Organization Behavior Section A

1. What is your understanding of Johari Window? What is the major difference between blind and hidden area, how does it facilitates a manager in his/her organizational life?

This article is about the cognitive psychology tool. For the episode, see Johari Window (Fringe).

Johari window

Johari window as Venn diagram depicting intersection between a+) "Known to self" and a-) "Not known to self" on one hand, and on the other hand, b+) "Known to others" and b-) "Not known to others", with c showing the intersection containing four windows (or rooms)

The Johari window is a technique created by Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham in 1955[1] in the United States, used to help people better understand their relationship with self and others. It is used primarily in self-help groups and corporate settings as a heuristic exercise.

When performing the exercise, subjects are given a list of 56 adjectives and pick five or six that they feel describe their own personality. Peers of the subject are then given the same list, and each pick five or six adjectives that describe the subject. These adjectives are then mapped onto a grid.[2]

Charles Handy calls this concept the Johari House with four rooms. Room 1 is the part of ourselves that we see and others see. Room 2 is the aspects that others see but we are not aware of. Room 3 is the most mysterious room in that the unconscious or subconscious part of us is seen by neither ourselves nor others. Room 4 is our private space, which we know but keep from others.

Open or Arena: Adjectives that are selected by both the participant and his or her peers are placed into the Open or Arena quadrant. This quadrant represents traits of the subjects that both they and their peers are aware of. Hidden or Façade: Adjectives selected only by subjects, but not by any of their peers, are placed into the Hidden or Façade quadrant, representing information about them their peers are unaware of. It is then up to the subject to disclose this information or not.

Blind Spot: Adjectives that are not selected by subjects but only by their peers are placed into the Blind Spot quadrant. These represent information that the subject is not aware of, but others are, and they can decide whether and how to inform the individual about these "blind spots".

Unknown: Adjectives that were not selected by either subjects or their peers remain in the Unknown quadrant, representing the participant's behaviors or motives that were not recognized by anyone participating. This may be because they do not apply or because there is collective ignorance of the existence of these traits. One facet of interest in this area is our human potential. Our potential is unknown to us, and others

A Johari window consists of the following 59 adjectives used as possible descriptions of the participant.

 able  mature  extrovert  ambivert  modest  self-assertive  friendly  accepting  nervous  self-conscious  giving  adaptable  observant  sensible  happy  bold  optimistic  sentimental  helpful  calm  organized  shy  idealistic  caring  patient  silly  independent  cheerful  powerful  smart  ingenious  clever  proud  spontaneous  intelligent  congenial  aggressive  sympathetic  introvert  complex  reflective  tense  kind  confident  relaxed  trustworthy  knowledgeable  dependable  religious  warm  logical  dignified  responsive  wise  loving  energetic  searching

How the Johari window assists the manager in his organizational life.

1. Play an important role in facilitating feedback and disclosure among group members, and in directly giving feedback to individuals about their own blind areas. 2. Also have a big responsibility to promote a culture and expectation for open, honest, positive, helpful, constructive, sensitive communications, and the sharing of knowledge throughout their organization 3. Encouraging the positive development of the 'open area' or 'open self' for everyone is a fundamental aspect of effective leadership 4. Team members and managers take responsibility for reducing the blind area - in turn increasing the open area - by giving sensitive feedback and encouraging disclosure 5. „Managers promote a climate of non-judgmental feedback, and group response to individual disclosure, and reduce fear 6. Members - and leaders - should strive to increase their open free areas, and to reduce their blind, hidden and unknown areas. 7. Managers and leaders can create an environment that encourages self- discovery, and to promote the processes of self-discovery, constructive observation and feedback among team members.

2. How will you use the concept of Transactional Analysis for removing dysfunctional behavior in your organization? Substantiate your answer with suitable illustration.

Transactional analysis is a social psychology developed by Eric Berne during the 1960s, which has further evolved over the past four decades to include applications to psychotherapy, counseling, education and organizational development. Transactional Analysis (or TA as it is often called) is a model of people and relationships and is based on two notions: first that we have three parts or 'ego-states' to our 'personality. The other assumption is that these converse with one another in 'transactions'. Transactional Analysis helps people identify their ego states, recognize the inner dialogues between ego states, evaluate and improve the ways in which their ego states function, especially those that involve a harsh demeaning Parent, to recognize the games that people play and to help them stop playing games and get strokes in a spontaneous aware and intimate and manner, provides permission to change and protection against the anxiety that change creates.

Stopping the playing of games is the first step in eventually replacing them with direct and honest interactions, eventually abandoning the dysfunctional life script. TA‘s efficient, yet insightful, contractual method makes it ideally suited to understand, predict and help improve dysfunctional, unproductive, toxic, uncooperative interactions between people and can quickly help people communicate clearly and effectively at the three levels of the Parent (values,) the Adult (rationality) and the Child (emotions, creativity).

TA is a theory of personality and uses the ego-state (Parent-Adult-Child) model to describe how people are structured psychologically. This same model helps understand how people function and express themselves in their behaviour. As a theory of communication, it extends to a method of analyzing systems and organisations. It offers a theory for child development and introduces the idea of a "Life (or Childhood) Script", i.e., a story one perceives about one‘s own life,... [continues]more notes and answers needed.

3. What is stress? Is it always bad for the individual? Explain the nature,mechanism and classification of stress.

Hans Selye, a medical researcher first used term “Stress” to describe the body’s biological response mechanism. He defined stress as “the nonspecific response of the body to any demand”.

He views that stress is the spice of life, the absence of stress is death. Stress is usually considered to be negative and caused due to something bad. Thus stress refers to distress.

Ivancevich and It”

According to Beehr and Newman, stress is a condition arising from the interaction of people and their jobs and characterised by changes within people that force them to deviate from their normal functioning.

Stress is a dynamic condition in which a person is faced with lot of constraints while functioning in the organization. Stress causes discomfort, which leads to disequilibrium in the individual’s mind set. Stress is not always negative in nature. In a broader sense it is discomfiture whether it creates problems.

Stress is also a source of inspiration. When there is a stress for any work it leads to higher performance. When stress is gravest, it reduces employee productivity. But there are examples where people may get immune to stress having no negative effect on their performance. Such people do not get tense. This type of immunity is achieved through constant experience and training.

John M. Ivancevich and Michael T. Matterson have defined stress as “adoptive response, mediated by individual characteristics and/ or psychological processes, that is a consequence of any external action, situation or event that places special physical and/or psychological demands upon a person”. As it is clear from the definition that stress is caused due to external factors, situations or events. These have adverse impact on the individual characteristics and psychological processes. These together put an additional burden or demands on individual, hence the stress. External factors may include social setting, work ethics in the organisation, leadership styles, availability of resources, workload, level of technology and the work environment. The internal factors that are effected are psychological in nature and includes emotions, ego state, attitude, perception, motivational factors, need and demographics. If employees feel that external factors are of not much consequence and have no compelling effect the stress is not formed within the minds of individuals. High desire, uncertainty, result of promotion examination, unrealized ambition may cause stress to the individual. Stress should not be confused with anxiety or nervous tension and damaging. They occur as regular features in many cases and have no long – lasting impact on the working capacities of the employees.

Mishra (2003) has very aptly explained that anxiety may remain purely psychological and may not cause any physical impact. Similarly, only physical impacts will not be stress unless it is felt by the mind and heart. The psychological and physical impacts are visible in the form of stress.

Anxiety is the cause of stress but not stress itself. Symptoms of stress are given as b

Is stress bad?