Organisational Behaviour Report

This report analyzes organizational behavior issues at Govia Thameslink Railway, a UK rail franchise, including strikes, service disruptions, and employee dissatisfaction. It proposes solutions like employee training, efficient time management, and monetary incentives, and recommends an autocratic leadership style and a rational organizational system to improve operations and employee satisfaction.

ORGANISATIONAL
BEHAVIOUR

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Analysing organizational behaviour issues experienced through Govia Thameslink.................1
Effective solutions to the workplace to address issues...............................................................4
Recommendation.........................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Organisational behaviour is considered as study of human behaviour in organizational
settings, interface among organization and human behaviour and sometimes organization itself.
In simple words, this is considered as study of both groups and performance of individual within
company. Generally, internal and external perspectives are two basic theories to view
organizational behaviour of organizations (Kim and et.al., 2019). The present report is about
Govia Thameslink Railway which is operating the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern rail
franchise in England. It will provide in depth analysis of organizational behaviour issues
experiences through Govia Thameslink. In the same series, it will highlight the issues faced
through all passengers, staff, conductors, drivers and different style of management used through
management for running franchise. This report will evaluate effective solutions to issues of
workplace being experienced or this could be elaborated as conclusions for these issues.
Simultaneously, this will make recommendations through evaluation and application of different
organizational theories and concepts.
Analysing organizational behaviour issues experienced through Govia Thameslink
In the present scenario, there are different organizational issues which are managerial
challenges, workplace issues, organizational issues, global and environmental challenges.
Generally manageress face issues regarding quality and productivity, quality, managing
technology and innovations, coping with temporariness and ethical behaviour (Ahmad and et.al.,
2019). The commuters face upgraded network with experience of mass last minute cancellations,
overcrowded services and long delays. Moreover, the passengers using Northern services in the
north of England have also faced similar issue as it has led to renewed calls for network of train
to be nationalised. The issues were increasing on regular basis as anger at lack of information.
The passengers face serious issues regarding alterations in time table and contrary to claims
through ministers. There was urge of petition to government by approx 4000 respondents to
cancel contract of Govia Thameslink.
It has been clearly viewed that neither Govia Thameslink railway nor Network rail were
resourced appropriately or financed for purpose of managing these huge operation. It had
outcome, numerous cancellation and services being withdrawn through regular time table. Apart
from this, while implementing robust and reliable timetable has met with more incredulity
through those passengers who faced cancellation services, confusion and dangerously
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overcrowded platforms and stations. These issues were also expressed on social media by the
unhappy customers about their level of frustration (Mattha Busby, 2019). The trains were
cancelled because of unavailability of drivers as they cancelled with absence of notice and
people ferried on and off. The trains have been rescheduled in its franchise in particular attempt
for purpose of improving rail efficiency but it is very complicated task and engagement of re-
training drivers on new routes.
Simultaneously, people are facing job losses as business are struggling lot of people who
stays in particular area. There was presence of train drivers strike which has been suspended but
conductor;s strike was on as their reason was about arguments over camera visibility, safety,
unmanned stations and access for trains for continuing the disabled people. The traffic density
has also raises sharply as they were forced to take cars as daily misery diverted, cancelled and
overcrowded trains grinds on struggling for travelling on network which relies heavily on
overtime for recovering the schedule (Ariel and et.al., 2019). There is presence of poor
management on industrial scale exacerbated through government hiding in fighting and shadows
a proxy war with unions, refusing to criticising the unions, and entrenched while passengers
suffered. It had affected jobs, relationships and mental health as there is absence of insight and
fact which is dreadful and poor service is dished on daily basis.
The strikes have occurred as it has an unacceptable along with soul destroying impact and
most important, local economy also suffered (Govia Thameslink 'could lose franchise' over rail
chaos, 2019). The railways are too dysfunctional and network team and Govia Thameslink
Railway has not coordinated appropriately. Instead, Southern had also breached contract and
even ministers failed to monitor the firm. This had raised disputes or strike in the long running
staffing as abject failure to undertaking issues related to safety has left with absence of option for
confirming other action. The main reason behind strike because of Aslif Union followed
conductors through RMT in considering industrial action in long running dispute on the biggest
Britain's commuter franchise. In simpler terms, alterations to role of conductors are now
rebranded as supervisors of onboard. It was claimed by union that this particular practice is not
safe and fear that safety critical task of conductor was rid, then jobs would be at risk.
In nutshell, major factor to cause disruption on Southern as commuters are not aware,
issues long pre-date the entire strike. It has been admitted about shortages of staff during
initiation of franchise, However, poor situation is worsened through requirements of taking out
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drivers to act as trainers or trained themselves on innovative rolling stock. In the same series,
higher than usual level of sickness which has been labelled through Southern and government as
unofficial industrial action along with fury of unions. The insufficient capacity to run sufficient
trains for demand as large scale engineering works, comprises overhaul of London bridge as
other source of disruption (Miles Brignall, 2019). Lastly, random events like flooding,
breakdown and sinkholes have struck the luckless southern with stretched resources to limit and
staff goodwill broken down along with knock on effects of these incidents could be more
extreme.
Effective solutions to the workplace to address issues
The effective solutions which can be implemented at the workplace to address the issues
was that the first problem arise was strikes by the employees of the railways which cause
inefficiency in operations and lead to delay in time for which customers had to suffer the issue.
The problem arisen because of poor management of the railways and mismanagement of
employees (Marsh, 2014). Employees did not have the higher authority which created chaos and
confusion and lead to such Detroit. For solving this particular problem the management of the
railway need to be proper which can be achieved by changing the style of leadership. The
management need to focus on making strict rules and guidelines for employees in carrying out
their work in which the authority needs to be very clear. The drivers need to know whom they
are answerable too and what can be the consequences of bad behavior. The leader and the
management need to be strict with the employees at initial level to solve the problems and later
need to be little less rigid (Wang and et.al, 2018).
The other issue arises was unsatisfied drivers which again cause trouble to customers.
The trains were not leaving for their particular destination which caused inconvenience to the
customers (Finger and et.al., 2017). To solving this issue the management need to adopt rational
system perspective which will focus on dividing work between workers and mangers which will
clear confusion of both the parties. It will provide incentives to the drives who departed on time
and came on time with taking full responsibility of the customers. When drivers will be lured by
monetary incentives they will put in their best efforts and will solve the problem of
unsatisfactory among drivers.
The other issue which railway need to dealt with was unskilled employees which create a
sense of fear among customers as when the drivers, mechanics are not skilled they cannot risk
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their life while travelling with them, therefore to solve this issue the management of the company
need to hire new recruits who are interested in working, the management need to be strict in
selecting candidates as if anyone would get selected will lead to risk (Finger and et.al, 2017).
The company at first need to adopt a fixes criteria and strategy to select candidates on the basis
of educational qualification, and on basis of their skill test. After selecting the best candidates,
they need to be trained for the designation they are being selected and then need to provide
proper training for at least 4 months to be best at their job. The management of the company
need to develop sense of motivation and satisfaction among all the new recruits and need to
delegate the individual responsibility specifically to avoid confusion and to achieve efficiency in
operations of railways.
The most important issue that has been underlined was the time issue which cause delay
in train and no customer can reach their destination on time. For this purpose, the railway
management need to make a proper and appropriate time schedule for each and every train that
will move from the track (Clarke, 2018). For making perfect time plan, the drivers of the train
need to come at their job 3 hours prior to the reporting time of the customers so that if any
misfortune happened, train does not get delay. The train which will leave from the track needs to
get checked 10 hours before it actually start working so that if any technical error arise can be
sorted. The customers who will travel in the train need to come 1 hour prior to the time of
departure so that time can be managed and train does not get delay.
Recommendation
This has been recommended to Govia Thameslink railways to adopt autocratic leadership
to resolve there above stated organizational issues. The leader exerts power of high level over the
employees, workers and entire team. The people within team must be given some opportunities
for purpose of making any effective suggestions. It would be in interest of team or organization.
The disputes could be settled by understanding case and offered guarantee of a second safety
critical member of staff with perspective of trains (Ullah, Kiran and Liu, 2019). In this case,
various staff tend to resent being treated and leader has full authority and reserves the right for
purpose of making decisions and its followers should obey instructions of leader without uttering
any question. This remains ideally suited for workers as it is on basis of nature of workforce.
The team of Govia Thameslink Railways has very low motivation due to low trust of
their passengers and bad reputation and working in group, tend to pass on works to others. So, in
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this aspect, autocratic leader would allocate clear and precise responsibilities as this ensures
workers work their share. This team would comprise different new team members as drivers and
even inexperienced team which is not familiar with their function, so this is appropriate approach
to get work done with absence of wasting time.
Apart from this, it has been recommended as per rational organization system which has
significant parts as appropriate specification of formalization and goals. Goal specification offers
guidelines for particular tasks to be completed with regulated mode of resources to be assigned.
In the same series, formalization is a mode for standardising the organizational theory and as
outcome, there would be numerous stable expectations which create the rational organization
system. This must divide the work between drivers and other staff and must be well coordinated.
The most attractive thing is to offer incentives which is wholly based on level of performance
and should be paid on weekly basis. The workers should be trained properly and development of
science for responsibilities of every individual. Lastly, this should ensure that work done on
timely basis along with efficient and effective manner (Alvesson and Spicer, 2019). The issues
arose in strike must be discussed appropriately and always be loyal and transparent. Thus,
unnecessary conflicts must be resolved along with misunderstandings at workplace.
CONCLUSION
Govia Thames-link was the rail franchise in UK government that faced a lot of issues
from driver's strikes to unsatisfied employees. It had poor workforce who were negligent towards
their work. The report concluded the issues that were faced by the railway which lead to loss of
customers, delay in time of the train, unwanted strikes etc. it has depicted the solutions that can
be adopted by management to solve the problems faced by railways which included recruitment
of new employees, introducing efficient time management plan and motivating workers through
monetary incentives. At last the report outlined the recommendation based on management
theories that the railway management can adopt in leadership as well as decision making which
included autocratic style of leadership as well as rational theory which can make the operations
of railways efficient and employees satisfied.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Ahmad, Z. and et.al., 2019. Islamic Work Ethics and Organizational Citizenship Behavior
Among Muslim Employees in Educational Institutions. In Proceedings of the Second
International Conference on the Future of ASEAN (ICoFA) 2017-Volume 1 (pp. 455-464).
Springer, Singapore.
Alvesson, M. and Spicer, A., 2019. Neo-Institutional Theory and Organization Studies: A Mid-
Life Crisis?. Organization Studies. 40(2). pp.199-218.
Ariel, B. and et.al., 2019. Reducing Assaults Against Staff Using Body-Worn Cameras (BWCs)
in Railway Stations. Criminal Justice Review. 44(1). pp.76-93.
Clarke, S., 2018, Safety culture on the UK railway network. Work & stress. 12(3). pp.285-292.
Finger, M., and et.al., 2017. Competition in passenger railways in Europe.
Kim, M. and et.al., 2019. The antecedents and consequences of positive organizational behavior:
The role of psychological capital for promoting employee well-being in sport
organizations. Sport Management Review. 22(1). pp.108-125.
Marsh, W. and Bearfield, G., 2014. Using Bayesian networks to model accident causation in the
UK railway industry. In Probabilistic safety assessment and management (pp. 3597-3602).
Springer, London.
Ullah, I., Kiran, A. and Liu, B., 2019. Impacts of Leadership Styles on Motivations of
Employees. In Servant Leadership Styles and Strategic Decision Making (pp. 205-217). IGI
Global.
Wang, K., and et.al., 2018. A simulation platform to assess comprehensive power quality issues
in electrified railways. International Journal of Rail Transportation. 6(4). pp.233-254.
Online
Govia Thameslink 'could lose franchise' over rail chaos. 2019. [Online]. Available through
<https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-44671423>.
Mattha Busby. 2019. Government urged to strip Govia Thameslink Railway of its franchise.
[Online]. Available through
<https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/jul/18/government-urged-strip-govia-
thameslink-railway-franchise-timetable-chaos>.
Miles Brignall. 2019. Govia Thameslink rail chaos: ministers urged to take 'emergency
measures'. [Online]. Available through
<https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/may/30/govia-thameslink-rail-chaos-
ministers-urged-to-take-emergency-measures>.
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