task performance
The individual’s voluntary goal-directed behaviours that contribute to organizational objectives.
agreeableness
A personality dimension describing people who are trusting, helpful, good-natured, considerate, tolerant, selfless, generous, and flexible.
openness to experience
A personality dimension describing people who are imaginative, creative, unconventional, curious, nonconforming, autonomous, and aesthetically perceptive.
ability
The natural aptitudes and learned capabilities required to successfully complete a task.
achievement-nurturing orientation
A cross-cultural value describing the degree to which people in a culture emphasize competitive versus cooperative relations with other people.
action research
A problem-focused change process that combines action orientation (changing attitudes and behaviour) and research orientation (testing theory through data collection and analysis).
adaptive culture
An organizational culture in which employees are receptive to change, including the ongoing alignment of the organization to its environment and continuous improvement of internal processes.
affective organizational commitment
An individual’s emotional attachment to, involvement in, and identification with an organization.
anchoring and adjustment heuristic
A natural tendency for people to be influenced by an initial anchor point such that they do not sufficiently move away from that point as new information is provided.
appreciative inquiry
An organizational change strategy that directs the group’s attention away from its own problems and focuses participants on the group’s potential and positive elements.
artifacts
The observable symbols and signs of an organization’s culture.
attitudes
The cluster of beliefs, assessed feelings, and behavioural intentions towards a person, object, or event (called an attitude object).
attraction–selection–attrition (ASA) theory
A theory which states that organizations have a natural tendency to attract, select, and retain people with values and personality characteristics that are consistent with the organization’s character, resulting in a more homogeneous organization and a stronger culture.
attribution process
The perceptual process of deciding whether an observed behaviour or event is caused largely by internal or external factors.
authentic leadership
The view that effective leaders need to be aware of, feel comfortable with, and act consistently with their values, personality, and self-concept.
availability heuristic
A natural tendency to assign higher probabilities to objects or events that are easier to recall from memory, even though ease of recall is also affected by nonprobability factors (e.g., emotional response, recent events).
best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA)
The best outcome you might achieve through some other course of action if you abandon the current negotiation.
bicultural audit
A process of diagnosing cultural relations between companies and determining the extent to which cultural clashes will likely occur.
bounded rationality
The view that people are bounded in their decision-making capabilities, including access to limited information, limited information processing, and tendency toward satisficing rather than maximizing when making choices.
brainstorming
A freewheeling, face-to-face meeting where team members aren’t allowed to criticize but are encouraged to speak freely, generate as many ideas as possible, and build on the ideas of others.
brainwriting
A variation of brainstorming whereby participants write (rather than speak about) and share their ideas.
Brooks’s law
The principle that adding more people to a late software project only makes it later.
categorical thinking
Organizing people and objects into preconceived categories that are stored in our long-term memory.
centrality
A contingency of power pertaining to the degree and nature of interdependence between the powerholder and others.