As humans we have always been curious about the direction and extent of the interdependence between people and organisations. Organisational behaviour thought has revealed some persistent themes; some of the most important ones investigate issues of leadership, motivation and organisational change. Let’s see why they are important to our current working environments, especially in the age of the pandemic.

Mary Parker Follet

In terms of leadership, the American sociologist Mary Parker Follet was instrumental in articulating ideas about human psychology and human relations within industrial management. In 1926 at a time of hierarchical conservative views in the workplace, she published “The Giving of Orders” where she promoted a more participative style of leadership. This more egalitarian approach promoted the idea of more flattened organisations because workers and managers mutually assessed situations and decided how to resolve them. In this view, both managers and workers could in fact issue orders.

In the perennial issue of how to satisfy work requirements, she described the essence of the problem as either of two extremes: on the one hand there was the “great bossism” with which orders could be given and on the other hand was the other extreme where no orders would be given. Her solution was “…to unite all concerned in a study of the situation, to discover the law of the situation and obey that…” (Extract from “The Giving of Orders“). She described the effect of this approach as a “depersonalising of orders” which resulted in the managers being “…as much under orders as the workers, for both obey the law of the situation.” At its heart this point of view held that the way that orders were given was very important in that it elicited a particular type of reaction from the receiver of the orders – as humans we obey orders where prior patterns have already been established or if new positive patterns are created. In recognition of this condition of human learning, Follet became one of the earliest proponents of workplace training to increase employee capabilities which in turn would yield greater returns for the organisation.

Abraham Maslow

In terms of motivation, it is hard to look past Abraham Maslow’s 1943 publication “A Theory of Human Motivation” in which he highlighted his hierarchy of needs theory. This motivational theory was characterised by a five-tier cascading model of human needs. The theory affirmed that needs at the bottom of the model must be satisfied before the subsequent set of needs higher up the ladder can be considered. The needs in ascending order of attention are: physiological (food, water, shelter etc.), safety (personal security, health etc.), love and belonging (friendship, intimacy etc.), esteem (respect, status etc.), and self-actualization (desire to fulfil and exceed potential).

The first 4 needs (physiological to esteem) are called deficiency needs and according to Maslow, their forfeiture motivates the person and the longer these needs are unmet the stronger the motivation to fulfil them (e.g. the longer you are denied access to food the hungrier you become).

The linearity of needs was challenged by other theories which offered empirical evidence to suggest that human needs were not linear.

Douglas McGregor

One of the most seminal works to advance the thinking on organisational behaviour was “The Human Side of Enterprise” published by Douglas McGregor in 1957. In this work, McGregor showed how assumptions of workers held by management were one of the most important factors in the tone of worker treatment in the organisation. He described two types of assumptions which he called Theory X and Theory Y assumptions; both assumptions held certain beliefs about workers’ natural behaviour. On the one hand, he stated that Theory X managers believed that employees did not enjoy the idea of attending work and whenever the appropriate opportunity presented itself to avoid work, the employees would take advantage of that. Because of this intrinsic reluctance to fully commit to work, employees had to be compelled to work or persuaded through punitive means. On the other hand, Theory Y managers believed that employees found work to be a source of satisfaction in their lives and sought responsibility in the workplace. As a result, employees under such managers would not need coercion in the workplace, and in fact they would be self-directed in completing their work. Many organisations actually premise their work cultures on either of these suppositions: Theory X organisations tend to have more stringent supervisory controls (centralisation of authority) while Theory Y organisations tend to encourage employees to be self-directed and take initiative on their own for the betterment of the team and organisation (decentralisation of authority).

Irving Janis

In the early 1970’s one of the most fascinating ideas on organisational behaviour was postulated in an article by American psychologist, Irving Janis. In “Groupthink” Janis discusses the tendency for group members’ desire for consensus to override their individual capacity for critical thinking to such an extent that decisions are made by some sort of “manufactured consent” rather than any objective appraisal process. Groupthink was arguably the reason for some of the most significant management decisions of the 20th century: the decision in 1962 by President John F Kennedy to sponsor a covert operation to dislodge Cuban President Fidel Castro (what came to be known as the “Bay of Pigs” fiasco) and the decision by President Lyndon Johnson to escalate the Vietnam war in the late 1960’s.

This cursory glance at the great organisational behaviour principles of recent ages ranging from thoughts on leadership (the giving of orders) to thoughts on motivation in organisations (hierarchy of needs) to ideas which placed more emphasis on the value of the human being (Theory X, Theory Y) and finally modes of decision making (groupthink) demonstrates the importance of organising in some way at the workplace. The common theme is the idea of dependence: who depends more on the other, organisations or people? Up to the middle of the 20th century it was generally accepted that people greatly depended on organisations. It was therefore a one-way dependency relationship and during this period organisations searched for ways to mould people’s skills to the organisational needs. After the 1950’s and 1960’s, much of thinking changed and now regarded the value of the human being as intrinsically special and therefore capable of great deeds, either individually or in the name of organised enterprise. As a result, the idea of dependence gave way to an idea of co-dependence. Humans and organisations needed each other equally, indeed many even now believing that organisations needed humans more.

As we consider these thoughts on organisational behaviour over the decades, it is worthwhile to consider their place in the age of social media. Which of these principles is still relevant in these times?

Social media, the organisation

Social media should no longer be associated purely with entertainment. Organisations have learned or are learning to transition from fearing it to embracing it. And even if they continue to fear social media, something else is happening anyway: the prominence of social media has risen so rapidly in a short space of time that its influence is now all-pervading. Social media has become an enormous organisation! Those who succeed in this new organisation are the ones who recognise the new form of human enterprise in organisational behaviour and take advantage of it just as their forebearers did in earlier times.

And the principles which mattered in the 1920’s when Mary Parker Follet discussed leadership and its effect of flattening organisations also matter in the 2020’s when social media “influencers” share content with their followers. Social media has flattened organisations because it has dispersed the access to information; virtually anyone can create and access content. Social media has allowed business leaders to gain immediate access to millions of their customers and followers. And the social media influence can come from virtually any source. The popular mommy blogger Heather Armstrong is a good example of this new democratisation of influence. She was “…so upset over the failure of her Maytag washer and the company’s ensuing service missteps that, using her mobile phone, she told her million-plus followers on Twitter they should never buy a Maytag…” (Empowered).

The following sentiment of Mary Parker Follet is relevant in this age of social media: the role of leadership should be “…to unite all concerned in a study of the situation, to discover the law of the situation and obey that…” The Social media organisation functions in this way. It is no longer the maverick character who alone makes key decisions, neither is it the most knowledgeable individuals who make such decisions; decisions are increasingly being made by the “law of the situation,” the social media situation. Key organisational decisions used to factor in a purely cursory check of social media; nowadays, such decisions are preceded by an active consideration of the “pulse” of social media. It is virtually unheard of these days for key organisational decisions to be made without some sort of examination of relevant social media issues. Some obvious examples are the grovelling responses of companies to successful campaigns of cranky customers or the backtracking by organisations after miscalculating the potential for social media backlash. Just ask the Argentinian Rugby Union which just two days after banning its captain and two other players for racist social media posts was forced to reinstate them after fears of a social media backlash.

Leaders and managers of the modern company will be even more successful in their enterprise if they demonstrate an awareness of this “law of the situation”; a law first communicated in the 1920’s but finding incredible relevance in the 2020’s.