Organisational Behaviour (OB) is the study about how individuals and groups behave in organisations. It does this by taking a systematic approach. This means that it interprets people-organisation relationships in terms of the whole person, whole group, whole organisation, and the whole social system. The purpose of OB is to establish better relationships by achieving human objectives, organisational objectives, and social objectives.
From the definition above, OB encompasses a wide range of topics, such as human behaviour, change, leadership and teams. The organisation's base rests on the management's philosophy, goals, value and visions. This in turn drives the organisational culture which is composed of the formal organisation, informal organisation, and the social environment. The culture results in the type of leadership, communication, and group dynamics within the organisation. The workers perceive this as the work life’s quality which determines their amount of motivation. The final outcomes are the standard of their performance, individual satisfaction, and personal development. All these elements combine to build the framework of how the organisation operates.
Although there are four different models of OB, no organisation operates only using one of them. There will usually be a dominating one, followed by one or more over-lapping areas in the other models. Autocratic, the first model, has started since the industrial revolution. The managers of this type of organisation operate out of Theory X by McGregor. The other three models are built upon McGregor's Theory Y. All have evolved over a period of time and there is not one "best" model. The collegial model should not be thought as the last or best model, but the beginning of a new model.