Understanding and Applying Principles of Organisational Behaviour

This report focuses on understanding and applying principles of organisational behaviour in the context of Thomas Cook, a travel and tourism company. It explores the importance of organisational behaviour for the culture of the company and the relationship between culture, politics, and power on workforce performance and motivation. The report also evaluates the content and process theories of motivation followed by Thomas Cook.

Understanding and applying principles of
organisational behaviour to a variety of
business situations

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................4
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................4
1.1 Introduction to organization focusing on organizational behavior and its importance for
culture of the organization......................................................................................................4
1.2 Relationship of culture, politics, power of chosen organization and its relationship on
workforce performance and motivation.................................................................................8
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................8
2.1 Evaluation of content and process theories of motivation followed by organization......8
2.2 Evaluation of the way motivational techniques enables the teams and organization to
succeed by influencing the behavior of others at workplace................................................10
2.3 Conclusion with recommendations and justifications on how firm could improve the
performance of staff to meet goals using theories of culture, power, politics and motivation10
TASK 3..........................................................................................................................................11
3.1 Application of Belbin, Tuckman team development models to analyze the effectiveness of
team during planning day activity when developing team and its roles...............................11
3.2 Analysis of difficult situations where team ineffectiveness and conflicts were dealt to
improve team efficiency and productivity............................................................................13
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................13
4.1 Concepts and philosophies of organizational behavior by applying Contingency and Path-
Goal theory to resolve conflicts and improve team performance.........................................13
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................14
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................15

INTRODUCTION
Organisational Behaviour refers to the study and execution of knowledge regarding the
way people act and behave with others and within organisation. It helps in understanding the
complex nature of individuals within firm. Management of company requires to understand
behaviour of each employee at work place as this helps in developing better relationship by
attaining human, organisational and social objectives (Bester, Stander and Van Zyl, 2015). In
this report, chosen organisation is Thomas Cook which is a travel and tourism company that
offers wide range of services including visa, passport, foreign exchange, travel insurance,
international and domestic holidays. This report covers organisational behaviour and its
significance for culture of company, relationship between power, politics and culture and the
way it influence team behaviour and performance. Moreover, it includes content and process
motivation theories that enables effective attainment of goals within firm. Apart from this, a
reflective report is prepared in which Belbin and Tuckman team development model are included
to analyse the effectiveness of team. At last, concepts and philosophies of organisational
behaviour by implementing path goal and contingency theory to improve performance and
resolve conflicts are discussed in the report.
TASK 1
1.1 Introduction to organization focusing on organizational behavior and its importance for
culture of the organization
Thomas Cook is a travel related financial services organization that operates in tourism
and hospitality industry. The company was established in year 1881, around 138 years ago and
its headquarter is located in Mumbai, India. It is one of the largest travel service provider group
that offers services like foreign exchange, passport, visa, travel insurance, package holidays etc.
It is a public limited company that extended to around 233 locations. It is a public limited firm
that closely-held by Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited by its fully owned subsidiary Fairbridge
Capital Limited and its control affiliates that hold around 67.61% share.
Organizational behavior is characterized as a way in which an individual or a person
behave with others in an organizational premises (Bharathy, 2018). It includes management

activities that are concerned with predicting, understanding and influencing behavior of a person
in organizational setting. Proper understanding of organizational behavior is very necessary as it
helps in developing better relationship between employees and management and supports in
enhancing workplace culture. The culture of an organization is highly impacted by the behavior
of individuals within organizational premises. Coordinate and cooperative behavior of
employees helps in developing strong culture within Thomas Cook in which all the individuals
works happily towards attaining common goal (Burrell and Morgan, 2017).
Organizational culture:
Organizational Culture refers to the system of shared values, beliefs and assumptions
that governs the behavior of people within a company. Individuals are strongly influenced by
shared values in a firm and these depicts the way they act, dress and perform their job role. For
understanding the culture of Thomas Cook, Handy's culture typologies model is use which
includes four types of cultures.
Handy's Culture Typologies:
Handy's culture model is propounded by Charles Handy in which four types of cultures
are defined including role, task, power and person culture. Impact of these cultures on behavior
and performance of team and individuals is mentioned below:
Power culture: This is a culture in which all the powers are concentrated in few hands
only and their influence spreads all over the organization. Individuals with power are responsible
for taking all the decisions and employees are judged by their performance rather than the way
they act and behave. Existence of this culture may decline the creativity and motivation of teams
and workforce as their opinions are not taken into consideration and leads to impact negatively
on their behavior and performance (Christina and et. al., 2014).
Role culture: In this culture, employees and team members are assigned with some roles
and responsibilities as per their skills, qualification and specialization. In role culture, employees
are empowered to decide the best way to do task and they willingly accept the challenge.
Existence of this culture within Thomas Cook can helps in improving motivations level,
performance and behavior of teams and individuals. It would result in maximizing productivity
level of employees as they get job roles as per their interest area. This encourages employees to
work effectively towards attainment of organizational goals.

Task culture: This culture is associated with the formation of team to attain targets and
resolve critical issues (Chumg and et.al, 2016). In this, people with common skills, specialization
and interest are grouped together and each individual contributes equally in team to accomplish
task in innovative way. This influence behavior and performance of teams and individuals in
positive way and can help company in gaining support from employees to develop a positive
work culture within firm. Hence, results in improving motivation level of employees and
enables them to attain organizational goals (Coccia and Cadario, 2014).
Person culture: Employees consider themselves superior in this culture and feels that
they are important than company. They are more concerned about themselves and works only for
the sake of money. If this culture is exist within Thomas Cook then it may impact the behavior
and performance of teams and individuals positively, but can impacts adversely on performance
and productivity of company. It would leads to decrease in overall profitability of firm.
Above mentioned are the different types of cultures among which role culture is the
most appropriate one to be apply in Thomas Cook as this culture helps in developing strong and
positive culture within firm. Allocation of roles according to the interest area and specialization
of employees helps in developing a sense of satisfaction among them which ultimately results in
improving productivity and performance of both employees as well as Thomas Cook.
Organizational Power:
Organizational power refers to the ability of making things happen as per the perspective
of an individual by getting some other person to do it. It is advantageous for those companies in
which managers assign jobs to workforce and make them to do the tasks (Cooke, 2018). In
context of Thomas Cook, power helps top management to mould the behavior and performance
of individuals and teams for welfare of organization. Different types of powers exist within
organization can be understand by French and Raven power types model.
French and Raven Power Types:
French and Raven model is propounded by John French and Bertram Raven in year 1959
in which they define five bases of power which are mentioned below:
Legitimate power: This power is associated with position and role within firm.
Individuals with legitimate power is responsible to take decision whether good or bad. Reward
and punishment is seen as the legitimate part of this role. This power may demotivate employees
and impacts negatively in their performance and behavior within firm.

Reward power: In this type of power, rewards are provided to employees for their
performance in terms of promotions, hikes, training opportunities etc. This helps in improving
motivation of employees and maximizing the output delivered by them (Dawson, 2018).
Expert power: This power is based on skills and knowledge of an individual. This is an
effective type of power as skills and knowledge helps a person in understanding the situation
more appropriately and provide solid judgment. This positively impacts behavior and
performance of teams and individuals as expertise of leaders are greatly appreciated by
employees and develop their trust on their leader (De Vasconcelos, Gouveia and Kimble, 2016).
Referent power: It is the ability of a person to attract others and develop loyalty among
them. This power stemming from background, traits, charisma and image of leaders. The
outcomes of this power may be positive or negative. Shared personal belief between leader and
employees with intention of correlated actions impacts positively while, negative referent power
develops actions in opposition.
Coercive power: This power use threat of force to attain compliance from others. Threat
and punishment are the tools that are used by leaders to make employees do something against
their will. This power often leads issues and negatively impacts the behavior and performance of
employees at workplace.
From the above mentioned powers, reward power is the most appropriate one for
management of Thomas Cook as this can assist in improving motivation of employees by
providing them rewards for their performance.
Organizational politics:
Politics within organization are the unofficial, behind the scenes and informal efforts to
sell the concepts or ideas that influence the company. In this, the use of power is very strong and
has capability to influence the behavior and performance of teams and individuals in an adverse
way (Jansen and Samuel, 2014). In Thomas Cook, positive politics can be executed in the form
of telecommuting, rotational shifts, flexible working practices etc. This can help in improving
performance of individuals and develop healthy relations among them. On contrary to this,
negative politics can be exist in the form of unhealthy work environment, partiality, biasness,
demotion etc. that negatively influence the behavior and performance of teams and individuals
within firm. Positive politics within Thomas Cook can assist in improving motivation level of
employees that leads to enhance overall organizational performance.

1.2 Relationship of culture, politics, power of chosen organization and its relationship on
workforce performance and motivation
Culture, power and politics within organization are interrelated with each other and
impacts the performance and motivation level of workforce. If there is strong culture exist within
Thomas Cook then it will encourage positive politics within firm and the power will be used in
right way by superiors or the individuals who have power. Positive politics supports in
developing healthy workplace culture where employees work freely with full enthusiasm
towards attainment of goals and objectives of company (Junaid and Haar, 2015). On the other
hand, misuse of power leads to negative politics within firm and develops unhealthy culture at
workplace. This reduces the motivation of employees and develops a sense of dissatisfaction
among them that adversely impacts their performance. So, it is necessary for management of
Thomas Cook to ensure that positive politics, right use of power and strong culture is exists
within organization so that goals and targets can be easily attain.
TASK 2
2.1 Evaluation of content and process theories of motivation followed by organization
Motivation is the way that initiate, guide and maintain goal oriented behaviors within an
organization. It is very necessary for an individual or company in order to get success. In a
company, motivation plays very crucial role in enhancing performance and productivity of
employees and organization as well. Managers of firm use motivational approaches to encourage
employees for performing their roles in better way. There are two types of theories including
content and process motivational theory that can apply by Thomas Cook for motivating
employees (Kitchin, 2017).
Content Theories:
Content theories emphasize on the factors present inside an individual that cause, sustain
or stop a particular behavior. These theories aims on the needs that motivates people. Example
of content theory includes Maslow's needs hierarchy theory.
Maslow's Need Hierarchy Theory:
Need Hierarchy theory is given by Abraham Maslow in 1943 in which five basic needs
of individuals are stated which are mentioned below:

Physiological needs: It involves most basic needs that are required by individuals like
food, water and air. This is the most dominating need that can be fulfilled by Thomas Cook by
providing employees with adequate salaries and other benefits to ensure their improved living
standard (Lee, Tui and Sharif, 2016).
Safety and security needs: This need emphasize on safety and security of against any
threat. Thomas Cook can fulfill this need by providing job security, medical insurance etc. to
employees and their family members.
Love and belonging needs: It consists needs associated with acceptance in society,
belongingness and love from friends, family members and colleagues. For fulfilling this need,
Thomas Cook can conduct regular meetings, get-together etc. so that employees can interact
with each other and they feel a sense of belongingness.
Self esteem needs: It is associated with the needs of being valued and respected by
others. Thomas Cook can fulfill this need by rewarding and recognizing employees for their
performance on continuous basis.
Self actualization needs: This is the final need when individuals desire to develop and
grow to their fullest potential. By providing growth and development opportunities to
employees, firm can fulfill this need (Maio and et. al., 2019). For instance, Thomas Cook can
provide training and development sessions to employees for enhancing skills and knowledge
that helps in their future career growth.
Process Theories:
Process theories explores the way particular behavior is caused, sustain or stop by the
factors of motivation. These theories implies that the choices of people are based on reward
factors, preferences and sense of accomplishment. Example of process theory includes Vroom's
expectancy theory.
Vroom's Expectancy Theory:
Vroom Expectancy theory was propounded by Victor Vroom in year 1964 which states
about how individuals choose from available actions (Natvig and Stark, 2016). It integrates the
equity, needs and reinforcement theories. The three factors that helps in improving motivation
of employees are mentioned below:

Expectancy: This aspect states that for attaining desired outcomes, an individual requires
to work hard. Management of Thomas Cook can motivate and encourage employees to work
hard by appraising them for their performance.
Instrumentality: This aspect is associated with the fact that if employees perform well,
they will get reward which motivates them to perform well. Thomas Cook's management needs
to ensure that promised rewards will be provided to employees to maintain their trust on
company (Odor, 2018).
Valence: This aspect ascertains the magnitude to which rewards are valued by
individuals. Firm can ensure that the provided rewards helps in encouraging employees to
perform tasks more effectively and attain organizational objectives.
Application of Maslow's theory will helps management of Thomas Cook to improve
motivation level of employees by fulfilling their basic requirements. This will assists in
improving productivity and profitability of both workforce and company.
2.2 Evaluation of the way motivational techniques enables the teams and organization to succeed
by influencing the behavior of others at workplace
Application of maslow need hierarchy theory helps manager of Thomas Cook in improving
motivation level of employees and influencing their behaviour. By fulfilling some basic needs of
individuals, manager can motivate employees. For fulfilling physiological needs, company can
provide adequate salary to employees so that they enable to fulfill their basic needs of survival.
Safety needs are fulfilled by providing job security to employees (Maio and et. al., 2019). Team
meetings and get together helps in fulfilling social needs. Promotions, rewards and recognitions
supports manager of Thomas Cook in fulfilling self esteem needs of an individual. For fulfilling
the final need, development opportunities are provided to individuals so that they develop
themselves to the fullest potential. By fulfillment of all the needs, company teams enables to
succeed improve motivation of employees and moulding their behaviour towards other in
positive manner.
2.3 Conclusion with recommendations and justifications on how firm could improve the
performance of staff to meet goals using theories of culture, power, politics and motivation
As per the above discussion it can be concluded that the culture of organisation must be
strong as this helps in improving behaviour and performance of employees. Organisational
culture, politics and power are interrelated with each other and impact on performance of

organisation. Maslow need hierarchy theory helps in improving motivation of employees that
ultimately improve their performance and helps in meeting goals of company. For improving the
productivity and performance of organisation, manager of Thomas Cook requires to provide
rewards to employees on regular basis as this helps in encouraging them to work in more
effective way towards attainment of organisational goals.
TASK 3
3.1 Application of Belbin, Tuckman team development models to analyze the effectiveness of
team during planning day activity when developing team and its roles
Effective team is very necessary for every successful company as without it the
organization often struggle to attain objectives of company. Effective team is the team whose
objectives are clear and work in coordination to attain goals and objectives of company.
Thomas Cook is a leading tourism company that offers variety of services to people. The
firm organizes a tourist visit to distinct locations. The company is planning a 'day out' event to
visit theme park (Omar, Jayasingam and Bakar, 2019). For this, the role of team is to determine
various planning activities and assign roles and responsibilities to each member. For analyzing
the effectiveness of team during planning day out event, manager of Thomas Cook will apply
Tuckman team development model which includes 5 stages that helps in developing effective
team within organization.
Tuckman Team Development Model:
Tuckman model was propounded by Bruce tuckman in 1965. This theory focuses on how
the team tackles a task or activity from formation of team to the project completion. It includes
five stages which are mentioned below:
Forming: this is the first stage in which a team is formed by a leader. This is a kind of
orientation phase and the team members required guidance from leaders or managers. The roles
and responsibilities of team members are not clear and leaders required to answer any questions
regarding objective and purpose of team (Peralta and et. al., 2018). In context of Thomas Cook,
while developing the day out event, leaders are required to assign roles and responsibilities to
team members and guide them to develop a successful event.
Storming: after forming, the storming stage comes in which members of team try to
establish a relationship with other members. The objectives and purpose of team are clear now.

The members start to share their ideas and views and work collectively towards attainment of
goals and objectives of the company. There are chances of rising conflicts at the stage and the
leader of Thomas Cook is responsible to avoid the conflicts among them.
Norming: this is the third stage in which team members are agreed with views and
opinions of other members. roles and responsibilities are more clear and all the members started
to work collectively towards development of an effective day out event. People in Thomas Cook
starts to appreciate strengths of other team members and work as a cohesive unit.
Performing: all the members in this stage are confident and familiar enough with each
other and the project that they do not require any supervision from their leaders. Is team member
in Thomas Cook works collectively to attain a common goal of developing day out event. Latest
play a crucial role in encouraging creative conflicts and assist in celebrating achievements
(Pradhan and et. al, 2018).
Adjoining: this is the final stage in which the task will be completed and the objective of
developing day out event fulfill. Whole team is divided in this phase and individuals are looking
for the new opportunities to work on another project.
Belbin team roles:
The manager of Thomas Cook use Belbin theory for determining the group members
propensity as well as their behaviour towards the task of developing their out event. There are
some roles defined in this theory which are mentioned below:
Plant: they are the persons who have ability to hold responsibility of developing healthy
relationship with customers and vendors. They are highly creative an effective problem solver in
unconventional manner (Quinn, 2016).
Resource allocator: in Thomas Cook, this rule is assigned to the individual who have
ability to allocate resources appropriately in a manner that they are utilised optimally for
attaining goals of the team.
Specialist: this role in Thomas Cook is assigned to those individuals who have expertise
in a particular area and who are able to suggest strategies which proved to be effective for the
completion of task in an effective way. They brings in-depth knowledge of the specific area that
assists in attaining goals effectively.

Implementer: In Thomas Cook, this rule is assigned to those individuals who hold the
responsibility to execute strategies in such a manner that it will help in improving overall
performance of team and attaining objective of company.
3.2 Analysis of difficult situations where team ineffectiveness and conflicts were dealt to
improve team efficiency and productivity
While developing a team, leader of Thomas Cook have faced with difficulties such as lack
of communication, ineffective coordination as all the team members are different and possess
different characteristics, skills and knowledge (Testa and Lee, 2018). This sometimes leads to
creation of conflicts as their views and opinions are not matched and team members were not
agreed with the opinion of other members. In order to overcome these challenges and improve
the efficiency of team, managers use effective communication tool so that proper communication
takes place within team all the members enable to communicate effectively with each other.
Situational leadership style is adopted by leader that helps in handling the conflicting situations
effectively and improving the motivation level of employees. This helps in encouraging
workforce to work collectively and attain common goals of company.
TASK 4
4.1 Concepts and philosophies of organizational behavior by applying Contingency and Path-
Goal theory to resolve conflicts and improve team performance
Business situation: the productivity of Thomas Cook is influenced by ineffective
communication due to which conflicts takes place and reduce the performance of team members.
This ultimately results in delay in accomplishment objective of company, i.e., to develop a day
out event (De Vasconcelos, Gouveia and Kimble, 2016). In order to effectively deal with this
issue, path goal theory is implemented by manager of Thomas Cook which is mentioned below:
Path goal theory: the theory aims to apply distinct leadership styles but best fit the
workplace and situation. For improving the communication within company and reducing
conflicts, path goal theory is utilised which includes three aspects including employee
characteristic, Leadership style and task and environmental characteristic. Imply characteristic,
leaders acquire knowledge of needs of employees so that search strategies and practices can be
implemented that can help in improving motivation level of employees effectively. This
positively impacts the performance of team and helps in creating healthy atmosphere by reducing

conflicts. In task and environmental characteristics, leaders are responsible to find out the issues
faced by employees and ensure that the environmental surrounding is adequate for them to
perform task effectively. This helps in enhancing performance and productivity of company. In
last aspect of leadership style, leaders are responsible to select appropriate leadership style for
addressing the business situation effectively. For dealing with an effective communication
situation, participative leadership style is used by manager of Thomas Cook as it includes
indulgence and efforts of work force in the process of decision making that facilitates in
developing effective communication (Jansen and Samuel, 2014).
CONCLUSION
As per the above mentioned report, it has been concluded that role culture is very
effective for an organisation as this helps in improving motivation of employees and moulding
their behaviour. Assigning roles as per the skills and specialisation of an individual helps in
creating a sense of satisfaction among them that leads to improving productivity of firm. It is
necessary for company to implement motivational theory within workplace in order to improve
motivation of workforce and encourage them to work towards attainment of common goals in
more effective manner. Effective team plays crucial role in success of an organisation. Tuckman
team development model helps in developing effective team at workplace. path goal theory helps
in dealing with the business situation in effective way and improving productivity of company.

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