Kubler-Ross hierarchy LO10960

rbacal@escape.ca
Tue, 12 Nov 1996 00:22:30 +0000

Replying to LO10945 --

On 11 Nov 96 at 10:02, GSCHERL wrote:

[quote of prev msg trimmed by your host...]
> From everything we've read, fear of retribution is not an effective
> deterrant. If your boss says 'Do this or you're fired', this will
> only be effective the first few times. Then you either live with it,
> or get out from under it.

It's always puzzled me that people don't realize what you have indicated
above....except that there is a tendency for some "autoritarian" types to
simply want to believe that punishment or the threat thereof is effective.
With respect to crime one of the salient characteristics of criminals
including multi-time "losers", is that they do not believe they will get
caught, despite the contrary evidence.

The research in psychology on punishment's effects is also clear..it gives
rise to inconsistent, situation specific behaviour that is mostly
destructive...so rather than a person stopping their punishable behaviour,
they continue to do it, BUT increase their efforts at hiding it. This
seems to apply to organizations.

> If we are seeing criminal acts increase, and we are reacting by
> building jails to hold more prisoners, aren't we setting up an
> expectation that there will be more crimes, so the criminal behaviour
> is 'acceptable' and if you get caught, you'll go to jail and be taken
> care of by the state?

I doubt it, but in the criminal culture, jail is not a serious thing for
many, although middle class folks seem to think that their own antipathy
to it is shared by all, sadly. I don't think the number of jails will
impact this.

Retribution in organizations is seldom an effective approach. There are
times, I think where there must be logical consequences tied to behaviour
and sometimes those consequences might be aversive. Actually, just doing
an article or two on the subject of workplace discipline, with the notion
of harkening back to the notion of discipline as "learning".

Robert Bacal, Bacal & Associates, rbacal@escape.ca
Join us at our Resource Centre at
http://www.winnipeg.freenet.mb.ca/~dbt359
Phone: (204) 888-9290

-- 

rbacal@escape.ca

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