The New York City Police Department (NYPD) BSSCS Analysis

This is a relatively new assignment for my teaching of Organizational Behavior. I have already posted on your homepage a piece of original writing called the Basic Social System Conceptual Scheme. It is a device that helps you to understand the forces that eventually create the emergent system (behaviors) of any group in any organization. This piece is self-explanatory, but I will answer, of course, any questions you might have.
I have given it you as a general device for group analysis. I have decided to provoke you to actually utilize it as a mid-term assignment.
What I want you to do is this:
1) Read the piece. Pasted again below and on your Homepag
2) Write me (course mail) with any questions you have about it.
3) Think of the implications of the BSSCS in terms of your organization…present or past.
4) Then…analyze one of the following groups by using the BSSCS

a) The New York City Police Department
b) The U.S. Senate
c) The NY Yankees
d) The United Nations
…or any other group that you’d like…the only criteria is that I have to know something about it so I can assess the quality of your analysis…get my permission. I expect a degree of research into the group you select…whatever it might be. My expectation is that you will fully delineate and discuss all Background Factors, The Required System, The Leadership Style, The Emergent System and, eventually, The Consequences for that group. If there are definable deficiencies I would expect that corrections be offered. If not…why has the group so sufccesfully.
5) Post this 4 to 7 page response in the Course Material under Mid-Term… I’d like everyone to be able to read each other’s comments.
The Basic Social System Conceptual Scheme
The Joppa Comprehensive Guide to Understanding Small Group Behavior
(He said humbly)
One might ask the question, "Why do managers need to know anything about organizational behavior?" This is certainly a reasonable question. After all aren't there specialists, who day in and day out, must deal with the issues of behavior, including individual, group and organizational? This is a legitimate challenge and the answer must be explored to give human behavior, a dignity as an academic requirement in any human resource management program.
I believe, in fact that no other manager in the organization has a deeper responsibility to ensure that appropriate behavioral phenomena take place more so than the manager at the nearest point to the behavior. They are so to speak, the chef dealing with an extremely complicated recipe. The recipe is comprised of many steps and many ingredients and many hardware issues... only the human immediate manager oversees the entirety of the organizational "recipe" with enough focus to ensure it has a chance of being successful at their level. For this reason, it is critical that all managers be as professionally astute in behavioral considerations as they are in fulfilling the legal and technical requirements of management per se.
In this introduction, I will present to you, and a simplified (not simplistic) form, a way of understanding small group behavior that will stand you in good stead in any management and, of course, wherever you might go in the organization. With that in mind, I present to you now, what I call, "The Basic Social System Conceptual Scheme."
One of the most difficult things to do is to create a mental image of the forces that ultimately result in the behaviors flowing from the group process. Perhaps of equal importance is the ability to understand this process well enough to be able to provoke the desired behaviors by your choice and, of course, to eliminate the undesirable behaviors. Let me try, in spite of its difficulty, to create a simple explanation that has some value… without it being simplistic.
I’ll start by describing...or trying to…the baking of a cake. This will serve as a metaphor for what happens as a work group is created.
What goes into the ultimate result of baking a cake? We might suggest that the recipe is all that matters and that would make it a good cake. But would it? Don’t we also need good equipment; a good stove, blender, timer, bowls, spatulas, etc? So, if we have a good recipe and good equipment we’ll then have a good cake…not so fast. Don’t we also need a good baker? Someone who can read the recipe and use the equipment and then add their own special variation of art seems essential. Now, if we had a good recipe, good equipment and a good baker could we expect to have a good cake? Probably so…but how would we know if it’s a good cake? What are the characteristics of a good cake? If it tastes good that’s all that matters. Hardly! What if the aroma was bad or the texture or the appearance or moisture were not good? In fact all of these elements would have to be good to have the cake be good.
If one or more of these elements were not good you probably would clearly recognize that something must have been wrong with the recipe or the equipment or the baker. Some change would have to be made in one or more of these areas that caused the cake to turn out poorly.
There it is...the group process contained within the process of baking a Bavarian Black Forest Cake (or your favorite variation). We have had three components come together to produce our result and we have then assessed the characteristics to see if it was good and we can understand what changes might have to be made in our components …if any.
Let me at this point turn a corner and begin to make this more obviously a tool for learning about group behavior. Suppose I said that group behavior is the result of three essential elements. It is the interaction of these three elements that produces group behavior. How would we know if the behavior is good? We would have to have a clear set of consequences that we would expect from the behaviors that were generated. If one or more of these consequences was not acceptable you would know that you’d have to change something in your three critical elements. Think about that cake.
Now for more detail but keep the cake baking analogy in mind. The group is affected by three sets of forces. These forces mix and affect each other…somewhat in the manner of the elements of the cake. These elements are called:
1) The Background Factors
2) The Required System
3) The Leadership Style
The Background factors are characteristics of the group itself. This includes many factors; for example:
1) Personal systems of the members- This would include their attitudes and any other factor that might influence their sense of personal identity. These are not “good nor bad”, “right nor wrong” phenomenon…these are merely things that create behavioral propensity. Age, for example, might be one of these elements. I’m 65 and come from the “I am guilty for everything generation.” Someone else might be from the 80’s “ME” generation. There is the possibility (likelihood) of a difference in our behavioral response. We probably wouldn’t bake a chocolate cake with lemon icing. Nothing wrong with either, they just don’t go well together.
2) External Status- This is the status of members brought into the group…not earned in the group. For example a 2nd level manager is added to a group comprised of first level supervisors or the son of the boss is added to the group or someone with greater seniority is part of the group, etc. In the very worse sense this had burdened women in male dominated organizations….they brought in what many men (and many women) saw as lower external status.
3) Organizational Culture- What are the organizations unwritten rules of behavior? Is the culture formal or informal, structured or unstructured, authority is paramount or authority doesn’t matter, etc. In OB we suggest that unless you know the culture you do not know the organization.
4) The Reward System- It has been said that the only sure way of understanding behavior is to understand the reward system. Keep in mind that behavior that is repeated has been rewarded (you may have to figure out what the reward was) and behavior that is rewarded will be repeated. We’ll talk more about this in motivation.
5) Technology and Layout- Technology here is a very broad based use of the word. We refer to any non-biologic support or assistive element being used by the group. It might be a computer…it might be a window. Layout is the location of the group as compared to other groups or as a physical reality within the company…your group for example meets in a dark room under the stairs in the basement….not the highest status positioning.
There are certainly other “ingredients” but these tend to be the major parts.
These Background Factors interact with and are affected by The Required System. Every group has certain requirements imposed on them. They are:
1) Activities- What must they do?
2) Interactions- Who must they interact with?
3) Attitudes- What positions must they hold intellectually?
Every group will fulfill these requirements exactly or do them more or less effectively than is required.
These two major elements…the Background Factors and the Required System then interact with and are “stirred” by the last of the three elements…The Leadership Style. We will talk more about this element at a later point. It will suffice to say that there are a variety of leadership styles, none of which is universally correct. Each style of leadership can only be seen as “situationally” correct.
There we have it; the three elements of our group “cake.” The Background Factors mix with the Required System which mixes with the Leadership Style to produce our actual group behavior. I will call the actual group behavior The Emergent System….what emerges from our three elements.
The Emergent System is the actual group. It, like the Required System, is comprised of Activities, Interactions and Attitudes. These results may be superior or inferior to the Requirements. How do we tell if our group cake is good"? The group must be measured against its needed Consequences. There are three major consequences:
1) Productivity- Does the group fulfill the output that is required?
Now isn’t that enough? Not really, we also have to know about…
2) Growth and Development- Are the members maturing for future organizational roles? (If necessary)
3) Group Satisfaction- The group member’s satisfaction points to the durability or reliability of the current situation.
If our cake (group) is good….leave it alone. Management manages best that manages least. If it is deficient you now know where to go to fix it…The Background Factors, The Required System or the Leadership Style. We don’t know exactly what has to be changed. That is where your skill as a manager and leader enters into this equation. Make the smallest change possible that might fix the problem and expand from there if necessary. Don’t use a shotgun where a pea shooter would work.
Does all of this enable you to answer all questions about the group process? Certainly not! It does, however, provide you with a profound framework in which you can place your information and towards which you can direct our questions. I would suggest that if you understand what I’ve written, and I know you do, then you will know more about the group process than almost any other leader in your organization.