Managing People & Performance in Organizations

QUIZ 1 Attribution at workplace

Group 14 (Ankit-1411286, Jignesh-1411300, Nished-1411311, Swati-1411338)

1. Stereo typing in learning

The manager claims that no training programs were conducted for the employees at lower level
(technicians/executives) of the organization as they have no aptitude & interest for the programs.
Implications:

An opportunity for growth of employees & hence, organization is lost as few such employees

have the potential to rise up in the management ladder.

Numerous hiring issues as well as technical issues that could have been solved much faster by
such employees remained unresolved.

2. Stereotyping in teamwork
Perception that graduates from Tier-2 & Tier-3 colleges are not as skilled as graduates from top
colleges. Thus, while working in a team, an employee from the secondary college might not be treated
as equal by other team members.
Implications:

This leads to differences among the team and affects the output of the team.
The confidence of the Tier-2/3 graduate decreases further fuelling the bias.

3. Self-serving in leadership
A Sales manager believes that it was his management & leadership skills which achieved the highest
sales & profit in the region.
Implications:

Failure to recognize the role of team members & other external factors, which will make the

sales manager overconfident about his skills.

It demotivates the other team members if the sales manager walks away with all the rewards
& they may not put the extra effort henceforth.

4. Halo effect in Performance Evaluation

A person with excellent communication skills generates a positive first impression in the mind of
senior managers. Managers form a perception that the better communicators are more proficient at
their work. The person thus gets a higher performance rating as compared to his peers even if their
productivity was higher.
Implications:

The employees start focussing too much on communicating & networking with the managers

rather than on the job at hand.

It is detrimental to the morale of the other employees who are not great communicators.

5. Hiring:
During recruitment, the managers have stereotypes that married women at the age of around 30 years
are unproductive due to family obligations and will also be unwilling to relocate when hired. Based on
this perception they prefer not to hire married female applicants.
Implications:

Company loses out on good talented female candidates as well as an opportunity for

increasing diversity.
It leads to further societal attributions towards the female gender.

6. Fundamental Attribution Error in Misusing Company Resources:

Employees are often found misusing company resources for their personal work either out of
ignorance or they are being unethical. When an employee observes his/her colleague misusing
company resources, he/she perceives it as an unethical behaviour instead of analysing the situational
aspects. The awareness levels of the employee may have been low about the misuse.
Implications:

It is hard to distinguish between genuine mistakes and intentional actions, decreasing the
mutual trust between employees.