Shortcuts in Judging Others – Meaning, Types and Applications

Meaning of Shortcuts in Judging Others In perceiving the stimuli in our environment, people are likely to make so many errors and ended up with poor results. Some of those errors are stereotyping, halo effects, selective perception, distortions, attributions, projections etc. Each of these errors is dysfunctional for good decision making and management. Since subjective emotions, judgmental attitudes, and distortion of facts are common in perceiving any situation, we have tried to identify ways in which we can minimize perceptual biases. The need for managers to accurately perceive the environment and how manages can sharpen their perceptual skill are vital in enhancing perceptual skills. People tend to follow a number of shortcut methods when observing others and making judgment of others activities. These techniques are to some extent valuable and allow us to make accurate perceptions rapidly and provide valid data for making predictions. However, they are not foolproof. However, Continue reading

Methods of Production – Job, Batch and Flow Methods

Production and operation management has become an essential part of manufacturing organizations. These organizations always experience pressure in all divisions and units. Pressures are in terms of orders to be completed on due dates, breakdown of machines, absence of employees, lateness on delivery of materials, and industrial actions by employees to improve working conditions. To meet these challengers, firms usually rely on an effective methods of production and operation methods. A manufacturing organization may use different methods of production such as use job, batch or flow production depending on a number of factors. However, it is important to have a clear distinction between these three methods of production to know where each one is applicable. Whatever methods of production is used, the objective is to produce goods and services which is highly profitable and to use the most effective and efficient method. Considerations should also be made to other aspects Continue reading

Role of Employee Involvement in Organizational Change

Employee involvement is known as the direct involvement of the organizational staffs in the growth, development and benefits of the company. This involvement can be with voice, participation, engagement and in democracy. These factors help the organization to improve its decision-making, improve the attitude of the employees towards work, increase the job satisfaction, and empower their employees with facilities for better health and life. To engage the employee in the organization, they should be given with the authority to become effective to take participate in substantive decisions, providing the training for appropriate decision-making skills and provide them rewards or incentives with successful participation. On the other hand, the organizational change is a process that refers to the modification or transformation of the organizations structure, work culture and goods. It has impact on the working of the employees and can also affect the work culture, infrastructure or to the process of Continue reading

What is Personality? Meaning, Definition, Determinants and Traits

People tend to have a general notion that personality refers to a personal appearance with charming smile, or outlook. But psychologists view the concept as dynamic in nature concerned with growth and development of a person’s whole psychological system. Personality can be defined as the consistent psychological patterns within an individual that affect the way they interact with others and the situations they encounter. Personality is defined as relatively stable and enduring characteristics that determine our thoughts, feelings and behavior. Personality is a complex phenomenon and there are various perspectives of personality construct. One common and simple definition of Personality is: It is the consistent psychological patterns within an individual that affect the way they interact with others and the situations they encounter. Research studies shows that individual’s personality is more or less consistent, lasting, and can remain substantially constant across all the situations and time. But there are individual Continue reading

Qualitative Characteristics of Financial Information

Qualitative characteristics are the attributes that make financial  information  useful to users.  The qualitative characteristics of financial information can be categorized as fundamental (relevance and faithful representation) or enhancing (comparability, verifiability, timeliness and understandability) based on how they influence the usefulness of financial information. Fundamental Qualitative Characteristics  of Financial Information 1. Relevance Relevant financial reporting information means the ability of users (shareholder) to make a difference in their decision. Information regarding to economic phenomenon will help the users make a difference decision if it included predictive value and confirmatory value. Predictive Value: Information has predictive value if the value can be useful to the shareholder in predicting certain things that is related to future. Information which is highly predictable does not necessary has predictive value. For instance, depreciation of plant and equipment by using straight line method can be highly predictable every year, but it cannot assist in evaluating the Continue reading

Alternative Objectives of Business Firms

The traditional theory does not distinguish between owners and managers’ interests. The recent theories of firm, which are also called managerial and behavioral theories of firm, assume owners and managers to be separate entities in large corporations with different goals and motivation. In this section, some important alternative objectives of business firms, especially of large business corporations are also discussed. 1. Baumol’s Hypothesis of Sales Revenue Maximization According to Baumol, “maximization of sales revenue is an alternative to profit maximization objective“. The reason behind this objective is to clearly distinct ownership and management in large business firms. This distinction helps the managers to set their goals other than profit maximization goal. Under this situation, managers maximize their own utility function. According to Baumol, the most reasonable factor in managers utility functions is maximization of the sales revenue. The factors, which help in explaining these goals by the managers, are following: Salary and other earnings of managers are more closely related to seals revenue than to Continue reading