The Current Nature Of Human Relations Essays - Workplace, Aggression

The Current Nature Of Human Relations The Current Nature of Human Relations Group Project 1 Group Members: Kari Johnson Todd Lessman Mark Mellum Craig Popp Tim Weller Organizational Behavior Richard J. Sebastian March 9, 2000 The nature of human relations is evolutionary. It changes over time as our society adjusts to our ever-changing environment. These changes can be positive or negative, and sometimes necessary changes have both positive and negative consequences on our lives. It seems that the overall nature of current human relations can best be determined by examining human interaction in a few key areas. Interaction in the workplace, the school, and the home, as well as interaction among strangers, can be analyzed to provide an accurate description. There are many factors that can have an effect on our interaction in each of these settings. The workplace is an environment in which there is generally a high degree of personal interaction. Recent technological advances have made it much easier for people to communicate with one another. The emergence of the Internet in the 1990's has forever changed the way that people will interact with one another. E-mail has become a way to connect with co-workers anywhere in the world. No longer is one confined to only communicating with people in their department or office. The increasing popularity of cellular phones had also changed human relations. One can now be reached virtually anytime, anywhere. Although technology has made human relations easier in the workplace, it has also decreased the amount of face-to-face interaction. People are relying immensely on technology and it has become simply easier to send an e-mail to someone than to physically go and talk to them. Technology has also created the virtual workplace, where people can work from the confines of their own home. This has drastically reduced the amount of personal interaction between workers. This new type of workplace is only in its beginning phase and will continue to gain popularity in the next millennium. The cultural diversity of the typical workplace has increased greatly over the last decade. This increase in diversity has come from a couple of sources. First, many companies were forced to diversify to comply with equal opportunity laws. Second, companies began to discover that people from different ethnic backgrounds were helpful in working with a wide spectrum of customers. Regardless of the reasons, this increasing diversity in the workforce has caused a change in human interaction. People are now being exposed to others with many different cultural backgrounds, beliefs and customs. This has forced people to expand their horizons and learn the proper ways to relate to people from other cultures. Many times language barriers exist, and it can be difficult to establish effective communication. Diversity has, for the most part, improved human relations within the workplace. It has made people friendlier towards others who are different and helped them to develop and improve the way they interact with co-workers. Unfortunately, not all workplace interaction is changing for the better. The threat of violence has been an increased concern for many companies. Homicide is the leading cause of death in the finance, insurance, and real estate industries (McMurry, 96). Violence in the workplace is blamed for the decreasing quality of human relations in many companies. In the past, many people considered their co-workers as a kind of extended family, which gave them a sense of security. In today's workplace, however, layoffs and downsizing have taken away that family feeling. Workers today feel as though they are just one part of a machine, and could easily be replaced. This has degraded the quality of personal interaction in the workplace. A co-worker who at one time may have been like a brother to you is now a competitor who could easily replace you. This feeling has lessened the friendliness between workers and has led to increased workplace violence. The workplace is not the only institution in which we have seen an increase of violence in the 1990s. It seems that this trend toward violent behavior is crossing the generation gaps and invading our schools as well. Too often we are seeing children inflicting harm on other students in what should be a safe and supportive environment. The shootings at Columbine high school in Littleton, Colorado last year sent