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The following discussion will examine aspects of learning and motivation.
Positive and Negative Reinforcement
The reinforcing contingencies of positive and negative reinforcement provides the motivation for employees to repeat certain desireable behaviors. (Hitt, Colella and Miller, 2014)
Positive reinforcement is the external stimulus from people or organizations which moves a person to do something willingly because he feels pleasure or is expecting to gain from his action. When we recognize that there is a cause and effect pattern that is consistently bringing us good feelings or benefits, then we normally respond positively to the action and even encourage its recurrence.
Common examples abound in all stages in life. Children behave because they are praised or rewarded materially with toys, candies or even small sums of money. Teen agers are given more freedom and additional allowance money when they achieve good grades. We work hard in our jobs because we continue getting regular compensation and entertain the possibility of promotions.
Good managers set patterns of behavior that will positively reinforce their desired behavior from employees. It can be as trivial as public praises or momentous as in a promotion. The rewards need not always be material as increases in salary, spot bonuses or more paid holidays. Employees also hold other values dear such as respect from colleagues, recognition for achievement and social acceptance and these can be as effective in molding behavior as much as material rewards.
Expectancy theory states that positive reinforcement will only occur if the expected desirable outcome holds more value than the effort and resources expended to achieve it. There has to be gain from the view of the actor, material or otherwise. Social learning also occurs when colleagues observe actions and consequences from other colleagues ((Hitt, Colella and Miller, 2014).
Negative reinforcement is the opposite in the sense that the desired outcome is the non-occurrence of an unpleasant experience or a loss in value, materially or otherwise. Some people would call it the ‘fear factor’ or the ‘stick’ as to the ‘carrot’ of positive reinforcement. The fears of people in certain situations are used to guide them to desirable behavior. A familiar example is of parents goading their children to study hard while instilling in them the fear or poverty.
In the workplace, public praises can be replaced with public reprimands or sarcastic remarks which cause embarrassment which is an unpleasant experience. Short of condemnable humiliation, managers find lighter ways to penalize employees for undesirable behavior. The use of ridicule veiled as humor is common. The most dreaded form of negative reinforcement would be material, in the form of unpaid suspensions or demotions which have long term opportunity costs. Equally punitive is a transfer to a position which the employee considers insignificant to his career.
Training and Enhancing the Performance of Associates
There is a process by which new behaviors can be learned and results in performance improvement. (Hitt, Colella and Miller, 2014)
The first step is to determine what new behaviors need to be learned. There is either negative situation that needs to be changed to cut losses or improvements in behavior to achieve gains. The task is to define these new behaviors that will improve the current situation.
The new behavior may be complex such that it needs to be broken down so it can be easier to observe. An example is to make a team more efficient and increase productivity. The second step is to break down this general behavior into specific behaviors which are making the team inefficient.
The third step is to teach and demonstrate the new behavior to the learner This can be done by actual demonstration which is often called “leadership by example” or the learner can be asked to observe another employee who is already exhibiting the correct behavior. For example, you can state to an employee that there is a 3-minute rule for chatting and he should check his watch or the wall clock that he is in fact observing this behavior. An abiding colleague can also be identified and the learner is asked to observe how the model employee is abiding with this behavioral standard.
The fourth step is the learner is allowed to practice the new behavior himself. Contingent reinforcement (positive and/or negative) is then used to confirm to the learner the correctness of execution. In our example, the learner may still be taking too long in chatting though it has become shorter. Or this time, he is going it more often. The learner continues to be cited on those defects until the new behavior is already correctly done.
The last step is to confirm the achievement of the new behavior and the consequent improvement in productivity is shown as positive reinforcement.
The above process is called organizational behavior modification or performance management. It looks like a science experiment which has a hypothesis, observations and conclusions. The task is to set a new behavior as a goal; teach and execute; and intervene as often as necessary until the behavior is established. The behavior is then monitored using positive and negative reinforcements of varying schedules from the superior.
Learning from Failure
Organizations understand that often-difficult challenges and dynamics will inevitably create a proportionate number of mistakes and failures from its people and the organization as a whole. Rather than treating this as system losses, smart organizations leverage these experiences instead as fertile grounds for learning and stepping stones towards larger successes. The idea is that the costs of trials and errors will eventually be rewarded by a single success many times over. With this approach, failures can be motivational if resultant lessons can be expected to point the way to a winning path. The purposeful extraction of lessons is what separates intelligent failures from mere wasteful failures.
Failures as investments though can only be justified if their magnitude is not so costly that the chances of recovery are nil. “Intelligent failing” therefore is not an excuse for sloppy workmanship. More leeway is given to unfamiliar endeavors where creativity is a success factor. Justifiable risk-taking can be a reinforced behavior in such environments. Pharmaceutical firms are known to celebrate well-done clinical trials with failed results. With the right goals, the same quality of effort is expected to yield enormous in the future.
Attributions of Success and Failure
The process of analyzing success and failures for the intent of replication and avoidance includes identifying the causes which led to the results. In order to have the correct conclusions that will lead us to behavior corrections, we have to determine whether the attributions to causality are internal (within the person) or external (from the environment). Incorrect conclusions can lead to demotivation. The factors of consensus, distinctiveness and consistency need to be considered to make the distinction. We also have to be aware of two important sources of error in the identifying attribution. (Cherry, 2015)
The fundamental attribution error puts the burden of blame of failure or the reason for success on the person’s personality traits. The emphasis downplays whatever contribution of external factors may have had on the results. To illustrate, John failed because he is not smart enough and lazy. The notorious complexity of the product and his problematic relationship with his boss was not considered.
The self-serving bias is in some way the opposite of the fundamental attribution error wherein failure is always erroneously attributed to external factors. The choice between internal and external attribution for success or failure is geared to be always advantageous to the person. John did well because he is smart and hardworking. He did not mention that he has worked on the product several times already and his boss gave him a tight deadline which required overtime hours. In the next round, John did poorly because he was getting bored with the product and the tight deadline’s stress caused him to make mistakes.
(Hitt, Colella and Miller, 2014)
Problems in Person Perception
Incorrect attribution of success and failure can also be linked to person perception problems or sometimes called, distortions. The common ones are implicit theories, halo effect, projecting and stereotyping (Hitt, Colella and Miller, 2014). Occurrences of these assessments can be demotivating to everyone who is privy.
Implicit theories include the consistency theory and the attribution theory. The former would assume that the person will always behave in the manner that his personality has shown so far. It is deductive in nature and internally oriented. The latter has two theories in the entity theory and the incremental theory which are reflective of the internal and external attributions respectively.
The halo effect is associating future behavior based on behavior already observed. The observed positive traits of a person form the basis of assuming other good traits. Example is Susan is always punctual; she is honest with company time so she must be telling the truth.
Projection is assuming that one’s values and needs are also what other have or want. For example, Dick is not keen on his career because he is negative about overtime work but the fact is Dick is a motivated person but he also values highly his family life. He can bring home his work and be as productive.
Stereotyping is assuming traits of a person because those traits have been associated with his group or category. For example, Anne is showing victim mentality because she is black and blacks are known for that. This perception prevents a closer look at the particulars of the situation which may disprove the assumption.
(Cherry, 2016)
References
Hitt, M.A., Colella, A. and Miller, C. (2014). Organizational Behavior, 4th Ed. New York City: Wiley and Sons, Inc.
Cherry, K. (2015, May 15). Attribution. verywell. Retrieved April 23, 2016 from https://www.verywell.com/attribution-social-psychology-2795898
Cherry, K. (2016, March 19). What Is Person Perception?. verywell. Retrieved April 23, 2016 from https://www.verywell.com/person-perception-2795900
