*Unit name: Organisational behavioral
*Due Date: , April Monday, 15th, 2013 (6:00pm)# Newzealand time
Late assignments will be penalised.
See pages 8-9 for how to lodge your assignment (hard and soft copies) .
*Length: 2000 words (No additional leeway. In fairness to all students, penalties
apply for words in excess of 2000.).
*Topic: An integrative approach to managing people issues arising from
implementing a new performance appraisal system
*Question: You are the team leader of an organisational and development unit within
a human resources department of a large university. You and your team
are required to introduce a new work performance appraisal system for
academic staff which is significantly different from the old one. Although
not everyone agrees with the new system (indeed there is strong
opposition to it by some staff members), it is designed to support new
strategic directions of the university, including raising its domestic and
international research profile. Your team needs to make sure that the
new system is understood and will be smoothly applied within the
university.
Your task is to present to the director of the HR department a formal plan
and rationale for how to implement the change. Your plan and rationale
should address key organisational behaviour (people) issues (except
those covered in assignment 1) and draw on the organisational behaviour
literature to manage those issues. For example, you might consider
relevant sub-topics within the broader topics of change management
theory, communication, leadership, perception, attitudes and learning.
These could include, shaping behaviour, managing resistance to change,
errors in perception, leadership behaviours, cognitive dissonance,
communication channels, barriers to communication, etc. You should
focus on at least five sub-topics and how the sub-topics you have chosen
are related. You need to strike a balance between depth and breadth.
*Note, you are not asked to develop a new appraisal system, but a plan to
implement the new one that has been developed so that it will be rolled
out efficiently with wide understanding and acceptance by academic staff.
You must present your work as a formal essay or essay style report, but
either way, it must comply to high academic standards. This requires
that you have an introduction, body and conclusion, that you draw on
journal articles and texts, that you write using full sentences and
paragraphs (no dot points), that you fully reference your work and that
you construct well developed arguments (descriptive definitions do not
attract marks).
*Aim of the
assignment:
Students are to demonstrate a sound understanding of theories relevant to
the sub-topics chosen for this assignment. A sound understanding is
demonstrated by: knowledge of the literature, a synthesis of the various
ideas found in the literature, an evaluation of the theories and application
of theoretical concepts to management practice.
*Notes: .
As noted above, you are expected to conform to high standards of
literacy and academic practice, including literature research and full
documentation of sources. This means you must use references in your
essay and you must cite those references both in the body of your essay
and in an end reference list. Failure to do so is likely to result in a failed
paper. Be sure to express the ideas you read about in your own words,
but acknowledge their source by citing the reference. Avoid the use of
direct quotes as they do not demonstrate to the marker your
understanding of the concepts and reading material and consume many
words without attracting any marks. You are required to reference using
the author / date method. This method is explained in detail in this unit
outline.
Plagiarised assignments will receive a mark of zero. Work that is not
written by the person who submitted it for assessment will receive a mark
of zero.
References
In-text: Using the author-date method of referencing, have you correctly cited all the
authors whose work you have drawn upon? (See this unit outline for the required
referencing style.)
*Reference List: Have you correctly listed all references used in the body of your
work in an end reference list, featured on a separate page? Note that a Bibliography
is not required.
**Structure of Discussion
Is your essay well organised? Does it have an introduction, a body of argument and
evidence, and a conclusion?
Introduction: What is your short answer to the question?
The introductory statement or thesis identifies the topic of the
essay, indicates a “position” with regard to the question, and
suggests the line of reasoning that will be developed in the essay.
The final form of the introduction will probably be written last.
**Analysis
Have you moved beyond simple descriptions? From the theoretical foundations,
have you drawn conclusions, and insights which address the assignment tasks? To
undertake an analysis you have to answer the questions: “So what?”; “What does it
all mean in relation to my point of view?”. Based on your analysis you must make
some logical conclusion/s. Without a conclusion your analysis is incomplete.
Analysis does not come by just descriptively listing the views of the various writers;
you must break down their arguments and look for the strengths and weaknesses in
each. If you have read widely, many of those strengths and weaknesses will have
been highlighted for you in the other papers you have read.
**Body of essay: How did you arrive at your answer?
What is your line of reasoning? Your evidence?
The body of the essay should develop and support your
introductory statement by making points that support the
statement and providing evidence in support of those points (for
example, research findings, expert opinions, data, examples,
etc.). The stringing together of quotes is not a line of reasoning
nor is jotting down points under sub-headings. Sub-headings in
an essay are very useful and you are encouraged to use them,
however an essay can – and must – be able to be understood
without them. As the author, you are responsible for ensuring that
your line of reasoning and your evidence is readily
comprehensible to the reader; it is not the reader’s responsibility
to do your thinking for you. Also, material presented in the body
of the essay should be explained and critically evaluated
**Conclusion: What should the reader conclude from what you have presented?
A conclusion draws together the ideas and line of reasoning
presented in the essay and makes some meaningful statement
with regard to the thesis as it has been developed in the essay.
**Literacy
Have you checked spelling, punctuation, grammar, inclusive language, and
sentence and paragraph formation? One sentence does not normally make a
paragraph. Good paragraphs will contain transitional sentences which clearly state and how you move from one theme to the next.
**A final check
If someone was to read your assignment could they:
• tell you what the task is you are attempting to address?
• explain what they saw as your major points and conclusion?
• be persuaded by the evidence you present and the line of reasoning you
offered to support your conclusions?
Guidelines of written work:
1. The essay is to be typewritten or word processed.
Typed essays demonstrate a commitment to academic standards.
2. Type on one side of the page.
3. Leave a generous margin on the left hand side of the page.
4. Always use double spacing.
5. Aim for a simple, clear and direct writing style.
• Use one point per sentence.
• Complete sentences should always be used.
• Each paragraph should cover only one main idea or a set of closely connected
ideas.
• Headings and sub-headings can be used to make the underlying structure of
the analysis clearer.
• A “chatty” or “journalistic” style should be avoided. The first person (I,we)
should be avoided in favour of an impersonal style (the evidence suggests
that…)
• Spelling, grammar and other elements of expression will be considered in the
assessment.
6. Avoid many of the problems of poor presentation by drawing up a plan and
preparing one or more preliminary drafts before writing the final version of the
report. Proof read your final typed version.
7. Use gender neutral language. This is most easily achieved by using the plural
form, for example, using “they” instead of “he”. Thus, “A worker faced by new
technology may feel that his skills are being devalued” can be re-stated as, “Workers
faced by new technology may feel their skills are being devalued.”
8. Appendices to the report should contain any additional information which you
regard as important (e.g. graphs, tables, questionnaires). Appendices should be
referred to in the text and should be numbered and sequenced in the same order as
they appear in the text.
9. Pages should be numbered and the entire report securely stapled. Plastic covers
and the like are cumbersome and unnecessary.
10. One copy of the report (hard and electronic) and all material submitted, should be
made and retained. In the event your assignment is “lost”, it will be your
responsibility to be able to immediately supply a replacement copy.
**11. All sources of information and ideas are to be acknowledged. References in the
report should be cited by author and date of publication.
Example
Beauchamp & Bowie (2004) suggest …….
OR
It has been suggested (Beauchamp & Bowie, 2004) that ……
12. A reference list must be included on a separate page at the conclusion of your
essay. Present the list of references in alphabetical order. In the list of references
presented at the end of the essay, cite journal articles and books in the manner of
the sample references given below.
In your reference list, name only those authors that have been referred to in the
essay. Do not list any additional reading whose author you have not named in the
essay.
Failure to cite your sources in the body of your essay, along with the absence
of an end reference list, will normally lead to a failed grade for your
assignment.
13. Make sure you know exactly what is required and that you answer the question
according to these requirements. If in doubt, see your lecturer.
**Referencing
The Faculty of Business and Government requires you to use the Author/Date (Harvard)
style of referencing. This style, rather than the footnote system, allows readers to
immediately see your source of information and saves the writer the trouble of adjusting
footnotes to the page. There are minor variations in style but you should aim for
consistency. The most important point is the author and date of the reference should
appear in brackets in the text. A reference is necessary when:
a. Another writer is directly quoted.
b. The ideas of another writer are reported or rephrased.
**To reference multiple sources:
Multiple references to a single author should be cited in the following manner:
De George (1993, 1999) suggests that ……
Reference to multiple authors should be cited by listing within brackets, and in
alphabetical order, the surname of each author and the date of publication. For example,
Some authors (De George, 1999; Velasquez, 2002) have noted that ……
**To reference a chapter in an edited book, or an article in a journal:
In your essay write the same details, e.g.
Duska, (1998) suggests …. OR It has been suggested …. (Duska, 1998).
In the list at the end of the essay you need to give the page numbers on which the article
appeared.
**To reference an electronic document:
Electronic document references should, at a minimum, include the author’s name, if
known; the full title of the document; the full title of the work it is part of, if there is one; the
ftp, http, or other address (URL); and the date the document was accessed.
Examples
Kravchyna, V. & Hastings, S. K. 2002. Informational value of museum web sites. First
Monday, 7 (2):http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue7_2/kravchyna.
Becker, E. 2002. Raising Farm Subsidies, U.S. Widens International Rift. New York
Times on the Web.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/15/international/europe/15FARM.html, 17 June.