Notes from an Introspective Behaviorist

Abstract

Based on the three-contingency model of performance management, I make the following argument: (1) Often, we fail to behave as we should because the natural contingencies supporting appropriate behavior are ineffective; the natural contingencies involve outcomes for each individual response that are either too small, though of cumulative significance, or outcomes that are too improbable. The delay of the outcome is essentially irrelevant. The psychodynamic model of the cognitive motivational theorists provides a poor explanation for why we fail to behave as we should. (2) The performance-management contingencies in organizational behavior management (OBM) must usually involve deadline-induced aversive control, even when they are based on powerful reinforcers. Furthermore, such performance management succeeds only to the extent that the person's behavioral history, “Jewish mother,” has inculcated an appropriate value system. Wiegand and Geller's critique of the necessity of the use of aversive control fails to take into account the necessity of deadlines and the difference between instrumental and hedonic reinforcers; furthermore, it greatly over values the power of intrinsic reinforcement contingencies in OBM.     

Preference for Flexibility in a Savage Framework

We study preferences over Savage acts that map states to opportunity sets and satisfy the Savage axioms. Preferences over opportunity sets may exhibit a preference for flexibility due to an implicit uncertainty about future preferences reflecting anticipated unforeseen contingencies. The main result of this paper characterizes maximization of the expected indirect utility in terms of an ‘Indirect Stochastic Dominance’ axiom that expresses a preference for ‘more opportunities in expectation.’ The key technical tool of the paper, a version of Möbius inversion, has been imported from the theory of nonadditive belief functions; it allows an alternative representation using Choquet integration, and yields a simple proof of Kreps' (1979) classic result.     

Goal Statements and Goal-Directed Behavior

Summary

Goal setting has consistently been shown to increase performance under specific conditions. These goal setting effects have previously been explored from both a cognitive perspective and in terms of traditional behavioral concepts. We highlight limitations of these approaches and propose a novel account based on Relational Frame Theory. This account focuses on both the content of goal statements and the contingencies that maintain goal-directed behavior. The content of goal statements is analyzed in terms of relational networks established for employees. We then detail how the current account explains the major effects noted in previous empirical studies. Two broad types of rule following contingencies that support goal-directed behavior, pliance and tracking, are then described. We then outline how these different types of contingencies results in the variety of goal-directed behavior observed in organizations. Throughout we relate this two-part approach to goal setting to specific recommendations for practice and future basic research.     

The Financial Impact of FSC Certification in the United States: A Contingency Perspective

This article focuses on an important and emergent standard for sustainable operations management: the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification. Unlike similar certifications, its focus is on the entire upstream supply chain, reflecting the criticality of supply chain management to ensure sustainable products. We investigate the financial impact from FSC certification, offering valuable decision support for managers considering this certification. Taking a contingency perspective, we view a firm's supply chain position and its prior certification to the ISO 14001 standard as influencing the results. Drawing on signaling theory, we suggest that firms farther downstream in the supply chain realize significantly greater abnormal financial performance benefits than firms upstream in the supply chain. We further hypothesize that firms that were not ISO 14001 certified at the time of FSC certification realize significantly greater abnormal financial performance benefits than firms that did have the ISO 14001 certification. To test these hypotheses, we utilize financial data of all publicly traded firms in the United States that have obtained the FSC certification, and assess whether FSC certification leads to abnormal performance benefits considering the above contingencies. Data collected from the FSC Certificate Database and Compustat, employed in an event study, provide support for our hypotheses. Overall, our findings contribute to research on decision making in the context of sustainable operations management, and offer a plausible explanation for contradictory results in prior studies. We highlight the applicability of signaling theory to decision sciences research, and stress the need to consider contingencies in sustainability management research.     

The role of self-determination theory in marketing science: An integrative review and agenda for research

The marketing literature is replete with the repeated use of traditional theories of behaviour, such as ‘the consumer decision model,’ the ‘theory of buyer behaviour,’ the ‘theory of reasoned action,’ the ‘theory of planned behaviour,’ and ‘the model of goal-directed behaviour.’ The conclusions and criticisms that are drawn from these theories stem from the many ways in which these theories are applied, which reduces the efficiency of these approaches in the sense of predictability and generalizability across different cultures. Moreover, these theories have minimal influence on autonomously motivated behaviours. Despite these limitations, marketing scientists have overwhelmingly applied these theories to predict consumer intention and behaviour. However, theories that are actually capable of explaining consumers' motivations have been surprisingly ignored in the marketing literature; for instance, ‘self-determination theory’ (SDT) is a leading theory of human motivation that has been proven effective at identifying the contingencies that affect motivation and behaviour. Therefore, the goal is to review the marketing research in which SDT is used. To this end, we review all empirical studies published on the subject over a 20-year period. Several clusters of research are identified in which SDT appears to be more promising in addressing marketing problems. Finally, we provide directions for future research in greater detail.     

Effects of Individual and Group Contingency Interventions on Attendance in Adolescent Part-Time Employees

This study examined the effects of individual and group monetary contingencies on the attendance of adolescent part-time employees. Attendance increased in both individual and group contingency phases; however staff questionnaire responses indicated a preference for the individual contingencies. Future research should consider staff acceptability regarding interventions and provide guidelines for the determination of intervention appropriateness.     

Innovation management in context: environment, organization and performance

Several decades of research into innovation management have failed to provide clear and consistent findings or coherent advice to managers. In this paper, I argue that this is because innovation management 'best practice' is contingent on a range of factors, and that we need better characterizations of the technological and market contingencies which affect the opportunity for, and constraints on, innovation. I review research on innovation together with relevant studies from organizational behaviour and strategic management, and develop a model which may help to guide future innovation research on the relationships between environmental contingencies, organization configurations and performance. I identify uncertainty and complexity as the key environmental contingencies that influence organizational structure and management processes for innovation.     

Institutional voids,international learning effort and internationalization of emerging market new ventures

Much of the existing scholarly works portray institutional voids (IVs) in emerging economies as impeding forces against the development of new ventures. However, little attention has been paid to how such voids generate positive outcomes in emerging market new ventures. Drawing on the institutional theory, we propose IVs as crucial enablers of new venture internationalization. In addition, we investigate both how and when IVs enhance the degree to which new ventures internationalize by examining international learning effort (ILE) as a mediator and two domestic market environmental factors (i.e., environmental dynamism and competitive intensity) as important contingencies. We test our moderated mediation model using primary data gathered from 211 new ventures from Ghana. We found that ILE mediates the relationship between IVs and new venture internationalization and that both environmental dynamism and competitive intensity moderate the indirect relationship between home-country IVs and new venture internationalization. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of this study.     

The organisational environment’s impact on the servitization of manufacturers

The transformation of product-centric businesses towards service provision is claimed to be a viable strategy for manufacturers across industries and sectors. However, previous research on servitization has not paid sufficient attention to explicitly investigating its suitability for manufacturers operating in different organizational environments. Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to establish propositions on the contingency factors in the organizational environment that affect the servitization of manufacturers at the industry level. Drawing on the theory of organisational ecology, the propositions include the effects of population density, competing populations, resource dependency, institutional linkages, technology, and political forces. Our study suggests that the operating environment explains at least part of the difficulties in the servitization process, which have been identified in previous studies, but whose causes have remained without full explanation. The study adds to the current understanding of the contingencies of transformation toward service provision and contributes to the managerial decision-making processes related to servitization.     

History in Organization and Management Theory: More Than Meets the Eye

Abstract

There has been a growing debate about the role of history in management research with several authors making suggestions on how to bring the two (back) together and others even highlighting the need for a “historic turn”. What we argue in this paper is that, while history was indeed sidelined by the scientization of management since the late 1950s, it started to make a comeback from the 1980s onwards and is increasingly employed in a number of research programs. We stress that the crucial question for management scholars engaging with history (or wanting to do so) is how it relates to theory. First of all, we present a systematic overview of the way history has been used—both at the micro (organizational) and macro-levels of analysis—distinguishing between what we refer to as “history to theory” and “history in theory”. In the former, we consider those research programs, such as (neo-)institutionalism, where history serves as evidence to develop, modify or test theories. In the case of “history in theory” we identify research programs where history or the past are part of the theoretical model itself as a driver or moderator, with “imprinting” as a prime example. Second, we also identify a growing number of studies that go further by displaying what we call “historical cognizance” in the sense of incorporating period effects or historical contingencies into their theorizing efforts. Finally, drawing on our broad overview, we make more specific suggestions for increasing the visibility and influence of history in organization and management theory.     

Representing Preferences with a Unique Subjective State Space

We extend Kreps' (1979) analysis of preference for flexibility, reinterpreted by Kreps (1992) as a model of unforeseen contingencies. We enrich the choice set, consequently obtaining uniqueness results that were not possible in Kreps' model. We consider several representations and allow the agent to prefer commitment in some contingencies. In the representations, the agent acts as if she had coherent beliefs about a set of possible future (ex post) preferences, each of which is an expected‐utility preference. We show that this set of ex post preferences, called the subjective state space, is essentially unique given the restriction that all ex post preferences are expected‐utility preferences and is minimal even without this restriction. Because the subjective state space is identified, the way ex post utilities are aggregated into an ex ante ranking is also essentially unique. Hence when a representation that is additive across states exists, the additivity is meaningful in the sense that all representations are intrinsically additive. Uniqueness enables us to show that the size of the subjective state space provides a measure of the agent's uncertainty about future contingencies and that the way the states are aggregated indicates whether these contingencies lead to a desire for flexibility or commitment.     

Elaborating the Contingency Theory of Organizations: The Case of Manufacturing Flexibility Strategies

What determines which manufacturing flexibility strategies are feasible and which are not? In this paper, I build both theoretical and empirical understanding of task‐environmental contingencies that may either enable or constrain the selection of various flexibility strategies. The special emphasis is on the various plant‐level actions that are used to seek manufacturing flexibility. Demand uncertainty and variability, technology, and competitive strategy emerge as the most important contingencies, although not in ways that are immediately apparent. Finally, managerial implications at both the corporate as well as manufacturing unit levels are discussed.     

Process Safety Behavioral Systems: Behaviors Interlock in Complex Metacontingencies

ABSTRACT

This paper seeks to identify behavioral components active in process safety. Three types of behavior classes are identified as contributors to process safety: task-specific behaviors, safety-directed behaviors, and behaviors associated with situational awareness. Behavioral systems analysis is used to provide a framework for identifying the cross-functional interlocking behavioral contingencies that can, even over a period of years, contribute to process safety incidents. Leadership behaviors are also identified that can create the context in the form of metacontingencies that maintain these interlocking contingencies.     

Increasing Sales by Managing the Interlocking Contingencies Between Sales Representatives and Customers Using Behavioral Self-Monitoring

Interlocking contingencies that exist between a customer and sales representatives (SRs) may contribute to buying decisions. Verbal behaviors related to closing sales were identified by analyzing these contingencies statistically. Self-observation checklists were then implemented. On average, the six targeted verbal behaviors related to sales increased 12 percentage points over baseline, compared to a 2% point increase in the comparison group. These changes were associated with 126% more sales for the experimental group compared with 36% more sales for the comparison group. For each SR, this increase in sales translates into $1,094,444 more in annualized revenue.     

Revisiting the Corporate Social and Financial Performance Link: A Contingency Approach

This study draws on and extends contingency theory, in relation to stakeholder theory to understand the corporate social performance (CSP) and financial performance (CFP) link, by evaluating under what circumstances CSP influences CFP. Contingencies include stakeholder configurations/salience and crisis conditions. Using differentiated measures of CSP, this study examined financial effects of various specific stakeholder facing activities pre‐ and post‐crisis in the food/beverage and pharmaceutical industries, and in firms selling search versus experience goods. The results indicate that pre‐crisis CSP is related to post‐crisis financial effects, but the relationships are dependent on the interactions among the contingencies studied, so investments in certain social areas improve CFP, whereas others may hurt it. This confirms that a finer grained approach should be taken to the examination of CSP and CFP. On a practical basis, it shows that deep stakeholder knowledge and attention to complementary factors to CSP, such as advertising, must be understood, so CSP activities are of benefit to the firm.     

Increasing the Accuracy of Computerized Summaries of Court Case Activity

This study examined data reporting problems in a local trial court environment. Inaccuracies in computerized summaries of criminal court filing documents were chronic and created problems for other individuals in the judicial system. An error reduction management intervention employing monitoring, objectives, feedback, and praise was implemented in the Clerk's Office and two other county offices to increase the accuracy of the data reported. Data accuracy increased from 45% during baseline to 95% at follow-up. The contingencies within the court and the effect of these contingencies on the attempts of the researchers to implement the performance management program are discussed.     

Behavior Analytic Concepts and Change in a Large Metropolitan Research University: The Graduation Success Initiative

The Graduation Success Initiative is a complex, organization-wide application of behavior analytic concepts to improving undergraduate student retention and on-time graduation at a large metropolitan research university. The behavior analytic concepts discussed here include culture, supraorganismic phenomena, selecting environments, macrobehaviors, macrocontingencies, interlocking behavioral contingencies, metacontingencies, and rule-governed behavior. We introduce a change template that includes all pertinent agents in the university system and that focuses change efforts specifically on desired behaviors, targeted behaviors, strategic interventions, and reinforcing contingencies for each of the categories of agents. The Graduation Success Initiative produced a 16-point increase in on-time graduation in 4 years.     

Intra-industry diversification effects under firm-specific contingencies on the demand side

How do firm-specific, demand-related factors influence the relationship between intra-industry diversification (IID) and performance? Recent findings regarding the performance effects of IID depict a complex picture with curvilinear relationships and several contingencies. However, firm-specific contingencies on the demand side have remained unexplored. We analyze how IID relates to firm performance (market share) in the German automotive industry using panel data between 1999 and 2008. We specifically focus on a firm's high-quality brand image as a demand-side contingency. We find support for our hypotheses of complex curvilinear relationships as well as for moderating effects of brand quality. Our results have significant theoretical implications for the IID literature.