Socialization of Employees Part 1

The first day in school, college, university and finally the work place is most memorable one. People remember their first day in any of these events. It is because of the new experience and new expectation. At the same time, we tend to feel anxious, and anxiety rules us over the new expectations and ongoing experience. There is, of course, a lot of uncertainty over the various events and moments to come on the way ahead. We tend to develop stress over a small matter also. We are not sure whom to talk with, what to talk about, what to do and many things revolve in our minds. Moreover, since we do not know people there, we tend to feel isolated and uncared for. All these are very discouraging but we have come across these things many a times which is inevitable most of the time. But all these anxiety and uncertainty can be reduced to minimum, if proper steps are carried out. It can be minimized or even reduced to certain extent.

The human resource department in every organization plays a major role in new employee orientation, that is, the role of coordination, which ensures that the appropriate components are in place. As job offers are made and accepted, the HR department should instruct the new employee regarding each and every event they would come across along with their job description. This process is known as orientation and the ongoing interaction with the employee during the work life in an organization is termed socialization.

Socialization is the process of mutual adaptation of new employees and new employer to one another. In course of familiarization to each other, employees learn the organizational culture, values, attitudes, and behaviors appropriate to their roles in the organization. It is a process of adaptation that takes place as individuals attempt to learn the values and norms of work roles.

Some of the purposes of socialization in any organization are to ensure predictability of employee behavior, to substitute for rules guiding employee behavior, to increase employee performance and satisfaction, and to reduce anxiety.

Orientation - A first step of socialization
Many a time's people are confused with orientation and socialization. Orientation is the introduction of a new employee to the organization, the requirement of job, the social situation in which he will be working and the organization's culture. The organization's culture includes its values, shared beliefs, history, tradition and norms of behavior expressed as do's and don'ts. Orientation is a part and first step of socialization process. A new employee who is socialized understands the key points about an organization and its people and why things are done in particular way.

Orientation should create an initial favorable impression. Key ingredients of the good first impression include sufficient information about when and where to report for work, efficiently handled paperwork and friendly people to guide new employees. Orientation should encourage acceptance by other employees. Introductions, informal interaction, a tour of the facilities with short stops to hear people talk about their jobs and history of employment at the farm, and opportunity for the new employees to ask questions all can help gain acceptance.

Every organization has a culture of its own in which the new employee may find it difficult to adapt in the beginning. The culture of an organization plays an important role in building the concept of socialization. It is necessary to examine organization culture, roles, values and norms to understand the concept of socialization in any organization. The shared values and beliefs, attitudes and behaviors that interact with a company's employee, organizational structure and control system constitutes the organizational culture. It is very important for a new employee to know about the organizations' culture to understand how things are done, what behavioral outcomes are important and how others are behaving in the organization.

In any organization, a new person can easily be socialized if and when their behavior conforms to the organizations' standards. If organizational roles, values and norms are rejected by a new employee, the socialization process will be complicated. Therefore, the organizational culture, values, roles and norms are inter-related and make the socialization process easily accessible to those who understand and act as per these standards.