Organizational Situations and Interventions

Socialization Activity
Socialization is an important component to the success and effectiveness of an organizational setting. Workplace socialization or social interaction is associated with numerous benefits for both the individuals and the organization. However, organizations are sometimes faced with socialization issues that negatively impact employee engagement and productivity. An example of an organizational situation relating to socialization is the integration of new members. Organization X has established human resource policies and plans to integrate new members into the workforce. However, these policies and practices are seemingly ineffective because new employees report of role uncertainties as they are not adequately informed of their specific duties. Consequently, the participation or engagement of new employees in the organization’s workplace is significantly affected. New employees state that they do not feel a sense of belonging and face numerous uncertainties in this working environment.
Relevant Research
Korte (2007) states that socialization in an organization is associated with four major benefits i.e. reduced turnover, transfer and maintenance of organizational culture, positive employee attitudes and behaviors, and learning organizational political and social norms. Despite these benefits, many organizations face challenges in integrating new employees. Existing socialization practices for new employees focus on the traditional view of learning, which is ineffective. As a result, many new employees experience difficulties in acquiring knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors that are necessary to engage effectively in an organization. Formal practices are not entirely effective in enhancing socialization and integration of new employees in an organization. Van Kleef, Steen & Scott (2017) state that informal practices should be combined with formal practices to enhance socialization and integration of new employees.
Practical Application
As shown in existing research, the organization can benefit from adopting suitable interventions that would help enhance socialization of its new members in the workplace. Existing literature shows that a combination of formal and informal socialization practices is the most effective approach. Therefore, the intervention for this organization is the adoption of formal and informal socialization practices. In this regard, training programmes and orientation processes to help new employees learn about their specific duties and roles in the workplace were established. These processes focused on promoting acquisition of the required knowledge, attitudes and behaviors. Informal socialization opportunities like team-building exercises and daily fun routines were also adopted.
Pros and Cons of the Intervention
The advantages of the intervention include reduction of role uncertainty among new employees, improved understanding of specific duties, enhanced interactions with other employees, and more employee engagement. However, the intervention was also associated with some disadvantages including reduced personal productivity, increased operational costs brought by team-building exercises, and disruptions in operations. Therefore, the implementation of the intervention could have been carried out in a different manner to avoid these disadvantages. If this was to happen again, changes would be made to the informal socialization activities since they affected daily operations and operational costs of the organization. In this regard, informal socialization activities that would be adopted would focus on enhancing employees engagement without compromising personal productivity. Some of the changes that would be made include changing the design of workspaces to enhance face-to-face interaction, employee recognition, and promoting interactions with superiors and colleagues (Njegovan & Kostic, 2014).
Work-Family Conflict
The modern society has become hectic to an extent that finding work-family balance is increasingly difficult. Work-family conflict is a term used to refer to a situation where the responsibilities from work seem incompatible with family roles. A 35-year-old African American woman recently divorced and has to take care of her three daughters. Despite having a full-time job, she experiences financial difficulties that have forced her to accept another job. Consequently, she has very busy schedule that hinders her from spending time with her children and attending their school events. She is always working and rarely creates time for her children, which has affected their wellbeing. The African-American woman is facing work-family conflict because of her struggles to balance family and work life. While she recognizes the importance of spending time with her children, financial hardships have forced her to keep working.
Relevant Research
According to Kossek & Lee (2017), work-family conflict has become a major issue for men and women in the modern society as they find that work interferes with their family roles. As the demographic trends continue to change worldwide, men and women are forced to take two or three jobs to meet their financial needs at the expense of some of their family responsibilities. This in turn contributes to poor family satisfaction and physical and mental health issues as evident in the case of the African-American single mom. Zhou et al. (2018) states that work-family conflict is one of the major sources of mental health issues among female employees. Kelly, Moen & Tranby (2011) suggest that schedule control is one of the most suitable approaches to address work-family conflict. Schedule control is a workplace initiative that enhances employees’ control of their schedule and results in reduced work-family conflict. It created workplace flexibility, which is essential in establishing a suitable work-family interface.
Practical Application
The most suitable intervention to address work-family conflict is adopting a workplace initiative that provides flexibility. In relation to the organization situation, the two workplaces for the African-American single mom have changed their human resource policies and practices to allow employees flexible work schedules. These changes permit employees to have control of their schedules and work toward meeting personal and organizational objectives each week. As a result, the organizations’ human resource department and managers have minimal control on the employees schedule. However, managers and supervisors establish goals and objectives that the employee must accomplish each week. These goals/objectives are reviewed at the end of every week to determine the employee’s performance and to make necessary changes.
Pros and Cons of the Intervention
Following changes in organizational policies and practices, the employee has had more control of her schedule. This has generated some personal and organizational advantages or benefits. Some of these advantages include reduced work-family conflict, enhanced employee engagement, increased employee and organizational productivity. These advantages are attributable to increased schedule control by the employee, which has been found to improve work-family fit (Kelly, Moen & Tranby, 2011). The employee can easily organize her work and create time to spend with the family and participate in her daughters’ school activities/events. However, the intervention is associated with some cons including reduced job control and reduced coordination of work activities by supervisors. These disadvantages can be addressed through making some improvements to the intervention. Some of these improvements include requiring supervisors to give permission to employees to deviate from ordinary work routines and hours and changing the organizational culture to Results-Only Work Environment.
Reducing Impact of Workplace Stressors
Workplace stressors refers to factors in the working environment or nature of work that generates stress or strain within an individual worker. These stressors can result in huge psychological distress that in turn affects the overall productivity of the worker and organization. Nancy is an advanced practice nurse working in an acute care setting that provides different healthcare services to critically ill patients. The healthcare facility is severely understaffed to an extent that clinicians like Nancy have burdensome work schedules. Due to the nature of her work shifts and demands for care, Nancy is suffering from work-related stress. She is constantly tired and has poor eating habits. Nancy spends most of her limited free time sleeping because of fatigue and psychological distress emanating from work demands and responsibilities. Nancy’s job performance has significantly declined because of fatigue and work overload.
Relevant Research
Workplace stress is a major concern around the world because of the increasingly demanding nature of today’s working environment. Employees in the healthcare industry experience high stress because of the demanding nature of their work and increased shortage of nurses (Khan & Khurshid, 2017). Existing empirical evidence shows that workers experience high levels of stress because of long working hours and work overload. These factors contribute to lack of autonomy, poor performance, job insecurity, reduced employee morale, and negative impacts on employee wellbeing. In some cases, workplace stressors can be sources of physical illness, mental health issues, and psychological distress (Bhui et al., 2016). Individual and organizational interventions are required to help manage stress in the workplace. The interventions should be focused on addressing potential causes of work-related stress and establishing measures to lessen workplace stressors.
Practical Application
Organizational interventions are among the most suitable approaches to deal with workplace stressors. This situation requires the use of an organizational intervention that will help lessen workplace stressors. In this regard, a flexible work schedule was implemented in the organization to help lessen work overload and reduce working hours. Following the implementation of a flexible work schedule, appropriate nursing shifts were established. Nurses at the facility are required to carry out their responsibilities during their shifts and ensure smooth transition of work responsibilities between them. The nursing shifts were established depending patient demands for healthcare services and other activities carried out in the acute care setting. After creating the flexible work schedules, the management provided information to nurses regarding their specific roles and responsibilities to help lessen uncertainty and confusion.
Pros and Cons of the Intervention
The intervention played a critical role in reducing workplace stressors at the facility and enhancing employee engagement. Some of the advantages of this initiative include reduced workload, reduced long working hours, better employee engagement, and enhanced employee autonomy. However, the intervention was characterized by some disadvantages include reduced organizational productivity due to staff shortage and increased demands for patient care services. Despite reducing workplace stressors, the effectiveness of the intervention could be enhanced through some changes. First, the intervention could be enhanced through hiring more staff to promote continuity of services provided to patients. Nursing shifts exacerbated the current shortage of nurses faced by the facility. Hiring more staff would help enhance the effectiveness of the intervention in reducing the impact of workplace stressors. In addition, changes in organizational culture would help accommodate the new work schedules.
References
Bhui, K., Dinos, S., Galant-Miecznikowska, M., de Jongh, B. & Stanfeld, S. (2016, December). Perceptions of Work Stress Causes and Effective Interventions in Employees Working in Public, Private and Non-governmental Organizations: A Qualitative Study. BJPsych Bulletin, 40(6), 318-325.
Kelly, E.L., Moen, P. & Tranby, E. (2011, April). Changing Workplaces to Reduce Work-Family Conflict: Schedule Control in a White-Collar Organization. American Sociological Review, 76(2), 265-290.
Khan, N. & Khurshid, S. (2017, February). Workplace Stress and Employee Wellbeing: Case of Health Care Staff in UAE. European Scientific Journal, 13(5), 217-226.
Korte, R.F. (2007). The Socialization of Newcomers into Organizations: Integrating Learning and Social Exchange Processes. Retrieved from Institute of Education Sciences website: https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED504550.pdf
Kossek, E.E. & Lee, K. (2017, October). Work-Family Conflict and Work-Life Conflict. Retrieved March 24, 2020, from https://oxfordre.com/business/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190224851.001.0001/acrefore-9780190224851-e-52?print=pdf
Njegovan, B.R. & Kostic, B. (2014). Impact of Organizational Socialization Towards Employees’ Social Adaptation. Journal of Engineering Management and Competitiveness, 4(1), 34-40.
Van Kleef, D., Steen, T. & Schott, C. (2017, October 26). Informal Socialization in Public Organizations: Exploring the Impact of Informal Socialization on Enforcement Behavior of Dutch Veterinary Inspectors. Public Administration, 97(1), 81-96.
Zhou, S., Da, S., Guo, H. & Zhang, X. (2018, April 17). Work-Family Conflict and Mental Health Among Female Employees: A Sequential Mediation Model via Negative Affect and Perceived Stress. Frontiers in Psychology, 9(544), doi: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00544