Organisational Behaviour Report: Unilever, Semester 1, 2024

This report provides an in-depth analysis of organisational behaviour within Unilever, a consumer goods manufacturing company. The introduction provides an overview of organisational behaviour and introduces Unilever. The main body explores key concepts, including the influence of organisational power, culture, and politics on team and individual performance, with an examination of reward, coercive, legitimate, referent, and expert power. The report evaluates motivational theories, such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs and Vroom's expectancy theory, and their impact on achieving organisational goals, including the application of Vroom's motivational force formula. The report further distinguishes between effective and ineffective teams, outlining Bruce Tuckman's five stages of team development. The report then applies different concepts of organisational behaviour to various business situations, providing recommendations for improvements. The conclusion summarizes the key findings, and the report is supported by relevant references.

Organisational Behaviour

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................3
P 1 analysing of organisational power, culture and politics which helps to influence team and
individual performance...............................................................................................................3
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................5
P 2 Evaluation of motivational theories which helps for effective achievement of goal of
organisation. ...............................................................................................................................5
Motivational force formula.........................................................................................................6
LO 3.................................................................................................................................................7
P 3 what makes an effective team as an opposed team. .............................................................7
LO 4.................................................................................................................................................8
P 4 Applying of different concepts of organisational behaviour in business situations.............8
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Organisational behaviour is study of performance of both individual and group activity
within organisation. It helps to assess the behaviour of humans in working environment with
determining its impact on performance,communication, leadership, motivation, job structure, etc
(Jacobs and Manzi, 2019). In present report chosen organisation is Unilever which is an public
limited company deals in consumers goods manufacturing industry. Company was founded in
1929 and its founders are James Darcy lever, William lever, etc. the head quarters of company
are situated in Unilever house, London, UK Rotterdam, Netherlands. Its products are beauty and
personal care, cleaning products, food and refreshments. The report will analyses organisational
culture, power and politics for influencing team and group performances. The study will be on
theories of motivation that enable the organisation to achieve the goal. Discussion will on what
makes effective team as opposed to ineffective team. The report will study different situations in
firm with applying concept of philosophies of organisational behaviour.
MAIN BODY
LO 1
P 1 analysing of organisational power, culture and politics which helps to influence team and
individual performance.
In Unilever the organisational power, politics and team culture influences team and individual
performance due to following reasons.
Organisational power: It refers to ability to influence people that is capacity for affecting the
behaviour of employees con control the organisational resources. For example the local
governments has power to collect taxes. Power is an important part of an organisation as it helps
to fulfil one's goal. As more power given to individual or group will wield organisation to
influence for more achievement. Their are fives sources of power: reward, coercive, legitimate
power, referent power and expert power which are explained below
Reward power: power of reward is controlled by the managers like salary increment,
promotions and bonuses (Barbaranelli and et.al., 2019).
Coercive power: it is the ability of manager to cause unpleasant experience for its
employees like threat for employees for demotion, dismissal, suspension, etc.

legitimate power: the power is based on mutual agreement between the target and agent
for the right to influence the employees.
Referent power: the power is based on the interpersonal attraction as the individual get
influence to have the power. For example to follow and behaves according to ideal person at
some stages.
Expert power: when the agents has expert knowledge or information that is required by
target then it can termed knowledge based power. Their are some condition to satisfy this, as the
target must trust that information is accurate and correct, the information must relevant and
useful for the target and target must consider agent as expert (Day, 2019).
Unilever influence team and individual by using rewards power as the manager tries to
motivate its employee to give their best in work by providing incentives, chances to get
promoted on higher position and increment in salary (Urban and Verachia,2019).
Organisational politics: It can also be termed as the office politics. It is the use of social
networking or power within the organisation for the achievement of changes that benefits
individuals or the organisation. As the influence by individual may serve the organisation due to
personal interest without regards to effect organisation. As due to use politic it lower the output
and affects the productivity of organisation. The observation says that individual who plays
more politics pays less attention on their work. As these employees are more interested in back
biting and leg pulling. In Unilever their there is less politics best informal structure of company
and employee have good maintenances of personal relations with their collogues. As it helps to
influence employees in the organisation work efficiently which improves the productivity of
Unilever (Alenazi, Muenjohn and McMurray, 2019).
Organisational culture: It refers to the beliefs, values, assumptions and ways to interact for
contribution in psychological environment in the company. It is very important to ensure that
members are aligned with the purpose of organisation. In Unilever the organisational culture is
Hierarchy which is an structured and formalised work environment. As the producer decide upon
what people will do. Leaders are happy with the organisation and efficiency based coordination.
Due to hierarchy organisational culture the organisation is able to work smoothly. The values
that Unilever derive are timeliness, consistencies, uniformity and efficiency (McCallaghan,
Jackson and Heyns, 2019).
Recommendation

The company is recommended to give more powers to its subordinates which will help to
generate more efficiency and consistency for the achievement of team and individual goal.
Unilever can give training to its employee to increase their expert knowledge and they can give
guidance to their junior also. The company decrease politics at all level by checking the
productivity of each employee. The organisation culture can be improved by involving
employees to improve their social relations in informal structure of organisation. All these will
influence team and individual behaviour positively and motivate employees to give their best in
organisation.
LO 2
P 2 Evaluation of motivational theories which helps for effective achievement of goal of
organisation.
Motivation helps to simulate action in employee for accomplishments of organisational
goals. There two types of motivational theories that id contents theory and process theory. In
content theory maslow's hierarchy need theory will be discussed and in content theory Vroom's
expectancy theory will be discussed.
Maslow's hierarchy need theory: The theory explains five important and basic stage that
human requires to get in their life (Ahmadi and te.al., 2019). These stages are physiological
needs, safety and security stages, social needs, self esteem needs, self actualisation needs all
these are explained below
Physiological needs: in this stage the basic needs of human are required to be fulfilled
that is food, shelter, cloth, etc. the employees in Unilever are being provided with these facilities
when the employee dose not possess any of these facilities.
Safety and security stages: In this stage the human should feel safe and secure from the
physical threat, fear from blackmailing, etc. Unilever provide security for safety and security of
job and income of employees (Roberts, Sojo and Grant, 2019).
Social needs: the humans ate this stage require social recognition that is affection, love
and belongingness etc. the Unilever gives its employees the need.
Self esteem needs:the need to feel confident and be respected by others.
Self-actualisation– the desire to achieve everything you possibly can and become the
most that you can be.

According to the hierarchy of needs, you must be in good health, safe and secure with
meaningful relationships and confidence before you are able to be the most that can be most
important (Satardien, Jano and Mahembe, 2019).
Vroom's expectancy theory: In 1964, Canadian professor of psychology Victor Vroom
developed the Expectancy Theory. In it, he studied people’s motivation and concluded it depends
on three factors:Expectancy, instrumentality and valence. Abraham maslow and Frederick
Herzberg also researched the relation between people’s needs and the efforts they make. Vroom
distinguishes between the effort people put in, their performance and the final result. His theory
primarily relates to motivation within a work environment. When employees can make choices
in their work. Victor Vroom argues that they will mostly choose that what motivates them the
most (Hassan, Iqbal and Malik, 2019).
Motivational force formula
Victor Vroom uses a formula to calculate the motivational force:
Motivational force = Expectancy x Instrumentality x Valence
Expectancy: This is about what employees expect from their own efforts and the relation
to good performance. Part of this expectation is the level of difficulty he experiences. An
organisation can respond to that by finding out which factors can motivate the employee to
deliver his best possible performance. Those factors can be facilities, training or support from a
supervisor who builds his employees’ confidence (Roberts, Sojo and Grant, 2019). Victor
Vroom indicates that, in general, more effort leads to better performance. Employees can be
stimulated to make an effort by offering them a juicy carrot if they complete their task properly
and quickly.
Valence: The final result that employees achieve is valued differently by each individual.
This value is based on their own basic needs. As such, it’s a good idea for an organisation to find
out what an individual employee values and what his personal needs are.
Instrumentality: Each employee is a cog in the machine and an instrument that
contributes to the business results. From that perspective, instrumentality isn’t difficult to grasp.
It’s about the employee’s performance being good enough to achieve the desired result (HÜGEL
and KREUTZER, 2019). An organisation can stimulate this by actually making good on

promises of additional rewards such as bonuses or promotion. The employee has to believe that
if he performs well, appreciation will be shown for the results (Bellini and et.al., 2019).
LO 3
P 3 what makes an effective team as an opposed team.
Effective team are the foundation of every successful organization. Companies without
teams that work well together often struggle, while effective teams help to improve quality,
facilitate the completion of projects and increase productivity and efficiency. For a company to
work at optimal levels, you must develop a team in which each member brings his or her talents
and skills, which contribute to the overall success of the group (Alenazi, Muenjohn and
McMurray, 2019).
(Source:Stages of Group Formation, 2019)
Bruce Tuckman proposed five stages for the team developments. Forming, storming, norming,
performing and adjourning. In 1965 Bruce Tuckman decide as every team goes during these
stages unpredictably.
Illustration 1: Stages of Group Formation

First stage: In this stage of team together a group of people have to come together to
accomplish the shared purpose and result can be unpredictable. At beginning, anxiety I high
people are pleasant. Stage can last a while a people get to know each other the teams success at
this stage depends upon their familiarity with each other work style their experience with prior
teams and clarity of assigned task.
Second Storming: this is hardest hardest in the development of any team and
uncountably your team and undoubted team will be at its at least effective. The stage marked by
conflicts and competition as personality. Teams may also disagree on goals and subgroups or
cliques may form. Many teams often fail at this stage so it is important to reduce and address this
conflict so that problems do not occur later on (Alenazi, Muenjohn and McMurray, 2019).
Thirds Stage : Norming: The team will begin to resolve their interpersonal differences,
appreciate others and form working relationships. There is a sense of cohesion and unity and this
allows for the team to work functionally together towards the end goal. At this point,
performance increase as the team begins to cooperate and focus on the goals.
Fourth stage: performing: At this point, relationships are formed and there is a clear
and stable structure. The team is mature, organised and has a sense of consensus and
cooperation. Problems and conflict, of course, do still arise, but they are dealt with effectively.
The prime focus of the team is on problem solving and meeting goals; effectiveness is at its peak.
Fifth stages: adjourning: this explains that project comes from to the end and separates
teams speed some members find it difficult and because they find the routine of the group and
have made close relation ship friendship for the future. After leaving this team looks bleak and
unpromising (McCallaghan, Jackson and Heyns, 2019).
LO 4
P 4 Applying of different concepts of organisational behaviour in business situations.
According to Keith Davis organizational behaviour is the study and application of
knowledge about how people act within organizations. It is human tool for the human benefit. It
applies broadly to behaviour of people in all type of organization such as business, government,
schools, etc. it helps people, structure, technology, and the external environment blend together
in to an effective operative system (Barbaranelli and et.al., 2019).

Stephen Robins defines organizational behaviour as a field of study that investigates the
impact that individuals, groups, and structure have an organization for the purpose of applying
such knowledge improving an organization’s effectiveness.
Fundamental concepts of organisational behaviour:
Individual Differences: in this concept individual difference comes from psychology.
As each person has unique different speciality and various different experiences.
Perception: every one in the organisation has different perception to see the objective.
A Whole Person: As people in the organisation have different an employees personal
life is different from others (Jacobs and Manzi, 2019).
Motivated Behaviour: The basic needs of the employees must be get fulfilled by the
organisation. Some motivation are necessary to enhance quality of work from the employees.
The desire for Involvement: every employee is seeking the knowledge opportunity to
work to involve indecision making process. Chances for the sharing the experiences, opinions,
ideas, suggestions.
The value of the Person: some person denies to accept new ideas and they just treat
economic tool because best creation of almighty.
Human Dignity: it make assure that human rights are not higher in order to define the
older respect them as and when they are treated unfairly.
Organizations are Social System: In the social terms the employees should be treated
fairly and they should feel the social roles and status.
Mutuality of Interest: Mutual interest is represented by the statement that organizations
need people and people also need organizations.
Holistic Concept: this concept is people oriented relationship regarding the the whole
person, organisation and whole systems. It takes across the broad views of people in the
organisation to understand as many as possible of human behaviour to influence. As the issues
are analysed on the terms of the totals situation affecting rather than in terms of isolated events
or problems (Hassan, Iqbal and Malik, 2019).
Path goal theory:
Path Goal leadership theory is based on vroom 's 1964 expectancy theory the organisation in the
which an individual will act in a certain ways based on the expectation that the act in a certain

ways based on the the expectation of the company. The goal theory explains that organisation
should have the as the best thought process for the leaders (Path goal theory, 2019).
Their are four styles of path goal theory that are explained as below:
The directive path-goal clarifying leader behaviour refers to situations where the leader
lets employees know what is expected of them and tells them how to perform their tasks. The
theory argues that this behaviour has the most positive effect when the employees’ role and task
demands are ambiguous and intrinsically satisfying (Urban and Verachia,2019).
The achievement-oriented leader behaviour refers to situations where the leader sets
challenging goals for employees, expects them to perform at their highest level, and shows
confidence in their ability to meet this expectation. Occupations in which the achievement
motive were most predominant were technical jobs, sales persons, scientists, engineers, and
entrepreneurs.
The participative leader behaviour involves leaders consulting with employees and
asking for their suggestions before making a decision. This behaviour is predominant when
employees are highly personally involved in their work.
The supportive leader behaviours directed towards the satisfaction of employees’ needs
and preferences. The leader shows concern for the employees’ psychological well-being. This
behaviour is especially needed in situations in which tasks or relationships are psychologically or
physically distressing (Barbaranelli and et.al., 2019).
CONCLUSION
From the above report it can be concluded that In Unilever the organisational power,
politics and team culture influences team and individual performance due to following reasons.
Unilever influence team and individual by using rewards power as the manager tries to motivate
its employee to give their best in work by providing incentives, chances to get promoted on
higher position and increment in salary. The company is recommended to give more powers to
its subordinates which will help to generate more efficiency and consistency for the achievement
of team and individual goal. Unilever can give training to its employee to increase their expert
knowledge and they can give guidance to their junior also. In 1964, Canadian professor of
psychology Victor Vroom developed the Expectancy Theory. In it, he studied people’s
motivation and concluded it depends on three factors:Expectancy, instrumentality and valence.

Effective team are the foundation of every successful organization. Companies without teams
that work well together often struggle, while effective teams help to improve quality, facilitate
the completion of projects and increase productivity and efficiency.

REFERENCES
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Online
Path goal theory. 2019. [online]. Available through<https://pathgoal.com/path-goal-theory/>.