be corrected or even reversed to the rescue of the organization. 

Organizational behavior

Is a field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups and structures have on behavior within an organization. It’s an inter disciplinary field that includes sociology, psychology, communication and management.

The understanding of individual or group behavior and the patterns of structure helps improve organizational performance and effectiveness.

Some of the key problems facing organizations today include;

·         Low morale

This is defined as the state of the spirits of a person or group as exhibited by low confidence, low cheerfulness, poor discipline, and unwillingness to perform assigned tasks.

·         Low productivity

This is a measure of the in efficiency of production and an organization with low production is in a state where by its output is less than its input.

·         High labor turnover

Labor turnover is the process of people getting hired and leaving the company over and over.

If a company has a high turnover rate, that means that people leave quite often and they have to hire new people to take their places. If a company has a low turnover rate, that means that people typically stay with the company for a long time. As a job seeker, companies that have low turnover rates are the most attractive companies, because you might have some job security.

·         Absenteeism

This is defined as the practice of regularly staying away from work without good reason.

·         Job dissatisfaction

Is the feeling of being displeased and discontented with ones work in an organization.

Employee dissatisfaction is usually caused by poor pay, working conditions, supervision and/or company policy and administration.

Below are the causes of the problems mentioned;

·         Lack of motivation

If the organization cannot motivate it’s employees both directly and indirectly for example by setting up END OF YEAR parties, giving bonuses and incentives to highly performing employees, then there would be no willingness to perform efficiently.

·         Over working of employees

A normal human being is supposed to work eight hours a day, therefore if employees work restlessly and are not compensated or are assigned a lot of work to accomplish in a short period of time for example giving employees unrealistic deadlines for heavy workloads, assigning work to employees that is out of their job description or scope.

·         Low salary

In this case a manager recommends payments to employees that are not relative to their productivity and this leads to job dissatisfaction.

·         Inappropriate job assignment

This entails people being placed in positions that are not of their area of expertise and qualifications for example a nurse being assigned accounting duties and this leads to low productivity.

·         Inadequate skills

If employee skills are not up to par then the organizations’ productivity levels are bound to decrease tremendously, lack of training of employees for example absence of seminars which would improve on the employees skills can lead to low productivity.

·         Strict supervision

This deprives a worker of his or her empowerment as he or she can’t do anything on his or her own which leads to low morale.

·         Too much bureaucracy

Bureaucratic organizational structures have numerous layers of management, cascading down from senior executives to regional managers to departmental managers, all the way down to shift supervisors who work alongside frontline employees. Due to the many layers of management, decision-making authority has to pass through a larger number of layers than with flatter organizations. Refund decisions, for example, may have to pass from frontline employees, through shift supervisors, to store managers for a retail outlet in a bureaucratic company.

This leads to delayed decision making which can lead to delayed implementation of operational activities.

·         Attitude of individuals

A person’s perception as a result of background ,education among others can cause dysfunctional conflicts which harms and hinders organizational performance thus leading to low productivity and absenteeism for example a heated argument between employees in an organization leads to absenteeism, high labor turnover, low morale to mention but a few.

·         Company policy and administration

Some company policies for example retirement packages, employee health insurance policies, unfair termination of employees, employee leave allotment among others can affect the morale and productivity of employees in an organization and also bring about job dissatisfaction.

·         Poor communication system

In an organization where there is no clear or proper flow of communication, there will be delay in decision making which will hinder the productivity of the organization.

·         Goal ambiguity or unclear job specifications

Unclear job description or specialization puts employees in a state where by none of them knows what task they are supposed to accomplish and this brings about conflicting within an organization which delays work ,reduces their morale ,promotes absenteeism as they feel others can best perform the task at hand to mention but a few.

For a manager with knowledge in organizational behavior, the following should be put in place in order to counteract the problems mentioned because if not properly handled and remedies not implemented, there is potential of collapse of an organization.

Appreciation of outstanding employees

This can be done through promotions, awarding bonuses and also assigning a pay to employees who work overtime. This will promote love for ones work thus easy accomplishment of organizational goals

Motivation of employees

This can be well achieved by creating a conducive working environment of employees, clear lay out of the organizational structure to minimize unnecessary or even disturbing employee supervision thus creating factors like a sense of maturity, trust to mention and so many others that will help empower the employees and also create social relation between manager and the subordinates which will impact a sense of responsibility, belonging and the urge to play ones role efficiently.

Recruitment of skilled personnel

People with relevant skills and techniques will help in the smooth running of organizational activities since their expertise knowledge of specific fields will help reduce the risk of uncertainties.

Put in place organized work schedules

This can be achieved by building team work and delegating or distributing work amongst workers which helps in getting the work done in a short period of time, making available all the required resources to enable employees play their roles efficiently and effectively.

Clear layout of each employee’s job specifications

Clearly state each employees job specification to reduce on job collusion that causes conflicts in the organization and in the case of absenteeism employees should communicate in time and a clear reason be presented so as to give a manager time to prepare how to schedule work in the absence of the employee which will enable smooth flow of activities in their absence and a penalty be given to the employee who misuses the favor.

Genuine salary increment

A manager should see through increasing of salaries of the hard working employees which will boost other employees’ morale thus effectiveness towards the attainment of organizational goals and its success.

Ongoing job training

Carrying out ongoing training will help employees a acquire more skills that will enable them keep their work standards up to date for example, sending them to seminars or workshops to mention but a few will help them learn the techniques they never had thus creating morale within them and also improving on the productivity of the organization.

Use of a proper communication system

For there to be efficiency in an organization, the most important aspect to be implemented is communication. A good communication system saves time, reduces on distortion of information and also creates understanding amongst workers and their managers. This will enable the smooth flow of information thus easy accomplishment of set goals.

Set up a clear organizational structure

As a manager with knowledge of organizational behavior, you should be able to put up a structure that will bring up easy coordination of activities, easy flow of communication, quick decision making and easy evaluation of employee performance.

 But despite the above solutions to the problems facing organizations, below are other skills a manager can use to solve the hazards and also attain organizational success.

1.      Communication
As a manager you have to communicate with each of your employees “sideways” with your co-workers and customers. And you have to communicate upwards with your own manager or executive.

You need some substance in the communication; of course you need to have                               something worthy of being communicated. A good manager must have the ability to communicate effectively.

2. Listening skills
This is a part of communication, but I want to single it out because it’s so important. Some managers get so impressed with themselves that they spend much more of their time telling people things than they spend listening. But no matter how high you go in the management hierarchy, you need to be able to listen. It’s the only way you’re really going to find out what’s going on in your organization, and it’s well stated that a good manager must be a good listener.

3. A Commitment to the Truth
The higher you are in the management hierarchy, the less likely you are to be in touch with reality. Managers get a lot of brown-nosing, and people tend to sugar-coat the news and tell managers what they want to hear. The only way you’ll get the truth is if you insist on it. Listen to what people tell you, and ask questions to probe for the truth.  Develop information sources outside of the chain of command and regularly listen to those sources as well. Make sure you know the truth even if it’s not good news.

4. Empathy

This is the softer side of listening and truth. A manager should be able to understand how people feel, why they feel that way, and what he can do to make them feel differently. Empathy is especially important when you’re dealing with your customers. And whether you think so or not, you’ll always have customers.  Customers are the people who derive benefit from the work you do. If no one derives benefit from your work, then what’s the point of keeping the organization around?

5.Persuasion
Put all four of the preceding skills together, because you’ll need them when you try to persuade someone to do something you want done. You could describe this as “selling” but it’s more general. Whether you’re trying to convince your employees to give you a better effort, your boss to give you a bigger budget, or your customers to agree to something you want to do for them, your persuasion skills will be strained to their limits.

6.Leadership
Leadership is a specialized form of persuasion focused on getting other people to follow you in the direction you want to go. It’s assumed that the leader will march into battle at the head of the army, so be prepared to make the same sacrifices you’re asking your employees to make.

7.Focus
The key to successful leadership is focus. You can’t lead in a hundred different directions at once, so setting an effective leadership direction depends on your decision not to lead in the other directions. Focusing light rays means concentrating the light energy on one spot. Focusing effort means picking the most important thing to do and then concentrating your team’s effort on doing it.

8.Division of Work
This is the ability to break down large tasks into sub-tasks that can be assigned to individual employees. It’s a tricky skill — maybe more an art than a science, almost like cutting a diamond.

Ideally you want to figure out how to accomplish a large objective by dividing the work up into manageable chunks. The people working on each chunk should be as autonomous as possible so that the tasks don’t get bogged down in endless discussion and debate. You have to pay careful attention to the interdependencies among the chunks. And you have to carefully assess each employee’s strengths, weaknesses and interests so that you can assign the best set of sub-tasks to each employee.

9. Obstacle Removal
inevitably, problems will occur. Your ability to solve them is critical to the ongoing success of your organization.  Part of your job is to remove the obstacles that are preventing your employees from doing their best.

10. Heat Absorption
Not all problems can be solved. When upper management complains about certain things that can’t be avoided (e.g., an unavoidable delay in a project deliverable), it’s your job to take the heat. But what’s more important, it’s your job to absorb the heat to keep it from reaching your employees. It’s the manager’s responsibility to meet objectives. If the objectives aren’t being met, then it’s the manager’s responsibility to:

·         Make sure that upper management knows about the problem as early as possible.

·         Take all possible steps to solve the problem with the resources you’ve been given.

·         Suggest alternatives to management that will either solve the problem or minimize it. These other alternatives may propose the use of additional resources beyond the current budget, or they may propose a change in the objective that’s more achievable.

·         Keep the problem from affecting the performance or morale of your employees.

11. Controlling

Is one of the managerial functions like planning, organizing, staffing and directing. It is an important function because it helps to check the errors and to take the corrective action so that deviation from standards are minimized and stated goals of the organization are achieved in a desired manner., measuring actual performance and taking corrective action. Thus, control comprises these three main activities and a good manager must have the ability to control the organizational activities listed below;

A. Planning

 A manager must have the ability of determining the organization's goals and defining the means for achieving them. Planning allows managers the opportunity to adjust to the environment instead of merely reacting to it. Planning increases the possibility of survival in business by actively anticipating and managing the risks that may occur in the future.

B. Organizing

 The organizing function of management is the process of defining and grouping of activities and creating authority relationship among them.

C. Staffing

 Planning the organization with suitable personnel constitutes the staffing function. It involves selection, training and development, compensation, and appraisal of subordinates by the manager. Manpower planning and manpower management looks after these activities and try to ensure suitable methods of remuneration and performance appraisal of the employees

D. Directing

 Involves managing people and the work through the means of motivation, proper leadership, effective communication and coordination. A manager must develop ability to command. He should issue orders and instructions without arousing any resentment among the subordinates. He must be able to secure willing obedience from his subordinates without destroying their initiative and creativity. Moreover, it requires a sound communication system to enable exchange of ideas and information for common understanding.

Conclusion
One can probably become a manager without having all of the above skills, but one would need all of them to be really successful and to get promoted to higher levels of management.

For every one of these skills, there are various levels of performance. No one expects a new manager to be superior at every one of these skills, but one should be aware of all of them, and one should do everything to learn more about each skill and with these done, most organizational problems will be easily solved or reversed.