The Final Reflective Writing Assignment is a summary of 5 key concepts you learned this semester regarding OB. You should describe how these concepts will inform/change your behavior (experience and practice) going forward, and situations you have encountered in the past and how your behavior, the behavior of others, or the outcomes might have been different if you had possessed this knowledge at that time. This paper should be at least about 1,000 words, and should include citations for any references you make (even to the course text), including the page number.
This paper is NOT intended for you to simply list the facts and information you have learned. The idea is for you to share your reactions, thoughts, and feelings to the things you've learned by relating them to your own life and your own experience, both in the past and how this knowledge might change your future.
1.Stress is defined as a psychological response to demands that possess certain stakes for the person and that tax or exceed the person's capacity or resources.11 The demands that cause people to experience stress are called stressors. The negative consequences that occur when demands tax or exceed a person's capacity or resources are calledstrains. This definition of stress illustrates that it depends on both the nature of the demand and the person who confronts it. People differ in terms of how they perceive and evaluate stressors and the way they cope with them. As a result, different people may experience different levels of stress even when confronted with the exact same situation.
2.So what types of employee behaviors constitute job performance? To understand this question, consider that job performance is formally defined as the value of the set of employee behaviors that contribute, either positively or negatively, to organizational goal accomplishment.9This definition of job performance includes behaviors that are within the control of employees, but it places a boundary on which behaviors are (and are not) relevant to job performance. For example, consider the behavior of a server in a restaurant that prides itself on world-class customer service. Texting a friend during a work break would not usually be relevant (in either a positive or negative sense) to the accomplishment of organizational goals. That behavior is therefore not relevant to the server's job performance. However, texting in the middle of taking a customer's order would be relevant (in a negative sense) to organizational goal accomplishment. That behavior, therefore, is relevant to the server's job performance.
3.Few OB topics matter more to employees and managers than motivation. How many times have you wondered to yourself, "Why can't I get myself going today?" Or how many times have you looked at a friend or coworker and wondered, "Why are they working so slowly right now?" Both of these questions are asking about "motivation," which is a derivation of the Latin word for movement, movere.5 Those Latin roots nicely capture the meaning of motivation, as motivated employees simply move faster and longer than unmotivated employees. More formally, motivation is defined as a set of energetic forces that originates both within and outside an employee, initiates work-related effort, and determines its direction, intensity, and persistence.6Motivation is a critical consideration because effective job performance often requires high levels of both ability and motivation
4. Trust is defined as the willingness to be vulnerable to a trustee based on positive expectations about the trustee's actions and intentions.11 If a customer trusts the quality of a company's products or services, that customer is willing to accept the consequences of paying money to the company. If a potential recruit trusts the words of a company's management, that recruit is willing to accept the consequences of becoming a member of the organization. Both examples illustrate that trusting reflects a willingness to "put yourself out there," even though doing so could be met with disappointment. The examples also highlight the difference between "trust" and "risk." Actually making yourself vulnerable-by buying products or accepting a job-constitutes risk. Trust reflects the willingness to take that risk. Unfortunately, trust in many companies has declined sharply due to corporate scandals and the economic downturn. Indeed, one recent survey revealed that only 44 percent of Americans say they trust business, down from 58 percent in the fall of 2007.12 "Trust is what drives profit margin and share price," notes the CEO of one branding and marketing firm. "It is what consumers are looking for and what they share with one another."
5. Disposition-based trust has less to do with a particular authority and more to do with the trustor. Some trustors are high in trust propensity-a general expectation that the words, promises, and statements of individuals and groups can be relied upon.18Some have argued that trust propensity represents a sort of "faith in human nature," in that trusting people view others in more favorable terms than do suspicious people.19 The importance of trust propensity is most obvious in interactions with strangers, in which any acceptance of vulnerability would amount to "blind trust."20 On the one hand, people who are high in trust propensity may be fooled into trusting others who are not worthy of it.21 On the other hand, those who are low in trust propensity may be penalized by not trusting someone who is actually deserving of it. Both situations can be damaging; as one scholar noted, "We are doomed if we trust all and equally doomed if we trust none."22Where do you stack up on trust propensity?
6.Ability refers to the relatively stable capabilities people have to perform a particular range of different but related activities.8 In contrast to skills, which can be improved over time with training and experience, ability is relatively stable. Although abilities can change slowly over time with instruction, repeated practice, and repetition, the level of a given ability generally limits how much a person can improve, even with the best training in the world. One reason for this stability relates to the "nature vs. nurture" question, an issue that has been much debated in OB (seeChapter 9 on personality and cultural values for more discussion of such issues). Are abilities a function of our genes, or are they something we develop as a function of our experiences and surroundings?