BMG638 Assessment 2: Essay Analyzing Pike River Mine Accident Behavior

This essay analyzes the Pike River Mine accident, examining the influence of individual and group variables on the disaster. It explores how factors like work diversity, job satisfaction, and task performance, as well as group variables such as leadership, contributed to the accident's occurrence and severity. The essay provides a detailed overview of the individual characteristics of employees, including their training, experience, and personality traits, and assesses how these factors impacted workplace behavior. It also investigates the group-level dynamics, including leadership styles, norms, and communication networks, and their role in shaping organizational outcomes. By analyzing these variables, the essay aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the complex interplay of factors that led to the tragic events at the Pike River Mine, offering insights into organizational behavior and its impact on workplace safety and performance.

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Organization Behavior
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INTRODUCTION
The employee personal characteristics affect the way the success of the firm directly or
indirectly. Having well skilled, experienced qualified Having a better leadership in the
organization is a critical thing as the management in on organization oversees all the activities in
the firm such as managing the employees and managing the business resources(wood et
al ,2016). The administration should also act as a role model to the employee to achieve the
business goal. The managers in a firm also control processes so as to make sure the firm is
working toward its purpose and to oversee risk that may occur as a result of employees’ activities
such a loss from a business transaction or provision of better working conditions of the workers
to prevent risk from occurring such as employees hurting themselves during the work
process(Tayri, Sayce, hands, 2015). The management should also provide measures to safeguard
the lives of the employees in case of an accident. To achieve the goals of the firm, the managers
should analyze both individual and group variables to understand the nature of the employee you
have and the whole firm in general. The process of analysis will enable the firm to understand
what input is supposed to be introduced and measures to be undertaken to ensure that the
employees’ individual and group variables impact on the firm are catered and are per
expectorations of the firm.
In this report, I will discuss and analyze the impact of individual and group variable and
their influence on the organization’s workplace and organization behavior that is a process of
learning the firm behavior either at group level at the individual level. In this report am using
Pike River Mine Accident. I will discuss and analyze how individual variable influenced the

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occurrence of the accident and how group level variables took part in making occurrences of the
accident higher. I will discuss three individual variables and three group lever variable basing my
basis on Pike River Mine accident.(Shukla and Drennan ,2018)

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1.1 Individual Variables
The individual variable is the characteristics of employees that are either gain through
training, studies or personality features of employees(Schyn ,2015). In other word is what the
employee behave when carrying out his/her duties whether under supervision in the organization
setting. Individual variables can also mean features like gender, education level, age, work
experience, religion or even races of different employment. All these individual variables are
significant to any business as they determine the success of the firm. A firm with a better
combination of employees with better variables enjoys the fruit of better work, efficiency and
low chances of error in firm’s operations(Reb ,Atkin ,2015). The following examples show the
impact of individual variables on work activities in the Pike River Mine accident.
1.1.1 The work Diversity
The term work diversity is the existences of employees from different types of employees
with various features from a mixed race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and ability(Pereira,
Malik, Froesea, 2017). A firm that observes work diversity widens its range of skill from its
employees becoming better competitive and its innovation increasing leading to the better
production process, provision of services and reduces the tendency of risks occurring. There still
challenges and issues associated with word diversity such discrimination to the young and those
who are not sufficiently experienced and harassment to women.
Pike River mine firm observed the work diversity as it hired worker of different
races, age, ethnicity and abilities to work in the mine(Parson ,2016). What it employed
from over the world may have a vast range of skill in the tunnel. Among the twenty-nine

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men that died during the accident twenty-four where New Zealanders, two Australian and
one South African. The mine also employed old and young in the range of seventeen
years to sixty-two years old. One of the people who died in the disaster was seventeen
years boys who had just joined the Mine.
The diversity in the workplace, being one individual variable influenced the
occurrence of an accident in the Mine in several ways(Mccracken, 2015). The firm
employed a young worker with little experience in the firm. Joseph Dunbar, one of those
who died in the accident was just seventeen years old. He was allowed to report in work
even before the legal time and was even allowed to work deeper in the Mine where the
experienced workers are an expected to work. The inexperienced employee and new are
expected to work in simpler process in the Mine, but Joseph was allocated to complex
part of mining(Lee,Kesebir, Pillutla,2016). The firm was also employed aged in the firm
who also handled complex part of the process to a maximum of sixty-two year as evident
from those who died in the accident. The Mine mostly employed men in its operation as
all who died in the accident where men. The mine should have also employed more
women to gender equality. Women tend to be more observant and maybe they good have
noted the leaking of Methane gas in the Mine.
1.1.2 Job Satisfaction
Job satisfaction is the measure of employee’s contentedness with their job regarding
working conditions and performance enforcement to determine whether they like the post or
not(Lamare,lamm,McDonnel and white ,2015). Having an employee who is satisfied with their

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jobs leads to better performance of the employees resulting in better services from the
employees. Job satisfaction enables the worker to work on their best and efficiently reducing the
numbers of hazards. Job satisfaction can be divided into three namely emotions, personality, the
well-being of workers acceptance of the workers by the employer(Kitchin, 2017). Emotions are
the feeling that tends to last for a shorter period while the moods tend to take a longer time
compared to emotions. The positive or negative emotion of the workers is found to have been
brought up by overall job satisfaction. The personality of employees has an impact on job
satisfaction. An employee which higher affectivity is much likely to experience negative job
satisfaction. The well-being of the employees is the act of ensuring the worker's safety and basic
needs are considered during the work processes(Kin and Reid ,2017). They are needs such as
better working areas, use of better working equipment and better working condition which leads
to worker satisfaction in the work he/she is working.
The Pike River Mine, they did consider job satisfaction of the employees. The new
workers and inexperienced workers were trained during induction and in the continuing
training(Hashim, wok ,2014). The mine provided better ventilation in the pits to have fresh air in
the pits and drive out the foul out of the pits. The Mine had the acting of accepting their
employees. Jacob the young man who died in the accident was allowed to work in the mines
before the right time
Lack of job satisfaction in the Pike River Mine was one of the factors that led to the
accident. Although the Mine trained the new and inexperienced employees, most of the resources
were directed on producing more coals rather than improving the quality of services of the
employees(Gabriel, Daniels,Diefendorff and Greguras,2015). In the years before the accident,
the Mines used to train employees better than the time the accident happened. The Mines had an

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initial plan of ventilating the tunnels in the mines which were to have two fans situated on the
mountainside near the shaft; the Pike management decided to change the fans and relocate it to
underground at the bottom of the shift. It resulted in poor ventilation in the mines which could
have made it possible for the Methane gas to concentrate in the tunnels in the pits. The Mine did
not provide better working places for workers as the second explosion happened without any
human involvement(Dorostkar,rad, Avein ,2017). There was a tunnel in the mines that void
where the Methane gas had accumulated. There were leakages in the roofs of the tubes that
caused the gas to spill out to where the employees were undertaking
1.1.3 Task performance
Task performance is the measure of an employee regarding his/her convention rate of raw
materials to good and services. Task performance is those behaviors that are relevant to the
organization that is evident from the day-to-day activities of the employees. The firm with a
better task or work performance has a higher probability that the firm will achieve its goals and
minimises the risks may be involved with having uncontrolled work performance. Work
performance is a mechanism that a firm can use to monitor the activities of the employees. Its an
individual variable that closely checks the performance of the employees. Task performance is
used to determine the productivity of the employee, skills of the employee, the effectiveness and
efficiency and the rate of work of every worker(Cross and Carbery 2016). The mechanism can
also help the firm in determining the salaries as per work performance. The task performance
also encourages group work during its operations. Doing tasks as a groups, enables the group to
bring together several skill, minds, and talents to solve a given task in areas where the individual
is best. It also encourages the employees to consult each other in case of failure in one area of the
process, and this will improve the task performances in the firm.

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In Pike River Mine, the work performance was emphasized by having the employees
undergoing training to increasing their work performance regarding efficiency and reducing the
occurrences of the risks happening the firm. The new employees and inexperienced employees
undertook training together to encourage teamwork and improve the efficiency of employees.
The Mine failed in managing the task in the mines. For examples, there was more concentration
of methane in the air, but no one reports the issues due to reckless employees in the firm who
continued to work even after realizing that methane gas had exceeded the limit. The Pike River
Mine did not invest a lot in employee training. It resulted in a bigger number of inexperienced
workers compared to experienced workers who could have led to the occurrence of the accident
in the mines(Coccia,2014). Poor communication methods among the employees in the mines
could have resulted in many deaths in the mines. Better communication among the employees
could have enabled the employees to communicate during the rescue missions. It was not
possible to track the other employees or warn them when the accident occurred. There was also
poor communication between the rescue team and the families of the affected workers as they
could not determine whether they were alive remaining workers involved in the accident due to
poor communication.

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1.2 GROUP VARIABLES
Group variables are the level analysis where socio-psychological and sociological is
brought about. It includes the study of leadership, norms, leadership, roles, networks and
interpersonal communication. It also involves the study of intergroup dispute, intra-group and
group gesture(Chumg, Seaton, Cooke and Ding 2016).
1.2.1 The leadership
Leadership is the action of leading a group of people with one goal toward achieving that
goal. A good leader should act the role model of the group he/she is leading toward achieving
their goal. A good leader should have the following qualities to lead his/her group: set objectives
effectively and strive together with the team to meet the goals, be able to communicate
effectively and appreciate development in his/her group(Carney,Cuddy and yap, 2015).
In the Pike River Mine, the lacked the better leadership to prevent the accident from
taking place. Inside the mines, there was void formed during the mining of the first coal. The
management should have realized how the void could be dangerous as methane being a gas
could accumulate in there and later cause an explosion. The void then got filled with methane
gas that leaked out of the void through a roof fall in the mine roadway to employees working
activities. The management had poor planning as it had no emergency exit from the mines in
case of an accident(Burrell and Morgan 2017). Lack of an emergency exit resulted in the death
of many who could have been saved if there were an emergency door. If the mines had
emergency exits, it would have been more comfortable in a rescue mission after the accident
occurred in the mines. It could have saved life and property from damage from the burst in the
mines.

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1.2.2 The Ethical Climate
This study of the culture of the business or an organization that determines what is right
and what is wrong. The ethical climate may be different from one firm to the others. The
organization ethical climate is derived from the organization history, norms and its leadership. It
proves that the moral climate has a significant effect on the employees and the employer in
general. Having a firm with positive ethical climate can lead to better performance of the
business and its strive to meet the goal.
At the Pike River Mine, they had the norm of having a high ratio of inexperienced,
experienced miners. The ratio shows that the firm had little-experienced employees compared to
skilled workers. It is a serious problem having this ratio in a big firm like Pike. The ratio could
have been the reason why we had much death in the accident as the new and inexperienced
employee don’t know how to fight fire or don’t know the best route out of the mine in case of an
emergency. The Pike firm still had the norms of only employing men as the most significant
number in the firm. The hundred percent of people who died in the accident were men. The
management should make sure some women are introduced to bring about gender quality and
work thus achieving workplace diversity(Algesheimer ,Bagozzi and Dholaki ,2018). The
combination of one gender and the inexperienced employee could have been a reason for many
death in the accident at mines as this combination has little range of skill and experience in the
mines.
1.2.3 Code of ethics

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It is some principles that are designed to aid the employees in doing their activities with
integrity and honesty. The code of ethics defines what the employees are expected of in term of
the way they carry out their functions in the organization. It may consist of different
responsibility depending on the level of hierarchy in the business. A code of ethics may also
define the values and the mission of the firm where the objectives are identified as per the
expectation of every employee and term and condition of the employment policy well outline in
the document. The code ethics are supposed to be followed to the letter by the employee so to
achieve the business goal and maintain all firm activities in order. The codes make sure that the
business processes are carried as possible with the slightest error to ensure the safety of the
employees and reduces hazards that may occur as a result of a failure in firm operations. In case
of breaking the code of ethics, it got several sequences to the firm and the employees. The
employees may be fired, to undergo training or reduction of responsibility to that
employee(Bolden ,2016). The firm may experience in its business operation or may cause an
accident in the work premises.
In case of Pike River Mine, we find that the code of ethics is not fully followed. The
workers were still working against the standards. The standards state that the concentration of
methane should be below fifteen percent in the air, but the employee in the mines was working in
the areas in mines where the concentration was much beyond the allowed the limit. The broke
the code of ethics that result in the vast accident that killed may lives in the mines.

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Conclusion
The activities of individuals or groups in the firm are driving forces of the firm’s future.
Having experienced, skilled and qualified employees may lead to the success of the firm as they
are carrying out their roles to the best way possible. The composition of employees in a firm is
vital as follows. The work diversity in the firm encourages better performance in the firm as it
has a range of skill from the different characteristic of people. Job satisfaction is the feeling of
being of belonging to a particular organization and its current management and nature of
working conditions. Job satisfaction is brought up by having good working condition and a better
code of ethics in the business. Task performance evaluates the ratio of work per time of the
employee. It enables the firm to know the efficiency of its employees. For a successful firm, their
number of group variables that influences its success as follows. Leadership is the core factor
that influences the success of the business as it oversees all the firm activities. Lastly, we have a
code of ethics that defines how tasks to be carried and consequences of breaking the code. It
enables the employees to work per certain range towards the success of the firm. For better
organization behavior study, it will to the success of the firm and reducing the occurrences of the
risks