Clayton P. Alderfer

An empirical test of a new theory of human needs

Abstract This study was concerned with developing and testing an alternative to Maslows theory and to a simple frustration hypothesis for the problem of relating need-satisfaction to strength of desires. The alternative theory is based on a three-fold conceptualization of human needs: existence, relatedness, and growth (E.R.G.), It does not assume lower-level satisfaction as a prerequisite for the emergence of higher-order needs. It does include propositions relating the impact of higher-order frustration to the strength of lower-order needs. Empirical tests of differential predictions among Maslows theory, the simple frustration hypothesis, and E.R.G. theory were conducted by a questionnaire study with 110 employees at several job levels from a bank. The results tended to support E.R.G. theory more than Maslows theory or the simple frustration hypothesis.

Diagnosing Race Relations in Management

This paper reports the theory, process, results, and consequences of diagnosing the race relations among managers of a large industrial corporation. A four person diagnostic team consisting of a black female, black male, white female, and white male, aided by a 12-person advisory committee of similar race/sex composition, developed an organic questionnaire and administered it to more than 600 managers. Data were collected and analyzed on general race relations, management groups, hiring, advancement, firing, actions for change, and reactions to the study. Analysis showed that the state of race relations in the company was related to a variety of systemic conditions including the ideas and feelings of individuals, the perceptions and actions of key groups, and the structure of the whole organization. As a result of the diagnosis, management committed itself to an action plan that addressed all the problematic issues uncovered by the diagnosis.

The Methodology of Organizational Diagnosis

The purpose of organizational diagnosis is to establish the widely shared understanding of a system and, based on that understanding, to determine whether change is desirable. By stating and then maintaining that the initial work in the client system is diagnosis, consultants provide clients with bases against which they can be held accountable. Organizational diagnosis is considered as a recursive process. The topics considered in this article include entry, data collection, and feedback. The methods described here are self-correcting. For client systems who wish to learn, this methodology provides the opportunity, if it is employed by consultants who have been thoroughly and appropriately trained.

Understanding and Consulting to Family Business Boards

When the boards of family firms are active, their properties as groups shape the authority of the chief executive and the quality of advice that directors provide to management. An understanding of the group dynamics of the board and the board-management relationship helps to reach a satisfactory balance between family concerns and company interests. Boards of directors can improve their value to firms and to individual directors by developing a capacity for self-reflection.

Life Experiences and Adults' Enduring Strength of Desires in Organizations.

September 1979, volume 24 This study reports the development of new measures of strength of enduring desires for existence in the form of pay, relatedness with the group and with supervisors, and growth in ones job. Propositions relating these four enduring desires to stages in the life cycle and to educational level of parents, sex, and race make it possible to assess the construct validity of the new measures. Results from a study of 229 adults in organizations show acceptable reliability and discrimination among the scales. The findings also show separate and theoretically meaningful patterns of relationship between each measure of enduring desire and life cycle, educational level of parents, sex, and race. These results imply a reconciliation between psychological and sociological interpretations of differences among individuals in their responses to organizational conditions through the use of concepts from intergroup theory.

A Critique of Salancik and Pfeffer's Examination of Need-Satisfaction Theories.

December 1977, volume 22 In the September 1977 issue of ASQ Gerald Salancik and Jeffrey Pfeffer presented an examination of needsatisfaction models of job attitudes. Their article included a description and evaluation of the theoretical characteristics of the model(s), an assessment of the empirical research relevant to the models, and an analysis of the practical implications of their position. This paper is a response to their views. It seeks to clarify a number of theoretical and metatheoretical issues raised, discussed, and confused by Salancik and Pfeffer, to present a more complete view of the data and concepts relevant to need theory than their examination does, and to expand the range of pragmatic and value questions raised by their presentation.,

The Effect of Variations in Relatedness Need Satisfaction on Relatedness Desires.

Abstract : Hypotheses pertaining to relatedness satisfaction and desire were derived from E.R.G. theory and tested in an experimental social psychology laboratory setting. Twenty-one adult male middle and upper middle managers participated in role playing activities based upon actual work experiences described by the men in pre-experimental interviews. Three significantly different degrees of mutuality and relatedness satisfaction were created by the role playing. The study presents a new behavior coding system for scoring mutuality in interpersonal behavior and demonstrates that high degrees of relatedness satisfaction can be produced in a laboratory setting. (Author Modified Abstract)

A New Design for Survey Feedback

Abstract : Survey feedback is a social technology without much theory to offer alternative design strategies or to explain why it works when it does. The present study presents a theoretical discussion analyzing and explaining the use of group methods in feeding back diagnostic data to organizations. A new design the peer group-intergroup model is presented and compared to the traditional family group model. Data evaluating one implementation of this design showed how senior officers of a bank might change their attitudes toward the relevance of a diagnostic study and their willingness to consider changing their own behavior. An explanatory model for the new design, derived from the general theoretical considerations, is discussed with relation to data taken from the feedback sessions.

A Quasi Experiment on the Use of Experiential Methods in the Classroom

The present study is concerned with the use of experiential methods in the classroom for students doing graduate work in administration. A quasi-experimental design was used in which behavior and attitudes in a T-Group course were compared with those in a more traditional human relations course. In addition, video tape viewing of the students own behavior was employed in both courses, and the behavior and attitude changes resulting from this intervention were observed. The comparison between the two courses indicated the following major findings: Compared with the human relations course, the T-Group course showed more here-and-now behavior, more group dynamics and less organizational dynamics content, more involvement, more perceived comfort with feelings, and more perceived transfer of learning. When video tape viewing was introduced into the human relations course, it resulted in changes toward more here-and-now behavior, more openness behavior, more group dynamics content, less organizational dynamics content, more involvement, satisfaction, and perceived transfer of learning. When video tape viewing was introduced into the T-Group course, it resulted in more here-and-now behavior and more satisfaction. An explanation for some of behavior attitude dynamics in experience-based learning was found in relatively high and significant correlations between here-and-now behavior and involvement, perceived transfer of learning, and perceived comfort with feelings.

Teaching Personality and Leadership: a Course On Followership

The literature familiar to most organizational psychologists provides a complicated and mixed picture of the relationship between personality and leadership. There is a body of findings, which taken together, shows a series of associations between a variety of personality traits and leader behaviors (Mann, 1959). However, the strength of association between measures of personality and indicators of leadership effectiveness tends to be small and