Guide to Management Core Subjects-Organisational Behaviour

This starts with the spelling. Behaviour, or Behavior? British or American? Take your pick. But for me, this was the pick of the subjects during my MBA. Along with Marketing. A nation built on marketing was Britain first, until they were outsmarted at their own game by the U.S.A.

Anyway, this is about O.B., as the acronym goes. There are two major components to OB, understanding the self and then learning interpersonal and organisational behaviour. How personality develops from childhood onwards, how a child is weaned away from dependence (or not, remaining a mama's boy), etc. Erik Eriksson had an interesting take on it, describing some seven stages in childhood, stages like Autonomy versus Doubt, which a child passes through. Freud and other theorists also add to the mysteries of the mind, with their take on the subconcious, including fantasy, dreams, and the like. Very interesting stuff. Pavlov and his 'dog'ged experiments also are taught to make us aware of conditioning, which parents, society, religion and government are so fond of.

How one behaves in an organisation and possible reasons for it, are the rest of the story. Motivation theories, leadership theories and so on are a part of this. How to handle people (or students/colleagues) at work is the biggest question before managers in industry, academics, or wherever. Most organisations which perform well have some leaders or managers to thank for handling their people well. Unfortunately, most people realise that people skills are important after they finish an MBA, and tend to neglect this subject (Indian experience distilled from several B schools). Engineers require these in large doses (I was one). Others also may need them.