violence in the workplace

Final topic for I/O psychology class is violence in the workplace.

• two categories of workplace violence
• non-employee against employee
• employee against fellow employees
• level one violence (described below)
• level two violence
• argues increasingly with customers, vendors, co-workers, and management
• refuses to obey company policies and procedures
• sabotages or destroys equipment or property of employer or co-worker
• verbalizes wishes to hurt co-workers/management
• sends sexual or violent notes to co-workers or management
• sees self as victimized by management ("me vs. them")
• level three violence
• recurrent physical fights
• destruction of property
• recurrent suicidal threats
• utilization of weapons to harm others
• murder, rape, or arson
• "typical violent workers"
• does not participate in organizational events
• has few outside interests
• has worked for the company for some time
• has a history of violence
• is a white male between 25-50 years of age
• has lost or is worried about losing his/her job
• has a history of conflicts with co-workers, supervisors, or both
• has difficulty accepting authority
• commonly violates company policies and rules
• works in a company or work group with an authoritarian management style
• abuses alcohol
• justice hypothesis of workplace violence
• procedural justice
• distributive justice
• interpersonal justice
• bullying
• article
• predicting workplace aggression and violence

frustration-aggression hypothesis- argues that frustration leads to aggression; ultimately found to be too broad - aggression was only one possible response to frustration with aggression

• not all frustrated individuals act aggressively, and not all aggressive acts are a result of frustration

bullying- harassing, offending, socially excluding, or assigning humiliating tasks to a person of subordinate status repeatedly and over a long period of time

REACTION

The newest topics we covered have built off of the information we learned at the beginning of the semester. An example is the perceived justice in the workplace- this is something that is taken into consideration when determining or attempting to predict violence in the workplace. I find it so cool when all of the concepts start to intertwine. This information was interesting to learn. To the average person, most of it seems like common sense- treat someone well and they are less likely to be aggressive/violent towards you (except bullying). The article we read dispelled some myths regarding the "typical violent worker."

ANALYSIS

I have worked with aggressive individuals. A job I held a few years ago had me in a leadership role- I oversaw a staff and that did include people who were older than myself. There was one male staffer who did not take kindly to "receiving orders" from a younger female. He went out of his way to avoid my requests of him. He was disrespectful and only listened to my superior who was a male. It was so stupid because I had done nothing to cause this guy to dislike me so much. This could be seen as psychological aggression and some characteristics of level one violence.

aggression- behavior by an individual or individuals within or outside an organization that is intended to physically or psychologically harm a worker or workers and occurs in a work-related context (Schat & Kelloway, 2005)

level one violence

• refuses to cooperate with immediate supervisor
• spreads rumors and gossip to harm others
• consistently argues with co-workers
• belligerent toward customers/clients
• constantly swears at others
• makes inappropriate sexual comments 

My superior and I discussed the issue with our director and we all agreed that we wouldn't be able to change his behaviors towards me. For the rest of his time with our organization, my superior was the one who had direct contact with this individual. It was frustrating and disappointing. This guy had an "old boys club" mentality and it is more sad than anything else. I learned to not take his actions personally and do my best to lead the rest of the people who weren't sexist.

REFLECTION
After having experienced aggression in the workplace and bullying outside of the workplace that affected my ability to perform my job tasks well, I can see how devastating this can be to an organization. Organizations need to be aware of what to look out for in order to prevent these things from happening. If they do occur, they need to be on top of the situation and know how to respond accordingly in order to have a decent outcome.

job satisfaction & human factors

This week we had two topics- job satisfaction and human factors engineering.

• job satisfaction
• Hawthorne effect
• value theory
• overall satisfaction
• facet satisfaction
• job descriptive index
• Minnesota satisfaction questionnaire
• intrinsic satisfaction
• extrinsic satisfaction
• article
• the job satisfaction-job performance relationship: a qualitative and quantitative review

• human factors
• input component
• output component
• human-computer interaction
• user-centered design
• shift work
• fixed shift
• rotating shift
• circadian cycle
• flextime
• compressed workweek
• articles
• wanted by the police: a good interface
• designs for working, why you bosses want to turn your new office into Greeenwich Village

job satisfaction- positive attitude or emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one's job or job experience; overall evaluation of a job, including emotions, behaviors, and thoughts

Hawthorne effect- a change in behavior or attitudes that was the simple result of  increased attention; attention affects morale and performance

human factors- approach that uses knowledge of human capabilities and limitations to design systems, organizations, jobs, machines, tools, and consumer products for safe, efficient, and comfortable human use; synonymous with human factors engineering/psychology

motivational approach- used in work design and redesign to increase productive efficiency through the modification of tasks or equipment

Reaction

These two concepts work well together. We learned about how a well-designed workplace environment (including the physical space design, tools/software design, and scheduling) can increase job satisfaction. We also discussed how difficult it is to measure job satisfaction, how that should be reconfigured to get an accurate measurement of how someone truly feels about the job. 

Human factors is one of my favorite topics and I'm really, really glad we could fit it into the schedule at the end of the semester. The two articles were excellent to acclimate classmates to the topic. I know I personally struggle with trying to explain what usability is to someone.

Analysis

With job satisfaction we talked a lot about measurement and the correlation to job performance. With my work history, I have experienced shift work and flextime. One of my campus jobs and my internship are pretty flexible with allowing me to rework my schedule (when needed) in order to accommodate class work and group projects. 

flextime- schedule in which individual workers are given discretion over the time they report to work and the time they leave work on a given day

• psychological advantages of perceiving some control over work schedule
• practical advantage of achieving a better balance between work and non-work
• benefits may depend on nature of work

I'm grateful for this because it truly allows me to enjoy the freedom of controlling my work schedule. I know I have to have in x amount of hours each week so I just reschedule accordingly. My supervisors for both understand that things come up and that I'm able to work those positions because I am a student. Personally, when I don't have to stress out about having to miss work and know I can just work at a different time, my job performance improves because I do not have that stress to worry about.

With human factors, I have second-hand experience with shift work. When my boyfriend was hired for his first career job out of college, he was hired on to work the third shift (11 p.m.-7 a.m.) after he finished training on first shift (7 a.m.-3 p.m.). 

shift work- scheduling of work into temporal shifts; common in particular occupational groups such as nurses, blue collar workers, and public safety personnel

Things in our relationship tend to go better when we are both on the same schedule (days). As soon as he switched over to third shift, we barely talked. He was five hours away and was trying to figure out how to deal with switching to a new shift.

circadian cycle- the 24-hour physiological cycle in which humans tend to be active during hours of light and inactive during hours of darkness.

He had completely turned his circadian cycle around for his job and he was not a happy camper. To make it worse, every time his company adds a new machine or program, his boss would tell him on a Friday he would be going from third to first shift Monday morning. This happened quite a bit until he finally told his boss he cannot continue to rotate shifts, especially with such short notice.

rotating shift- workers moved from shift to shift over a certain period of time

• lead to sleep disturbances-> associated with medical (ex. gastrointestinal) and psychological (anxiety and depression)

After four years of working for this company, he has acclimated to being on a different shift every so often. We discussed in class how if people have to work on a rotating shift, supervisors should give them about a month on each shift so they can properly adjust without too many physiological and psychological side effects.

Reflection
To some, human factors seems like common sense. I feel it is something that younger generations feel is inherent to every day life because they generally experience well-designed pieces. However, there are a lot of things that go into developing a quality work experience. Employers have to consider what goes into creating the best experiences for their employees- workplace environment, ergonomics, shift scheduling. All of these factors contribute to how someone feels about their job- job satisfaction. For some, this may contribute to their job performance. The article we read showed us there is conflicting data on that relationship. Also, industrial/organizational psychologists need to find better ways to measure employee job satisfaction. Maybe after we can better measure satisfaction, we can better measure it against job performance.

stress & burnout

This week we discussed topics revolving around the concept of stress, including:

• the problem of stress
• eustress
• distress
• general adaptation syndrome
• alarm reaction 
• resistance
• exhaustion
• methods of coping
• role stressors/conflict
• burnout
• levels of preventions strategy
• reducing and managing stress
• Gig
• flight attendant

eustress- type of stress that provides challenges that motivate individuals to work hard and meet their goals

general adaptation syndrome (GAS)- a nearly identical response sequence to almost any disease or trauma (poisoning, injury, psychological stress); identified by Hans Seyle

burnout- extreme state of psychological strain resulting from a prolonged response to chronic job stressors that exceed an individual's resources to cope with them

primary prevention strategy- stress prevention strategy concerned with modifying or eliminating stressors in the work environment

Reaction

This topic was well planned for this point in the semester and ironically for the events going on in my personal life. Stress caused by classes, work, personal life add up and can really cause someone to become overwhelmed and ill if they don't seek help to manage and relieve that stress. There are different types of stress but the one most damaging is distress.

distress- type of stress resulting from chronically demanding situations that produce negative outcomes

Those negative outcomes include:

• behavioral consequences (ex. absenteeism, alcohol, drugs, information processing)
• psychological consequences (ex. anxiety, depression, fatigue, depersonalization)
• physiological consequences (ex. blood pressure, digestive issues, lowered immune system)

Without management, these can consume an individual's life and cause them to not be able to function at their highest level. 

Analysis

This past week brought about a variety of issues that arose in my personal life. These issues caused me a great deal of distress that sparked behavioral, psychological, and physiological consequences. I'm still recovering from these consequences even though I have moved on to a new chapter in my life. This is a great example of why my post is late today- my memory is shot this week from dealing with everything which is a behavioral consequence of distress. In class we weren't sure which stage of memory was affected by stress- either something to do with how we encode the information or not forming cues to be able to retrieve that information later.

These things ran over into my abilities to properly function at work and in class. It's ridiculous how much stress can do to a person. After noticing how utterly down I was, my supervisor made a call to someone (social support) who could help remove me from the situation (problem-focused coping).

social support- the comfort, assistance, or information an individual receives through formal or informal contacts with individuals or groups

problem-focused coping- directed at managing or altering a problem causing the stress

It wouldn't be emotion-focused coping:

emotion-focused coping- directed at reducing the emotional response to a problem by avoiding, minimizing, or distancing oneself from the problem

because we were trying to get me completely out of the situation causing me stress not trying to change my emotional response to the stress.

I realize the stress wasn't initiated by the work environment but my stress outside of the work environment did impact my ability to perform well in my work and class tasks. However, the same concepts can apply since we are dealing with the topic of stress.

Reflection
So many components go into how to manage and prevent stress. There are many outlets for individuals to seek in order to better deal with, eliminate, or prevent stress. An example from our classroom discussion:

employee assistance program (EAP)- counseling provided by an organization to deal with workplace stress, alcohol, or drug difficulties, and problems stemming from outside the job

It is important for organizations to understand the causes and effects of stress on an individual. Because the likelihood of those overlapping into the work environment are fairly high. Organizations need to be sure to educate their supervisors and all employees to know the signs of stress and what resources are available to handle it.

motivation

This week's topics:

• motivation
• motivational theories- classic approaches
• modern approaches to work motivation
• practical issues in motivation
• Gig
• adhesives company sales rep
• article
• academy of management executive (on the folly of rewarding A, while hoping for B and more on folly)

motivation- concerns the conditions responsible for variations in intensity, quality, and direction of ongoing behavior

need- internal motivation thought to be inborn and universally present in humans (Maslow)

person as machine- metaphor suggesting that people's behaviors and actions are reflexive and involuntary and are performed without conscious awareness

person as godlike- metaphor suggesting that people are perfectly rational and intentional rather than automatic/reflexive

performance = (motivation x ability) - situational constraints

Reaction

Without certain pieces of the equation above, we will never achieve performance. There are many factors that go into each piece of the equation above. This week we focused on the motivation piece. These are the main theories that tie into motivation: Maslow's hierarchy of needs, two-factor theory, ERG theory, reinforcement theory, equity theory, and VIE theory. Each account for different things people experience in order to have needs met in order to be motivated to achieve something.

Analysis

In one of my more recent jobs, my motivation was to do the best job I could and to run down the clock. I wanted to get things done well and fill my entire shift because if there were not enough things to be done, people would get sent home early. When I gave my boss a quality performance, he was more likely to reward me with not being sent home early even if there were few things to be completed. These could be considered incentives.

incentives- situational factors that direct behavior to achieve goals that satisfy needs

My boss needed specific tasks performed, he wanted them done well. The incentive to meet what my boss needed accomplished was the possibility of not being sent home early. If you did things well, my boss knew you would be capable of staying later and working alone. The reward was getting those precious extra hours.

Reflection
A lot of things play into this concept- motivation. Factors on both the employer and employee's side need to be considered when setting up the rewards system for an organization. Like the other topics we cover, there are many things that need to be considered and could go wrong. The article we read discussed the various follies experienced in different situations. With careful planning, organizations can have meaningful rewards systems for their members. Occasional evaluation of this system should be performed in order to maintain a quality system that is appreciated.

diversity

"Culture is more often a source of conflict than a synergy. Cultural differences are a nuisance at best and often a disaster." Geert Hofstede, Emeritus Professor, Masstricht University

This week's topics:

• multicultural and cross-cultural issues in I/O psychology
• diversity
• models
• assimilation
• protection
• value
• Hofstede's five dimensions
• individualist vs. collectivist cultures
• power distance
• uncertainty avoidance
• masculinity vs. femininity
• long-term vs. short-term orientation
• merging organizations
• ethnocentrism
• polycentrism
• regiocentrism
• geocentrism
• Gig
• tofu manufacturer
• merchandise handler
• article
• affirmative action: psychological contributions to policy

diversity- differences in demographic characteristics; also includes differences in values, abilities, interests, and experiences

• can be predicated on attributes that are easy to detect (surface-level), or on attributes that are less detectable (underlying)
• can be distinguished on the basis of attributes that are related to tasks compared with those that are more relationship oriented

multinational- diversity of nationalities

multicultural organizations- characterized by full structural and formal integration, minimal prejudice or discrimination, minimal subgroup differences in organizational attachment, and low levels of conflict; one culture reflecting the mixture of diversity in an organization rather than several mini cultures reflecting the different elements in the mixture

REACTION
Diversity is a touchy subject that organizations must handle carefully. There are too many things that can be distorted and taken out of context. Even the best intentions may not turn out to be politically correct. There is a lot for organizations to consider both ethically and legally.

ANALYSIS
In one job, I have had to handle incoming applications for various positions. We consider everyone who applies. It always comes down to what skills each person brings to the table. There are so many applications turned in that do not meet the specified requirements and we have no choice but to hire someone else. Another consideration is how well they can communicate with people since most of these jobs are customer-service oriented. Diversity issues are never a factor when making these types of decisions. These go back to the concept of affirmative action.

affirmative action- program that acknowledges that particular demographic groups may be underrepresented in the work environment; provides specific mechanisms for reducing this underrepresentation

• promise equal opportunities (not outcomes)
• specialized recruiting programs intended to reach underrepresented groups in the workforce
• specialized pre- or posthire training to develop job-related KSAOs
• mentoring programs for underrepresented groups 
• planned developmental opportunities such as assignment to particular teams and departments
• specialized performance feedback programs

We have to afford equal opportunities to everyone by allowing them to apply and be considered. That does not mean every minority person who applies is guaranteed a job.

REFLECTION
These are hot-button topics. People get very heated when they debate these issues. Some feel that in the end majorities are being discriminated against. It's a difficult subject for I/O psychologists to handle. Careful steps need to be taken in order to maintain justice and fairness within organizations.

Compensation

This week's topics:

• job evaluation
• comparable worth
• the law
• article
• beyond money: toward an economy of well-being

job evaluation- method for making internal pay decisions by comparing job titles to one another and determining their relative merit by way of these comparisons

compensable factors- factors in a job evaluation system that are given points that are later linked to compensation for various jobs within the organization; factors usually include skills, responsibility, effort, and working conditions

equal pay act of 1963- prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in the payment of wages or benefits, where men and women perform work of similar skill, effort, and responsibility for the same employer under similar work conditions

Reaction

It is important to I/O psychologists to understand the thought process behind compensable factors and comparable worth. Both are things that need to be weighed while employers are determining compensation of employees.

Analysis

I have come into contact with many people who are well below the highest pay scale (especially at the University). There are some people who are "higher up" on the pay scale and literally do LESS, understand LESS, and have been observed as playing computer games for a majority of work time. These are the people I feel should receive lower compensation ESPECIALLY in comparison to lower pay scale employees who perform way more work to support their departments. For these people, there should be a serious look into reevaluating the job position so they can receive comparable pay. 

comparable worth- notion that people who are performing jobs of comparable worth to the organization should receive comparable pay

I feel that periodically larger organizations should commit time to reevaluating job positions of those who are paid significantly more in order to reduce the number of lower pay scale jobs.

Reflection
This week's topics were very interesting to me. I'm glad we were able to cover them and do an in-depth class discussion today- it helped us to understand and apply the terminology and article information.

Performance Measuring

Topics

• basic concepts in performance
• performance rating- substance
• performance rating- process
• social and legal context of performance evaluation
• Gig
• UPS Driver
• Articles
• The politics of employee appraisal
• Rating formats and rater training redux: A context-specific approach for enhancing the effectiveness of performance management

performance measures

• objective
• personnel
• judmental

behaviorally anchored rating scale (BARS)- rating format that includes behavioral anchors describing what a work has done, or might be expected to do, in particular duty area

behavioral observation scales (BOS)- asks the rater to consider how frequently an employee has been seen to act in a particular way

rating errors- inaccuracies in ratings that may be actual errors or intentional or systematic distortions

• central tendency error
• leniency error
• severity error
• halo error

training

• administrative training
• psychometric training
• frame-of-reference (FOR) training

Reaction

Performance is so important to our jobs. The question is: "how do we measure it?" The measurement process of performance has ins and outs that have to be considered in order to provide an accurate and unbiased report. We learned that often times the evaluations are not accurate or free of bias and somehow related to organization politics or money woes. These factors alone drive the evaluations to be inflated or deflated and can cause a misunderstanding by the employee receiving the evaluation.

Analysis

I've only had one job where I've been officially given a performance review. This was the job I had in high school where I conducted telephone surveys for hospitals. I had one review before I graduated from high school and quit my job. The evaluation was a surprise. When they brought me in, I was told my previous supervisor (who left suddenly, very dramatic!) was supposed to have handled them. They told me it was supposed to actually happen and frequently but they didn't realize she wasn't doing this portion of her job. Anyway, I was told when I was hired I would be periodically monitored throughout my time with this company- they would randomly listen in on my surveys and take notes. I just never knew when I would receive that feedback. The evaluation was very informal and they didn't have much to say. What they did have to say were comments from previous months and were outdated comments. Things that I had already learned from on my own. It was pretty much a joke. The comments I did receive could be classified as:

judgmental performance measures- evaluation made of the effectiveness of an individual's work behavior, most often by supervisors in the context of a yearly performance evaluation

The method of obtaining information to measure my performance could be considered:

electronic performance monitoring- monitoring work processes with electronic devices; can be very cost effective and has the potential for providing detailed and accurate work logs

The surveys I conducted were on a specially developed system so all of the work I did was monitored. I was evaluated (not paid per) on percentage of surveys completed, quality of completion and so forth. All of these things were monitored. They were more heavily monitored after my first supervisor left since the new supervisor was interested in actually doing his job.

Reflection
There are many different methods of monitoring performance and then translating that into an evaluation process. Companies can devote a lot of time and effort into ensuring they have a good system in place to monitor and then provide feedback to their employees. Unfortunately, not all are interested in providing quality feedback to their employees and can be distracted by office politics, monetary concerns, and other personal issues. These things are important to I/O psychologists because they will most likely be advocating for the implementation and upkeep of quality performance evaluation measures.