A model of how the climate within an organization develops and influences job behavior is suggested in Exhibit 16. The influences on climate (the external environment, differences in the structure of the organization, and personal differences in the style and behavior of management) are moderated by the norms of the group of which the employee is a member, as well as the individual's tasks and personality, to produce, in effect, three types of climate. The individual has a perception of the climate that exists within the company. To the extent that this is shared by the other employees in his or her department, a group climate is formed. Where there exists a collective perception within the property, an organizational climate can be described, one that is generally agreed on to be descriptive of the operation as a whole.
The individual then develops in his or her mind a map of the perceived climate, which acts as a screening device to reinforce that perception. Research has shown, for example, that the longer an individual has been working within a certain climate, the more difficult it is to change that person's perception of it. On the basis of the individual, group, and organizational climates, employees develop expectations that—moderated by the employees' ability and personality—affect motivation, satisfaction, and job performance.
External influences
The external environment surrounding the company influences the type of climate that is appropriate. We can speculate, for example, that the availability of labor will help shape the extent to which the company values employees. When the competition for employees is stiff, management will adopt a stronger employee orientation than when labor is plentiful.
Organizational influences
There is an assumption that close physical proximity between workers and management will produce greater employee identification with management goals and objectives. Additionally, some feel that a smaller property will produce a greater feeling of teamwork than a larger operation. The results of research on the effect of size on organizational climate are mixed. While some studies have shown that increasing size reduces job satisfaction of employees, all agree that size alone is not a decisive determinant of organizational climate.
Although insufficient studies have been completed to produce generalizations, one study found a significant relationship between climate and the type of technology. Employees in companies that used small batch and process technologies perceived more favorable climates than those in operations using mass production techniques.
Studies have also looked at the orientation of the organization in terms of its effect on employee perception of climate. It has been found that highly bureaucratic structures are more likely to be perceived as closed systems with a less satisfactory climate. In another study, employees felt they had more individual autonomy and were rewarded more when they perceived that the company had an orientation toward customers rather than stockholders.
Personal influences
Individuals bring with them biases toward seeing what is around them. Individuals who grew up inherently suspicious of management will tend to see negatives in everything management does. They may view things differently from another employee who was raised to believe that management is not out to get the workers.
Moderating influences
The external influences on climate are moderated by several factors. It has been shown, for example, that perceptions of climate vary among employees at different levels in the management hierarchy. Perceptions are also influenced by the type of job that employees perform and the type of person they are. One study found that when an experimental group was given more discretion to make decisions, those in the group showed more motivation toward responsibility and achievement, felt a closer relationship to management, and felt that rewards were tied more closely to performance than a control group did. They were also more successful in sales and profitability than the control group.
Employees can conduct a simple exercise to determine what motivates them to do a good job. People are motivated by many different factors. Some are internal factors, such as a need for power or achievement; others are connected to the job itself, such as the desire for challenging work; while still others are influenced by a supervisor or manager, such as the need for feedback or praise. The employee should take a few minutes to list, in no particular order of importance, the factors that motivate him or her to do a good job. Then review the list. Which items are directly influenced by the supervisor? There are certain things that an individual manager can do little about; for example, perhaps, pay and benefits. The supervisor can directly influence other things, such as recognizing employee achievements and giving some decision-making authority. The list is likely to contain more manager-influenced items than the employee expected. Many people, including managers themselves, are surprised to realize the number of items important to creating motivation that can be influenced by the boss.
For employees who place great importance on the work situation, certain dimensions of climate are more important. Such employees prefer task-oriented management actions that seek to get the organizations moving. They also enjoy friendly social relationships while not wishing to be burdened with what they consider merely busywork. For those who see the work situation as being less important, the emphasis sought is on maintaining pleasant relationships while reducing dissension and disruption.
Dimensions of climate
At least 10 questionnaires have been developed to measure the climate within an operation. This research has resulted in descriptions of climate in anywhere from four to seven dimensions, or key aspects. A well-respected model is that of the Forum Corporation. 1
The Forum model describes the climate of an organization in six dimensions: three dealing with performance, three with development. The performance dimensions are clarity, commitment and standards.The development dimensions are responsibility, recognitionand teamwork.
Clarity refers to how well the employees understand the goals and policies of the company, in addition to how clear they are about their own job. It is the feeling that things are organized and run smoothly, not confused. Too often, employees are not given a written job description when they join a new hotel or restaurant. They must pick up the elements of their job from existing employees. If they feel unclear about what they should be doing relative to others in the operation, they would have a low score on this dimension. In general, companies do not tell employees enough about their overall goals and objectives. Perhaps the feeling is, "They're just not interested", but the result is that employees do not know what is important to the company. When they are not clear about that, they will be unclear about how to act in work situations. "If a customer complains, what should I do?" or "If my boss makes a pass at me, what can I do?"
Commitment is the extent to which employees feel continually committed to achieving the goals of the company; the extent to which they accept company goals as being realistic; the extent to which they are involved in the setting of such goals; and the extent to which their performance is continually evaluated against the goals of the operation. Companies have certain goals, such as profitability, return on investment, customer satisfaction, and cleanliness. These goals are achieved (or not achieved) by the efforts of the employees. Company goals can be met only if employees are in some way committed to achieving them. The greater the commitment, the more likely it is that the objective will be achieved.
Standards measure the degree to which employees feel that management emphasizes the setting of high standards of performance, and the extent to which they feel pressure to improve their performance continually. Strange as it may seem, employees often have higher standards than the company does. This can occur in an operation that is very bottom-line oriented. In an effort to achieve that all-important profit, concessions are made in the areas of customer service, equipment maintenance, and employee training and development. Employees, in particular those who have been with the operation for an extended time, may feel that standards toward the customer have been slipping. This will influence how they feel toward the company and may well affect their performance. In Search of Excellence, by Tom Peters and Robert H Waterman Jr., in comparing companies that emphasized financial objectives with others emphasizing non-financial objectives (such as customer satisfaction or cleanliness), found that the latter actually produced better bottom-line results than the companies that stressed financial objectives. One explanation is that few layers of employees can relate to the financial objectives of the operation; many more layers can relate to something such as customer satisfaction. They may not share in the profits of the company, but they have all been customers.
Among the development dimensions of climate, responsibility is the feeling employees have that they are personally responsible for the work that they do, that supervisors encourage them to take the initiative, and that they have a real sense of autonomy. The employee who has to check with the boss before he or she can do anything does not have this. Some supervisors, while complaining that their subordinates will not leave them in peace and will not make decisions for themselves, do not encourage employee initiative. They criticize employee decisions without being constructive; they will not tolerate employee opinions that differ from theirs. One explanation for this behavior is that the supervisor, while critical of the employees' lack of initiative, wishes to keep a close check on them. This paternalistic feeling comes from the belief that if employees can make decisions and initiate actions without them, the supervisors will not be needed. The way this type of supervisor feels needed is to force employees to check with him or her about even the most minute details of a job.
The second development dimension is recognition: the feeling that employees are noted and rewarded for doing good work, rather than receiving criticism and punishment as the predominant form of feedback. In a climate such as this, rewards and recognition outweigh threats and criticism, there is in place a promotion system that helps the best person rise to the top, and the hotel or restaurant has a reward structure related to excellence of performance. It sometimes seems, however, that the only feedback employees get is when something is amiss. When we hear: "The boss wants to see you", most of us will immediately think: "What did I do wrong?" A major reason is the idea of management by exception. Under this accounting term, targets are set and, if met, the property is on target and no remedial action need be taken. If sales or cost projections are out of line, however, a red flag goes up to initiate corrective management action. Thus, if things are going well, the manager, who has many demands on his or her time, will pass over that department to concentrate on the problem areas. The result is that the only time employees hear from the manager is when things go wrong. Under this type of climate, in fact, employees may perform negatively in order to receive some feedback, even if it is criticism. The fact is that an absence of feedback (extinction is the psychological term) is more punishing than punishment. This idea is as prevalent for children at home and students in the classroom as it is for employees in the workplace.
Teamwork is the third development dimension. This is the perception of belonging to an organization that is cohesive, one where people trust one another, and where employees feel personal loyalty and the sense that they belong to the organization. It is the feeling of us working together, rather than us versus them, whether that be management versus workers or kitchen versus dining room. We all like to feel that we are part of a winning team. Consider how this can work for or against a hotel. We know that the most effective form of advertising is word of mouth. A negative comment from a friend can outweigh the effect of an advertisement costing thousands of dollars. If we assume that a hotel has 200 employees and that each one talks to 100 people each week, both in and out of work, each and every week there are 20,000 messages going out about that hotel that could be positive or negative. "Oh, you work at the XYZ Hotel; how is it?" "You wouldn't believe the way they treat us; I wouldn't trust that new manager as far as I could throw him!" Result? One lost customer.
Job behavior
Numerous studies have found a correlation between organizational climate and job performance. Climates seen as supportive have produced higher performance than those perceived as less supportive. Employee-centered climates have not always led to higher performance levels. One major factor seems to be the consistency with which climates are perceived. Employees who perceived that a climate was always rules oriented or always employee oriented performed better than in situations in which the climate perception changed.
That link is not as clear or as persuasive, however, as the relationship between climate and job satisfaction. Supportive climates lead to job satisfaction.
However, is there a link between job satisfaction and job performance? Most of the studies conducted prior to 1950 assumed that there was a positive relationship between job satisfaction (the extent to which an individual perceives getting satisfaction from the job) and productivity. Literature reviews in the 1950s indicated that there was little evidence of a significant relationship between satisfaction and performance. It has been demonstrated, however, that there is a consistently negative relationship between job satisfaction and turnover. That is, the greater the job satisfaction, the less the turnover. Links, while less strong, have also been found between satisfaction and absenteeism, and between satisfaction and on-the-job accidents. Greater satisfaction is related to less absenteeism and fewer on-the-job accidents.
The link between satisfaction and performance seems to be related to the type of job. The relationship is greater for jobs that call on higher levels of skills and knowledge.
The traditional viewpoint that high morale leads to good performance has given way in some quarters to the reverse notion, that good performance leads to high morale. When an employee achieves a measure of job success (performance), that leads them in turn to being satisfied with their job. Academic rigor aside, in the hospitality industry, which relies on guest-employee contact so much, it is hard to believe that a dissatisfied employee can give complete and hospitable service to a guest.
Moderating influences
At this level there are also external individual factors that moderate the link between climate and job behavior. One is the ability of the individual employee. In an innovative climate, employees who have the skills to produce in an unstructured setting will be more productive than those of lesser ability. Another factor is the employee's personality. Those with a high need for order perform better in a highly structured climate, while those with a high need for autonomy perform better in an environment in which decision making is decentralized.
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