When do teams begin and end? We see team membership change all the time, whether we’re talking about sports or a workgroup. My favorite baseball team is the Pittsburgh Pirates. As anyone that follows the team knows, they have had quite a bit of turnover in players (for example the recent unfortunate trade of Andrew McCutchen, one of my favorites), yet they remain the Pirates. This team did not end when McCutchen left. Nor did it begin when he joined their ranks. In other words, the existence of a team can and likely will continue even when membership changes. I can think of several work teams that I’ve been a part of, including in my role as director of the Master of Science in Management: Operational Excellence program here at Saint Vincent, where members leave the team and new members come on board, all while the team continues along in its purpose.
Topics: Operational Excellence, organizational culture, management, saint vincent professor, st. vincent professor, Dr. Mike Urick, Andrew McCutchen, organizational behavior, Jethro Tull, Master of Science in Management
In my last blog, I discussed linking research to classroom instruction. In this blog, I advocate the importance of classroom learning to students’ lives and careers outside of (and after) their formal education.
Topics: organizational culture, class, life, teach, lessons
Citizenship Behaviors Benefit You, Me and Us
Engaging in the tasks that are listed on a job description likely comes to mind when many people hear the term “job performance.” Yet, engaging in these tasks is only part of how to define successful performance in the workplace.
Another aspect of being a successful performer at work is engaging in organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs for short). These are “voluntary” in that they are not listed on one’s job description, but organizations, coworkers and those individuals who perform them often benefit from these activities (LePine, Erez & Johnson, 2002).
Topics: workplace culture, organizational culture, organizational citizenship behaviors, OCB
Creating an inclusive and welcoming workplace that values all employees is crucial for organizations (and society as a whole). Yet, we constantly hear news of racism, sexism, bigotry, discrimination and other forms of marginalization in our country and in our organizations.
Topics: workplace culture, organizational culture, multicultural organization
Many people love drama, even though some may not want to admit that fact. Drama is why some viewers are glued to reality TV, social media or celebrity gossip stories. Even though drama can be entertaining in the media, it can be disastrous if it exists in the workplace. Yet, workplace drama is so common that several blog readers asked me to address this issue here.
Topics: Michael Urick, how to deal with drama at work, conflict at work, workplace culture, organizational culture, drama in the workplace, workplace relationships