Antecedents acquire a powerful influence on behavior by being present when it is reinforced or punished. The antecedent becomes a cue that informs the person of the probable consequence of a behavior. The presence of the supervisor can be a cue which signals that looking busy will have positive consequences and loafing will have negative ones. Rarely does a person deliberate over such questions; the antecedent is perceived and the behavior is performed without thought. The antecedent becomes so powerful a cue that it controls the behavior.
Work behavior can be brought under stimulus control by arranging the conditions in such a way that a particular work behavior becomes associated with a particular antecedent cue. Consider Bill's problem. One of Bill's responsibilities was to write proposals. In his previous position he wrote many of them, and had little trouble. But in his new position he arrived each morning with a strong determination to write, only to find that he had difficulty getting started and could work on the proposal for only a few minutes. He entered his office and sat at his desk with the intention of writing. But while sitting at the desk he engaged in several other behaviors, such as answering his mail, talking on the phone, reading the paper, reviewing resource material, eating lunch, and chatting with peers. Many of these behaviors were reinforced, so that sitting at his desk had lost much of its power as an antecedent to proposal writing.
Bill's supervisor assisted by giving him a new antecedent for writing-moving him to the conference room, where Bill did nothing but write. If he began to daydream he simply left, and eventually writing came under stimulus control-that is, entering the conference room would evoke or signal writing. Therefore, Bill should find it easier and easier to write in the conference room.
Of course, it is essential that the writing in the conference room be reinforced. Most likely the act of writing itself and seeing the words on the paper, as well as the feelings of accomplishment they evoke, would be reinforcing, but it would be wise for Bill's supervisor to insure reinforcement with contingency contracting, such as "If I write in the conference room for 30 minutes, then I may answer the mail." In this contract, writing (behavior) in the conference room (antecedent) is reinforced by the high-probability behavior of answering the mail (consequence). A word of caution: Bill should not attempt to begin by going into the conference room and trying to write for two or three hours; he should start off by requiring himself to write for only a short time. The length of time can be gradually increased.
The lack of stimulus control can create problems in all areas of the company. In small offices, for example, employees frequently engage in a lot of socializing. This reduces the stimulus control power of the office, so that the socializing can eventually become a real threat to productivity. Socializing can be controlled without punishment by designating a specific area for its occurrence and then setting a time limit on breaks. In general, arrange for a situation or a signal to be associated with the behaviors that you want to encourage. It is easier to establish an association between a new antecedent and a desired work behavior than it would be to attempt to revitalize an antecedent that has become contaminated by its association with several undesirable behaviors.
Creating Stimulus Generalization
There are times when you do not want the performance of a behavior restricted to one situation. Training is a prime example: Time and money would be poorly invested if skills learned in training workshops were not generalized to the entire work environment. Yet all too often this important step is neglected. Let's examine this problem more closely.
Stimulus generalization occurs when a behavior that has been learned in the presence of one antecedent is performed in the presence of other, similar antecedents. The more similar the subsequent antecedents are to the original one, the more likely the behavior will be performed. Training sessions should therefore employ mock set tings and situations that simulate as much as possible the work setting in which the behavior is to be performed. Whenever possible, training should move out of the workshop into the target setting: The more the training approximates the target setting, the more generalization can be expected.
Homework assignments can be a valuable tool. For example, in the first session of my communication skills workshop, I teach questioning techniques for gathering information and for maintaining an interaction. During the workshop session, participants practice the techniques in behavioral rehearsal exercises. Then, as a homework assignment, they are given data sheets and requested to conduct a "shyness poll"-that is, they interview three people about their experiences with shyness. In addition to learning first hand that most people have felt shy, they practice their new interviewing skills in a situation outside the workshop setting. As they do their assignments, stimulus generalization begins to occur, because they are performing the behavior in the presence of a new antecedent. If the behavior meets with positive consequences, then they are more likely to perform the behavior again outside the workshop.
Any training can include assignments that require participants to perform the behaviors that they have just learned in their work set tings. For example, participants in sales training could be asked to tape record an actual presentation, and in the next session (or individually) the trainer could review the tapes and give valuable feedback. In short, training is incomplete if it ends in the classroom. To be effective, the training must be structured to move from the classroom into the target environment.
Feedback
Feedback as a managing technique grew out of communications theory. It is not a behavioral technique in the purest sense, but is frequently incorporated as a vital link in organizational behavior modification programs.
Feedback is information to a work unit (individual, group, organization) about its performance. In and of itself, feedback is neutral; the way in which the information is dispensed and how it is interpreted by the target person can make it reinforcing or punishing. The supervisor who uses feedback to berate a subordinate for substandard performance is translating it into a punitive consequence; needless to say, this is counterproductive, and should be avoided. The individual who evaluates feedback in terms of progress toward a goal is translating it into a reinforcing (or punishing) consequence. Here are some guide lines for an effective feedback system:
- Feedback should be related to a goal. When combined with goal-setting, feedback provides guidance and direction so that both manager and subordinates know when they are performing up to standard and when they need to improve. Goals and behavioral objectives for achieving them can be assigned or individually negotiated during contingency contracting. Likewise, feedback is a particularly useful adjunct to the shaping technique in which successive approximations of the desired goal behavior are reinforced. Monitoring the feedback quickly tells when the current goal has been reached and when a new behavioral objective should be set.
- To have the most impact, feedback should be directed at the person or group that has direct control over actual performance. In most cases this would mean the employee and immediate supervisor. Feedback that indicates improvement can be particularly reinforcing to employees when they are committed to the goal. This will tend to foster more improvement. By the same token, feedback tells the supervisor when to reinforce. Feedback is also error-correcting, because it points out when additional efforts are necessary to correct declines in performance.
- Collect feedback on the appropriate behavior. If the goal is to increase the quality of typing, for example, collecting feedback on the quantity of letters and reports typed per day may be counter-productive, because employees could use the information as an impetus to increase speed at the expense of quality. If quality is a priority, then feedback should be collected on the quality of each unit produced.
- Like reinforcement, feedback should be timely. Obviously, an employee can't correct a mistake six months after the fact. From reinforcement theory we know that the most rapid learning takes place when feedback is immediate and continuous. The best way to shorten the gap between performance and feedback is to have employees collect data on their own performances. The data collected not only provides immediate information, but it can be used as the baseline and evaluative data for a behavior change program. In addition, it takes from the manager the responsibility for monitoring performance and puts it on the employee. Such self-monitoring can be the first step in teaching self-directed behavior to employees. Finally, self-monitoring can be continued as a maintenance technique after the intervention phase.
- Stress the positive, not the negative. Express feedback in terms of how closely it approximates the desired goal. Feedback should be information on the frequency of the desired behavior-for example, number of sales made, length of up time of equipment, number of invoices completed correctly. Information on successes or improvement tends to be more reinforcing than information on failures and setbacks.
- Present feedback graphically. A graph is like a picture-it depicts movement. At the end of each day the data for that day can be recorded on a graph. Whenever possible, display the graph so that others can see it. In this way the employee's peers can provide reinforcement by commenting on improvement. When the target is a work group, posting of the graph is essential.