Question

Gerald Murphy is a manager at Wright & Wayner, a publishing house which is a very employee-friendly company. The demarcation between managers and subordinates is flexible and the nature of these reporting relationships is flexible and informal. Gerald recently assigned five of eight of his subordinates to work on a new publication project with a fairly tight deadline because he believed that these efficient employees would function even better with each other's support. A week before the deadline, however, Gerald realized that the group had been shirking work as each of the members thought that the project was not just his or her responsibility. Additionally, under the guise of working together, the team was actually doing their personal work, surfing the Internet, or just socializing. This scenario reflects *BLANK*. A. groupthink B. goal incongruence C. scapegoating D. job sharing E. social loafing

Answer 1

E) social loafing

Step-by-step explanation:

In sociology, social loafing takes place when the members of a team or group do not assume their share of responsibility and work because they believe that someone else in the team will do the work for them. Since each individual contribution is not defined, then individuals will use that excuse to simply not work hard enough or not work at all.

E.g. it is the same that happens in school when an assignment is given to a large number of students, e.g. 5-6, and only 1 or 2 of them actually do all the work.