Book Review - Organizing Relationships - Patricia M. Sias

Book Review Organizing Relationships

In Patricia M. Sias's book Organizing Relationships: Traditional and Emerging Perspectives on Workplace relationships, the author gives total theoretical perspectives as evidence in chapter one, discusses supervisor and subordinate relationships in chapter two, discusses the peer coworker relationships in chapter three, gives overview and insight of functions of workplace friendships. Chapter four discusses workplace friendships both positively and negatively, which personally, was this writer's favorite chapter. In chapter five the author addresses romantic workplace relationships that provided clarity and thought provoking insight of the outcomes and consequences of workplace romantic relationships. In the chapters closing of six and seven, this reader gained a further sense of knowledge and more understanding of how customer client relationships are defined and how both are important and needed. Chapter seven discusses how globalization and technological advancement have important implications for links between organizations and for society as a whole. The goal of this book review is to highlight important notes that this reader found insightful and informative. It is the writer's intentions to imply personal examples that relates to perspectives discussed and also provide correlation to author's concepts provided.

In chapter one the author discusses relationships in the workplace and defines workplace place relationships as "individuals engage as they perform their jobs, including supervisor- subordinate relationships, peer coworker relationships, workplace relationships, romantic relationships, and customer relationships (Sias, 2009 p.2)." As these relationships occur it is important to understand how these relationships work and how workplace relationships operate from different theoretical perspectives. These theoretical perspectives include positivist social construction, critical theory, and structuration theory. According to the author each theoretical perspective provides conceptualizations of organizations .Which in turn provides in depth insight of how complex and dynamic workplace relationships can be.

The postpositivism theory takes a stance from the realist perspective. This principle stands on the principles of critical realism. A critical realist believes that there is a reality independent of our thinking about it that science can study. Postpositivism approach to workplace relationships is through results driven that includes self reports as a form of communication. This theoretical perspective believes that organizations exist but they only exist in other observable phenomena, specifically through human behavior. This theoretical approach correlates to this writer's organization. The compliance quality assurance coordinator would fall in this theory of our organization. The duties of the quality assurance coordinator main objective are to observe reports of compliance of federal guidelines in our non profit organization. Although this position knows that we are guided by the non profit principles of helping the underserved, this job requires and focuses only on reports analysis, and treatment goal outcomes, employee and clientele satisfaction, and exit surveys and compliance data.

The Social Construction theory takes on the theory that human behavior does not simply "indicate reality but it creates reality (Sias, 2009, p. 10)." Under this theoretical perspective, social construction maintains that humans construct the world through social practices and rejects the essentialist explanations that phenomena is natural, inevitable, universal, and biologically determined. The socialist tries to understand how human creates knowledge and social reality. The socialist main objective is to primarily focus on human behavior rather than outcomes or product. Socialist believes that an organization does not exist in physical location but it exists in the interaction of its members. An example of this is with the organization of our workplace Narcotics and Alcoholic Anonymous meetings. Although this group has a centralized location in our building, members may also meet in various locations and settings that consists of churches, facilities, via web groups, residential homes, group homes, etc. The focus is not value in facility but it recognizes its importance through its members and encourages its members to share their individual stories of sobriety, obstacles, and triumphs. It empowers its members to keep coming back if relapse occurs.

In critical theoretical approaches in work relationships critical theorist are not concerned with managerial effectiveness, but with the institutional oppression and exploitation of individuals. Critical scholars focus on ethical practices largely done to individuals as