Organisational Behaviour Report: Waitrose, Semester 1, 2024

This report provides an in-depth analysis of organizational behaviour (OB) within Waitrose, a British supermarket known for its employee-owned structure. It examines the influence of organizational culture, politics, and power on individual and team performance, differentiating between power, role, task, and person cultures. The report further explores content and process theories of motivation, including Maslow's hierarchy of needs and equity theory, and how these theories are applied to achieve organizational goals. It also contrasts effective and ineffective team dynamics, emphasizing the importance of team working and problem-solving. Finally, it investigates the application of OB concepts and philosophies within the context of Waitrose's business operations, providing a comprehensive overview of how these elements contribute to the company's success. The report highlights practical examples, such as Waitrose's implementation of reward power and its efforts to foster employee motivation and engagement, in the context of leadership management.

ORGANISATION
BEHAVIOUR

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................2
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................2
P1 Organization's culture, politics and power influence individual and team behaviour and
performance -..............................................................................................................................2
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................4
P2 Content and process theories of motivation and motivational techniques enable effective
achievement of goals in organizational context .........................................................................4
LO 3.................................................................................................................................................7
P 3 Understanding of what makes an effective team, as opposed to an ineffective team ..........7
LO 4...............................................................................................................................................11
P 4 Concepts and philosophies of OB within an organisational context and a given business
situation.....................................................................................................................................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES .............................................................................................................................15
1

INTRODUCTION
Organization Behaviour is the observation of individual and group behaviour in response
to other individual or bunch of them. The aim is to observe the behaviour of individual or group
to evaluate their attitudes towards certain conditions. present study is based on Waitrose
company. It is a British super market that operates a retail business and is the largest employee
owned business having 353 outlets and 65 little Waitrose convenience shops. They became the
fastest growing shops in UK offering their products. Report will include the effect of
organization culture, politics and power on individual and team behaviour and performance,
achievement of goals in an organization based on concept and process theories of motivation and
motivation techniques, brief of effective team compared to that of ineffective team and
Organizational Behaviour concept and philosophies for an organization.
LO 1
P1 Organization's culture, politics and power influence individual and team behaviour and
performance -
Organisational culture is the unique social and psychological environment of a company
along its values and behaviour (Osland, Devine, and Turner, 2015).
The different kind of organization culture namely power, role, task and person culture in
Handy's is defines as -
Power Culture -
In this type of culture power is held by few individuals who influence other people in an
organization. There are few rules and regulations in a power culture controlling working
conditions and employees are also generally evaluated by what they achieve in an organization
rather than their performances of task and role. By the power, employee control is concentrated
focusing on few people eliminating the chances of confusion and disputes amongst the workers.
This type of culture impact on individual behaviour as people have to work under huge control
that makes them demotivated towards firm and they become negative towards business. Hence,
2

negative employee don’t perform well in team which affect performance of business badly.
Enforcement of power culture results in influencing of people will focus on achievements at the
time of work not by evaluating their performances based on roles and responsibilities resulting in
focusing only a few employees in firm (Borkowski, 2016).
Role Culture -
Organizations with role culture are based on rules. Individuals are aware of their roles
and responsibilities in the company. The power flow in firm is based on hierarchical bureaucracy
and is determined by a person's role in the company. The power is commanded by the top
management in firm. This type of culture impact on individual behaviour because employees do
not get rights to say their views in front of management. This makes them negative and this also
badly affect team performance because such negative employee so not support other team
members which influence organisational performance to great extent. Implementation of role
culture will result in affecting the roles and responsibilities of its employees considering their
performances of job responsibilities and evaluating the amount of improvement required. The
top management decision, rules and guidances are to be followed by the employees in case of
culture dilemma (Miner, 2015).
Task Culture
Waitrose has this kind of culture where it focuses on team working of employees for
matters related to problem solving. The power is derived from expertise when necessary as based
on matrix organization, the employees are thus focused on resolving their issues (Handy's Model
of Organisational Culture,2018). The task culture of the organization emphasis on solving all the
problems by the team or group of Waitrose staff (Osland, Devine and Turner, 2015). This culture
promotes and accepts suggestions and directions given by the expertise as per the requirement of
the team. Company gives task to each workers as per their abilities and all individuals perform it
well. They have rights to make own decisions that makes them positive towards the brand and
these staff members perform in team very well. This kind of culture impacts positively on
3

organisational performance because all individual support each other to meet organisational goal
(Lăzăroiu, 2015).
Person Culture -
It shares power between people establishing business and partnership. Employees
perform their work individually as they think they are superior in the firm. This type of culture
increases conflict situation in the firm which negatively influence individual and team behaviour
both. The person culture in Waitrose will develop a sense of responsibility and accountability as
people tend to believe they are superior in the organization and will work as if they are
accountable of things happening will result in maximum utilization of their efforts thus increase
the efficiency of individual as well as team. (Tasselli, Kilduff and Landis, 2018).
How power and politics influence organisational behaviour
The organizational behaviour in Waitrose is vastly affected by the involvement of power
and politics in the functioning of organizational activities and achievement of finalized goals -
 Power is an important aspect of human civilization, they tend to affect business and
decisions heavily. Their are types on power namely Coercive power i.e. the kind that
involves use of threat to make people do what ever organisation desires. It basically aims
to threaten people to lose something thus develops force on individual to achieve for
organization's goals, Reward Power i.e. use of rewards, perks , monitory benefits to
motivate people but will not cover all employees as there are several managers and high
authority staff involved in the company. The employees will be rewarded on the basis of
excellence of their performances thus aim to improve employee performances.
Legitimate power means the power spread out from the official position held by someone
like organization, government, etc. This type of power is shortly owned and also is under
the control of position head. Expert Power that focus on an individual owned based on
skills and an expertise which is of high quality and generally not available and the last
4

one is Referent power that is possessed by celebrities or people having huge fan base
amongst masses.
The Waitrose must follow reward power in their organization as the employees will be rewarded
with perks and several opportunities thus develop their interest in the working conditions and
also focuses on creating inner motivation at times as well.
 Politics in the workforce is the efforts made in intention to upgrade one's status or power
in the organization. The Waitrose evaluated that the politics can bring a positive and
negative impact in the operations of the organization. The employee performance in
Waitrose can have a positive and negative impact on the politics of the organization such
as the employees can overcome personnel inadequateness if considered politics as
positive aspect and thus help the employees coping up with the change and on the other
hand the Waitrose can also be affected by the involvement of politics in their processes
such as can affect the job satisfaction factor of the employees working with the Waitrose
for promoting favouritism, increase anxiety and stress level of the employees affected by
the politics resulting in the employee turnover of Waitrose and decrease the performances
of the other employees.(Borkowski, 2015).
LO 2
P2 Content and process theories of motivation and motivational techniques enable effective
achievement of goals in organizational context
Content theory of motivation -
The content theory of motivation highlights the change of human needs with the passage
of time. David McClelland, Abraham Maslow and other psychologist attempted to explain the
reason of change of human needs but not the pattern on how they change. They also highlighted
the factors that motivate them as the theory focuses on interconnecting need and motivation that
is what pushes us to please our requirements. This can be measured by job satisfaction, job
enlargement, job enrichment, fair promotional policies, flexible hours, creating a cooperative
5

environment. The Waitrose as own 353 retail outlets throughout UK and 65 little convenience
shops is one of the fastest growing shops in UK as the workforce need to be retained and
motivated. The Waitrose promotes good promotional policies, job satisfaction, job enlargements,
job enrichment, flexible hour working, employee appreciating policy, creating a cooperative
environment (Heinitz, 2018).
Maslow's Hierarchy of needs -
The theory came in effect in the 1940's and 1950's putting forward hierarchy of needs
namely Psychological needs, Safety needs, Social needs, Self Esteem needs, Self Actualisation
needs.
 Psychological needs - The Waitrose takes care of basic psychological needs by providing
them food, shelter, sleep, clothing, etc. These facilities including develops a mentality of
an individual to work with Waitrose. The mental stability of an employee will result in
maximum output of his potential thus ensuring maximum productivity (Lindebaum, and
Geddes, 2016).
 Safety needs - The company promise to provide individuals with the safety needs to keep
their work productive and help them achieve mental satisfaction by providing them
employment, health, resources, personal security thus will result in maintaining employee
stability at work. The waitrose installed several security cameras to ensure no unethical
activity is being promoted within their work premises, the employees are provided with
basic insurance plans thus are entitled for their safety in the future. It also trains them so
that employees can use safety equipment’s easily. This thing makes employees positive
and they work hard to meet organisational goal. By this way productivity and profitability
of firm gets increases. The employees safety needs in The Waitrose helps them develop a
stable mind in performing business activities in more effective and efficient ways and
thus help in motivating employees gain organizational goals (Graham, Ziegert, and
Capitano, 2015).
6

 Love/Belonging needs - The Waitrose creates a sense of friendship and intimacy creating
a sense of connection amongst the organization and it's employees thus eliminate the
chance of disputes resulting in organizational bond to achieve its objectives. They
support their colleges in several of business activities resulting in increase of employee
satisfaction as well as sense of belongingness help them reduce employee turnover and
increase better employee satisfaction. The employees also seek help from each other and
the management helps them achieve better (Vibert, 2017).
 Self Esteem needs - This level of pyramid is concerned on having recognisance and
reputation in the society. The Waitrose focuses on establishing value by the customers as
well as competitors creating a brand image for Waitrose and thus help to achieve
organizational goals. The workforce in Waitrose entertain the customer's complaints to
priority basis thus increasing its loyalty value amongst its competitors. The firm targets
on providing recognition to the employees thus they are motivated towards achieving the
organization goal.
 Self actualization needs - The organization goals are achieved by identifying inner
potential and processing them for further progress. Each and every individual in The
Waitrose focuses on the inner potential or their field of interest and are made to perform
in those specifies areas resulting in maximum output at the time of operations in the
expertise field they master (Miller, 2016).
Process theory of motivation -
The process theory of motivation combines the psychological and behavioural process
that motivates an individual to act in a particular manner. These theories will reflect the
behaviour of a person to achieve the goals for the needs.
Equity theory
The employees in this type of motivation asses their comfort level amongst fellow
workers and the award they achieve for their effort. If the authoritian fell the differences between
7

the desired and current efforts they will pursue the employees to bring equality amongst each
other by adjusting the performance or by taking measures from their co workers. The Waitrose
managed to motivate the employees to manage current situations and also motivate them to
reduce inequality input change, outcome change as well as level of comparison (Waldman, Ward
and Becker, 201). The waitrose access level of effort of individual against fellow workers and
the reward they receive for their effort. The gap is filled in the performances by putting on some
extra efforts to generate sense of achievement in the organization context. The Waitrose tend to
eliminate the gap between the desired and actual outcome thus going back and reviewing the
process to bring quality to their work by putting extra efforts resulting in achievement of their
ultimate goals and objectives thus setting standards of achievement for other employees to
review and learn.
LO 3
P 3 Understanding of what makes an effective team, as opposed to an ineffective team
Waitrose considered effective team as the individual that participate effective in any task
along with distributed leadership emphasizing on goals and internal maintain nance where power
is equalised and shared. (Kong, 2016).
Effective team of Waitrose firm:
Effective team in Waitrose are the group of people focused on steeing of standards as a
member of hospitality industry and creates a healthy customer relationship. The effective team as
measured have several characteristics such as good communication, better understanding, and
many other characteristics that help them in effective achievement of their goals.
Waitrose prefers to hire for values that includes hospitality, integrity, leadership, teamwork,
ownership and a sense of urgency. They prefer those who are committed to the above mentioned
values (Miller, 2016).
Ineffective team of Waitrose:
8

Ineffective teams are the ones made by several individual who don't mix up or lack
necessary skills to perform variety of work. The includes the lack of people with skills,
inadequate communication, mismanagement thus resulting in failure of any task performed.
Ineffective team in Waitrose are a bunch of people that devalue the services of the firm
by violating the rules or regulations or failed to cope up with the expectations of the consumers.
They find it difficult to hire high quality employees and they are to go through extra training to
so serve guest from western culture. Several times the employees tend to be job hoppers so the
company has to go through the recruitment process again and again and that increases training
cost.
Effectiveness Ineffectiveness
 The brand value is taken into
consideration by the team while
providing any goods or services.
 The effective team in Waitrose is
motivated even by non monetary
incentive like recognition, leadership,
allowances, etc (Vibert, 2017).
 The brand value holds no importance
to these people as their main objective
is to earn their pay check.
 The team in Waitrose firm is not even
motivated by any monetary incentive
or raise in the pay check.
Truckman theory:
To explain team development and behaviour Bruce Tuck-man developed Team
Development method and it can solve Waitrose flaws and pitfalls in following ways -
9

As this theory involves four stages name which are following below:
Forming -
High dependence on leader is established for guidance and direction whereas the team
has little involvement in it. So the roles and responsibilities of individuals team members are
unclear and the leader is responsible and accountable for everything. The leader thus manage the
work of all the individuals and keep a close track on all the levels of activity so the things might
not go wrong in the organisation (Graham, Ziegert and Capitano, 2015).
Storming -
The team faces issue of different point of views, positional difference and several other
emotional issues as the people from different background, caste, culture, mentality come forward
and perform their roles and responsibilities. The Waitrose company need to eliminate these
types of distraction and focus on the ultimate end results.
Norming -
Resolved disarrangements and personality clashes results high intimacy and a spirit of co-
operation emerges. The team in this case resolves the differences and thus take the small
decisions by themselves and the major decisions on the mutual understanding and mutual
agreement basis. Thus eliminate the chances of individual differences. By this way everyone in
this case feel equally involved in a particular task (Vibert, 2017.).
Performing -
Performing leads to the performance of the tasks at individual level and by the mutual
agreement by the leader and the team members. The members do not look for guidance from
their leader, the leader delegate the responsibilities and the task is being performed assistance
from leader is being involved for personal and interpersonal development.
Adjourning -
10

After the task is being done and the goal is achieved the group is again separated so that
everyone can move to their personal work and feel delighted about the previous achievement. As
the group gets emotionally involved the partition creates a sense of vulnerability is helpful to feel
insecure from this change and that is ultimately a natural attribute (Miller, 2016).
Factors affecting team development -
Commitment and trust -
The members of a team must be fully committed towards achieving the team's mission
and goals. Each individual must contribute equal time and energy to proceed towards the aim of
the Waitrose and must have trust on all the other members for the same. Mistrust happening due
to any reason personal or professional may decrease the output amongst the individual.
Communication -
An effective team must show confidence and trust amongst each other when it comes to
communication. The team of Waitrose must have common mode of communication so that every
member of the team can contribute thoughts and visions for better understanding. The members
of the team must always without any hesitation come up with ideas and beliefs as well as clear
all the differences and grudges verbally (Kong, 2016).
Team size -
The size of a team plays an importance role in team development, the right amount of
people will achieve in time with better output rather than the excess one wasting resource or the
deficit once lacking time.
Team stability -
Waitrose firm focuses on the team stability as the training and development of newly
hired staff will take time and resources and slam a pitfall in the progress of the company.
Diversity of capabilities -
11