Conflicts in todays work life are normal and to some point they can be useful for business because they can create new thinking and development (check my earlier post: “CONFLICTS – DO WE NEED THEM?“.)
However, conflicts can get features that are harmful for the organisation and the individuals working there so it is necessary to handle them in appropriate way or in some cases to even try to prevent them before they born. But how to do this?
Big part of adult’s life is spent at work place. Work is important for person’s self image and identity. Therefore it is also important for physical and mental health. At work other people can decide over us and our time, we have obligations towards other persons and we are dependent of them and their performance. It is usual that one can not choose who to work with. Friendships in work can be supportive or relations can be difficult, cause irritation, frustration, stress, health problems or even bad self image. At work different needs, expectations, values and interests meet. It is normal that these can be different and this can cause risks that conflicts arise.
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How conflicts are seen at your work place?
In traditional view of conflicts a conflict is seen as an opposite to the concept of co-working; if the co-working is good, there is no conflicts. Conflicts are not hoped and they are seen as abnormal. If there are conflicts between colleagues or work groups, it is a sign that something is fundamentally wrong or does not work normally. What comes to leaders, according to this view, leaders who do not take part to conflicts are seen as effective and successful and leaders who take part to conflicts are seen as opposite to this. In this kind of view there is problems when it comes to conflicts; employees and leaders do not raise difficulties at work because they are afraid that they are seen as difficult persons. Problems are explained away or sweeped under the mattress. Traditional view to conflict is not functional because it is unrealistic in today’s work life, reduces possibility to handle conflict in constructive way and probability that conflict gets negative consequences in next time increases.
Below I summarise what were the most important key points within the theme of job satisfaction at work- and organisational psychology course at Bergen University in autumn 2016.
Job satisfaction
How satisfied are employees to their work? The answer depends on a person, work place and the culture one is living. Many organisations monitor job satisfaction and related employee attitudes, because job satisfaction can have consequences to employee’s behaviour and performance.
Job satisfaction is a person’s evaluation of one’s job and work context. It is an Continue reading
The competition of competent employees is increasing in Europe’s working life because workforce is getting smaller. Post-war baby boomers are reaching retirement age and the same time fertility rates among women have decreased. This means challenges for organisations when they have higher needs to retain their employees due the demographic change in population but also because turnover processes are highly expensive. Organisations need to find ways to keep their employees more satisfied and motivated, as satisfied and motivated people are more likely to keep their jobs. In this way organisations have better possibilities to retain their competent employees and avoid unwanted turnover.
I will present next, what is meant by the term turnover. Second I will explain some means that employer can use to avoid unwanted turnover in their organisations. In the end, some conclusions follow.
How to attract and attain good candidates in a competitive marketplace? This is a relevant question for many organisations when competent personnel is seen as an advantage for business. Variety of personnel recruitment and selection methods are designed to attract and to find the right employee to specific job. When competition of qualifies employees is tough and wrong recruitment decisions are very expensive, securing good recruitment and selection processes have become more essential. But what is good recruitment and selection process from the organisation’s perspective?
First this article will give insight to concepts of recruitment and selection. After that best methods of securing good recruitment and selection process is presented. Finally conclusions will follow.
The amount of older persons in the total population will increase significantly in the coming decades in Europe. There are many explaining factors to this development i.a. fertility rates among women has decreased, life expectancy of individuals has risen and a greater proportion of the post-war baby-boom generation is retiring. (Eurostat 2016.) This development causes that competition of skilful employees is greater between organisations in the near future when the workforce is shrinking. It means challenges for organisations to attract new employees but at the same retain their current ageing employees. HR-professionals need to find solutions to utilise resources of their older workers and find the ways to keep them longer in their service even though advanced age workers may be perceived more as a problem than as a resource for business.
First, this essay will give insights to following concepts: older worker, old age and different definitions of age which are important to understand when concentrating on advanced age of workers. Second, elements of attitudes in work environment are presented. After that the essay concentrates to main ideas about older age workersage of workers as a problem or as a resource in business. Third, it will be showed how organisations can utilise older workers’ resources and finally, conclusions will follow.
Motives are internal states that arouse and direct our behaviour toward specific objects or goals. Motive can be caused by deficit, a lack of something (e.g. hunger -> food). They differ on intensity depending on person’s circumstances and are often based on needs, states of tension within a person. When the need is satisfied, tension is reduced. Motives cause people to perceive, think and act in the ways that satisfy the needs and people are not always aware of them.
Henry Murray (1938) thought that “a need refers to a potentiality or readiness to respond in a certain way under certain given circumstances”. Needs organise perception, guiding us to ‘see’ what we want (need) to see. For example if a person has not eaten, he has a need for food. The motive behind this need is hunger. In this point, an individual can have thoughts and fantasies about food (hamburgers, pizzas ice creams, just a mention a few :) ). Our behaviour guide us to satisfy the need we are going trough at the moment. When we are feeling hungry we might go to store, buy food, cook it and eat it.
Research of motives have concentrated on a small set of motives. These are need for achievement, power and intimacy which are described to be the most important motives for human behaviour, “Big three”.
Attention
Attention can be defined as a concentration of mental activity that allows you to take in limited portion of information available both of your sensory world and memory. Attention work as a gatekeeper. If certain information do not get attention, it has no existence in your cognitive system. This emphasises the view of attention as a limited resource.
Attention tasks
The fact that attention is divided, explains why attention might be seen as a limited resource. In divided-attention task person is trying to pay attention to two kinds of simultaneous messages at the same time and tries to respond to these messages appropriately (for example teacher’s lecture and nearby conversation). In both tasks accuracy suffer. When tasks involve movement, speed can lower down (e.g. speaking in a phone when walking -> walking will get slower).
If person is multitasking, he is trying to concentrate on two tasks at the same time. It restricts the limits of attention and working and long-term memory. For example, when a person is driving a car and speaks on a phone (even when with hands-free), attention what happens in visual field is reduced.
Selective-attention task allows people to to pay attention to certain kinds of information, while ignoring other ongoing information. This makes our everyday life a bit easier. Selective attention also emphasise, that attention is seen as a limited resource. There are four kind of selective-attention tasks that clarify in which ways our attention is limited and selective. These are dichotic listening, the Stroop effect, visual search and saccadic eye movement. Next I am going to present these and show, how they support the fact that attention is limited.
Mari Kettunen 
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