The importance of Organizational Behavior (OB) can be simply stated by the concept that a business can not be successful without utilizing the study of OB. To explain that statement starts with an explanation of OB: OB strives to make businesses more effective, and in turn more successful, by studying the impact that people have on the business as a whole. In layman's terms, OB teaches the interpersonal skills that many business leaders will agree are necessary for their business to be successful. Interpersonal or "touchy-feely" skills include knowing how to properly communicate with, listen to, interact with, and motivate each other successfully. Those skills incorporate an understanding of the employee's values, attitudes, personality, motivation, perception, and learning ability. Opposing viewpoints suggest that businesses only need people with proper technical knowledge of their job to make the business successful. Those viewpoints fail to realize that technical ability is merely one aspect of understanding individual behavior and without that understanding business leaders won't be able to apply the technical ability as effectively as possible to their business. OB can help leaders understand their employees and guide them into being effective members of an organization and ultimately make their business successful.
An individual's behavior at work is influenced by many elements. Technical ability is one of those elements and the rest, values, attitudes, personality, motivation, perception, and learning, comprise interpersonal skills. Everyone has these elements whether or not the business leader chooses to value them. For example, Everyday people come into work with certain ideas that they value. This could be as simple as just wanting to make some money. Those values then help make up their attitude, which in turn, affects the person's motivation and perception of the business around them.
