Case of Joe

Leadership & Organizational Behavior

Case Study: Joe Salatino

President of Great Northern American

Dr. Gigi Smith

Salednika McKenzie

July 29, 2012

People’s perceptions and attributions influence how they behave in their organization. Perception describes the way people filter, organize and interpret sensory information. Attribution explains how people act, determining how people react to the actions of others as well. Accurate perception allows employees to interpret what they see and hear in the workplace effectively to make decisions, complete tasks and act in ethical manner. Faulty perceptions lead to problems in the organization, such as stereotyping, that lead people to erroneously make assumptions. When people in organizations find themselves in unfamiliar, ambiguous situations, they tend to have difficulty coping. Effective business professionals handle objections to their ideas by clearly stating the benefits of their position to all parties. By presenting a compelling case for their ideas, these people get approval for their proposed strategy even if opposed by apathy or confrontation. By actively recognizing people’s perceptions and attributions, effective leaders build justifications for their approach and get support when needed. People commonly attribute success to skill, luck or chance. People tend to react to situations based on what they think caused the event. Just as perceptions can be faulty, attributions can be inaccurate as well. Organizations can ensure people attribute actions more effectively by providing diversity training. This helps prevent a hostile work environment for people from different cultures. By training people to make more accurate attributions, daily operations run more smoothly. This helps reduce faulty attributions, such as managers who attribute exceptional performance to chance as they resist assigning more challenging work to qualified individuals they view as lucky. People tend to...