Organizational Behaviour

Citation

Buchanan, D. A., & Huczynski, A. A. (2023). Organizational Behaviour (11th ed.). Pearson.

Chapter Summary

The 11th edition, published by Pearson in November 2023 (copyright 2024), has twenty-two chapters in five parts, followed by a glossary. Its order is distinctive: it begins with the organizational context (environment, technology and culture) before turning to individuals, then groups, then the design of work and organizations, and ends with leadership and the processes through which organizations change and decide. Pearson presents the book as a way to develop a critical understanding of how organizations shape people's views and actions and how the behaviour of people in organizations can be explained, and says the 11th edition asks readers to predict the results of research studies, challenge assumptions, consider alternatives and engage with podcasts and videos.

Chapters 1–4: Explaining organizational behaviour; Environment; Technology; Culture (Part 1: The organizational context)

The opening chapter asks what organizational behaviour is and how it can be explained. The next three chapters place behaviour in its setting: the organization's external environment, the technology people work with, and organizational culture. Starting here signals that the book treats behaviour as shaped by context, not only by individual traits.

Chapters 5–9: Learning; Personality; Communication; Perception; Motivation (Part 2: Individuals in the organization)

Part 2 covers the psychology of the individual at work: how people learn, how personality is described and assessed, how people communicate, how they perceive others and their situation, and what motivates them.

Chapters 10–13: Group formation; Group structure; Individuals in group; Teamworking (Part 3: Groups and teams in the organization)

Four chapters on groups move from how groups form and how they are structured to the effect of the group on its individual members, and then to teamworking as a way of organizing work.

Chapters 14–17: Work design; Elements of structure; Organization design; Organizational architecture (Part 4: Management and organization)

Part 4 shifts to the design side of organizational behaviour: how individual jobs are designed, the basic elements of organization structure, the design of whole organizations, and organizational architecture, the broadest of the four.

Chapters 18–22: Leadership; Change; Decision making; Conflict; Power and politics (Part 5: Leadership processes)

The final part treats leadership and four processes that run through organizational life: change, decision making, conflict, and power and politics. Ending with power and politics leaves the reader with the most contested view of how organizations actually work.

Key Concepts

Part 1: The organizational context

• Organizational behaviour: the study of how people behave in organizations and how organizations influence that behaviour.
• Environment and technology: external conditions and the tools of work as influences on behaviour.
• Organizational culture: the shared assumptions and practices that characterize an organization.

Part 2: Individuals in the organization

• Learning and personality: how people acquire new behaviour and how stable individual differences are described.
• Perception: how people select and interpret information about others and their situation.
• Motivation: the forces that direct and sustain effort at work.

Part 3: Groups and teams

• Group formation and structure: how groups come into being and develop roles and relationships.
• Teamworking: organizing work around teams rather than individuals.

Part 4: Management and organization

• Work design: how tasks are combined into jobs.
• Organization structure and design: the elements (such as division of work and hierarchy) from which organizations are built, and choices among designs.

Part 5: Leadership processes

• Leadership: influencing others toward goals.
• Organizational change and decision making: how organizations alter themselves and choose among options.
• Conflict, power and politics: competing interests and the means by which people pursue them inside organizations.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• Context first. Most introductory texts start with the individual. Placing environment, technology and culture in Part 1 frames individual psychology and group behaviour as shaped by their surroundings, which suits courses that take a sociological as well as a psychological view of organizations.
• A critical stance. The publisher's description centres on developing a critical understanding, and the 11th edition's prompts to predict research results and to challenge assumptions push readers to test the evidence rather than memorize findings.
• Breadth. Twenty-two chapters cover the individual, group, organizational and political levels, including topics often given little space in shorter texts, such as technology, organizational architecture and power and politics. A glossary supports readers new to the vocabulary.
• Multimedia and research engagement. The edition links its material to podcasts and videos, according to the publisher.

Limitations

• Length. Twenty-two chapters are more than a single-semester module can cover in depth; courses must select.
• Survey depth. As a broad textbook it gives each theory a share of a chapter. Students who need the detailed development and evidence for motivation or leadership theories will need a specialist review.
• Edition-specific claims hard to check. Pearson's public description of the 11th edition is brief; claims about particular contemporary topics in this edition (for example hybrid working) could not be confirmed from the publisher's pages and should be checked against the book itself.

Where It Fits in the Course

Among the course's general textbooks, Robbins and Judge's Organizational Behavior is the standard American introduction, moving from individual topics such as personality and perception through groups to organizational systems, with self-assessment features and accessible summaries of research. Buchanan and Huczynski cover similar topics but begin with organizational context and adopt a more questioning stance, so they suit a course that wants students to argue with the evidence. Mullins and Rees's Management and Organisational Behaviour is the closest alternative from the UK; it ties organizational behaviour more directly to the practice of management and adds sections on personal skills and employability.

Mary Jo Hatch's Organizations: A Very Short Introduction is a brief overview of how scholars study organizations and why they disagree, useful before Part 1. For deeper study after this book, Miner's Organizational Behavior 1 evaluates the major theories of motivation and leadership one by one, following Chapters 9 and 18, and March and Simon's Organizations, the 1958 founding work on decision-making with bounded rationality, gives the theoretical background to Chapter 20.

How to Use This Book

The book suits undergraduates in business and management, including those with no previous study of organizational behaviour. Some familiarity with psychology or sociology may help but is not required.

• Start with Part 1. Chapter 1 sets out how the subject is studied; Chapters 2–4 provide the context the rest of the book refers back to. In a short course, Chapter 1 and the culture chapter are the minimum.
• Core modules: Part 2 (especially perception and motivation) and Part 3 for courses focused on individuals and groups; Parts 4 and 5 for courses on organization design and change.
• Selective reading: choose by course emphasis rather than reading straight through. A people-management module might take Chapters 1, 4, 5–9, 13 and 18; an organization-theory module Chapters 1–4, 14–17 and 19–22.

Use the prediction prompts as intended: write down an expected result before reading what a study found, then compare. Keep a running list of glossary terms for each part, and when a chapter presents competing theories, practise stating the assumptions behind each. Pair the leadership and power chapters with a current case from the news to test the frameworks against a real organization.