Talent Management Quarter

Worker Productivity Quarter (hereinafter, the Quarter) is the first of four lectures of Operations Quadrivium (hereinafter, the Quadrivium):

• The Quarter is designed to introduce its learners to enterprise discovery, or, in other words, to concepts related to obtaining data needed to administer the enterprise effort; and
• The Quadrivium examines concepts of administering various types of enterprises known as enterprise administration as a whole.

The Quadrivium is the first of seven modules of Septem Artes Administrativi, which is a course designed to introduce its learners to general concepts in business administration, management, and organizational behavior.

Outline

The predecessor lecture is Human Decisions Quarter.

Concepts

1. Employees productivity. A performance measure of both efficiency and effectiveness.
   • Group order ranking. An evaluation method that places employees into a particular classification, such as quartiles.
   • Individual ranking. An evaluation method that rank-orders employees from best to worst.
   • Shaping behavior. The process of guiding learning in graduated steps using reinforcement or lack of reinforcement.
2. Job satisfaction. A positive feeling about one's job resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics.
   • Job satisfaction. An employee's general attitude toward her or his job.
   • Motivating potential score. A predictive index that suggests the motivating potential in a job.
3. Counterproductive workplace behavior. Any intentional employee behavior that is potentially damaging to the organization or to individuals within organization.
   • Counterproductive work behavior. Actions that actively damage the organization, including stealing, behaving aggressively toward coworkers, or being late or absent.
   • Counterproductivity. Actions that actively damage the organization, including stealing, behaving aggressively toward coworkers, of being late or absent.
   • Deviant workplace behavior (also known as antisocial behavior or workplace incivility). Voluntary behavior that violates significant organizational norms and, in so doing, threatens the well-being of the organization or its members.
   • Employee theft. Any unauthorized taking of company property by employees for their personal use.
   • Absenteeism. The failure to show up for work.
   • Withdrawal behavior. The set of actions employees take to separate themselves from the organization.
   • Turnover. The voluntary and involuntary permanent withdrawal from an organization.
4. Job dissatisfaction. A negative feeling about one's job resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics.
   • Exit. Dissatisfaction expressed through behavior directed toward leaving the organization.
   • Neglect. Dissatisfaction expressed through allowing conditions to worsen.
   • Loyalty. Dissatisfaction expressed by passively waiting for conditions to improve.
   • Voice. Dissatisfaction expressed through active and constructive attempts to improve conditions.
5. Professional ability. An individual's capacity to perform the various tasks in a job.
   • Reading skills. Skills that entail an understanding of written sentences and paragraphs in work-related documents.
   • Writing skills. Skills that entail communicating effectively in text as appropriate for the needs of the audience.
   • Interpersonal skill. The ability to work well with other people individually and in a group.
   • Resilience. An individual's ability to overcome challenges and turn them into opportunities.
6. Workforce development.
   • Diversity skills training. Specialized training to educate employees about the importance of diversity and teach them skills for working in a diverse workplace.
   • Sensitivity training. Training groups that seek to change behavior through unstructured group interaction.
   • Social learning theory. A theory of learning that says people can learn through observation and direct experience.
   • Social-learning theory. The view that we can learn through both observation and direct experience.
7. Positive organizational scholarship. An area of organizational behavior research that concerns how organizations develop human strengths, foster vitality and resilience, and unlock potential.
   • Vesting. When an employee of a company gains rights to stock options and contributions provided by the employer. The rights typically gain value (vest) over time until they reach their full value after a pre-determined amount of time. For example, if an employee was offered 200 stock unites over 10 years, 20 units would vest each year. This gives employees an incentive to perform well and stay with the company for a longer period of time.
   • Employee stock ownership plan. A company-established benefits plan in which employees acquire stock, often at below-market prices, as part of their benefits.
   • Profit-sharing plan. An organization-wide program that distributes compensation based on some established formula designed around a company's profitability.
   • Flexible benefits. A benefits plan that allows each employee to put together a benefits package individually tailored to his or her own needs and situation.
   • Flextime (flexible work hours). A scheduling system in which employees are required to work a specific number of hours a week but are free to vary those hours within certain limits.
   • Flextime. Flexible work hours.

• Employee involvement and participation. A participative process that uses the input of employees to increase employee commitment to organizational success.
• Employee recognition program. A plan to encourage specific employee behaviors by formally appreciating specific employee contributions.
• Employee recognition program. Personal attention and expressing interest, approval, and appreciation for a job well done.
• Bonus. A pay plan that rewards employees for recent performance rather than historical performance.

Methods

1. Attitude survey. A survey that elicits responses from employees through questions about how they feel about their jobs, work groups, supervisors, or the organization.
2. Forced comparison. Method of performance evaluation where an employee's performance is made in explicit comparison to others (e.g., an employee may rank third out of 10 employees in his or her work unit).

Instruments

1. Least preferred coworker questionnaire. An instrument that purports to measure whether a person is task or relationship oriented.

Practices

The successor lecture is Communication Quarter.