Various forms of punishment remain a crucial tool for managers. They use discipline in order to apply sanctions against employees who do not perform in the manner the company desires.
Progressive discipline
To be most effective, a system of progressive discipline is in order. This is a method of applying punishment to the individual in a way that is increasingly severe. For example, the first time an employee is late for work, he or she may get a verbal reprimand. The next time, a written warning may go into the employee's personnel file. On the third occurrence within a given time period, the employee may be suspended without pay for a certain number of days. If the infraction occurs a fourth time, the employee would be fired.
The idea is to apply punishment appropriate to the offense in a way that will influence or shape employee behavior.
For punishment to be effective, certain principles should be followed. The action management takes should be immediate. For it to be effective, the employee must see a relationship between the act (say, coming in late) and the consequence of that act (initially, a verbal reprimand).
It is also important that the action, not the personality, be penalized. It should not be, "You are lazy", but rather, "Your coming in late caused others to work overtime".
Discipline must be applied consistently over time and with people. Employees must perceive the consequences for certain actions to be fair, which means applying the same sanction for the same actions to everyone and in every situation.
To be effective, punishment also must be moderately severe. That is, the employee must feel its effect. A story is told of a ski area employee who, after a couple of reprimands, was told that after one more occurrence he would be suspended without pay for three days. The infraction re-occurred, the employee was reprimanded, and he went off to enjoy three days of skiing.
It is important to reprimand in a setting that the employee perceives as warm and supportive. This, at first, may seem contradictory. Are we not giving mixed signals to the employee? The point is that while punishing one action, we are also setting a climate for future interactions and performance. It is vital to deal with the situation, then set a positive tone as a basis for the future.
Potential side effects
Punishment seeks the elimination of negative behavior by the application of negative consequences to that behavior. An employee comes in late. The employee is told: "If you come in late again, you will be fired." The negative behavior is the lateness; the punishment is being fired; the objective is to reduce or eliminate the negative behavior, to stop the lateness.
There are several problems with an over-reliance on punishment. It may eliminate the lateness, but it may instead result in avoidance behavior. Our tardy employee wakes up late. Instead of coming in late and being fired, the employee may call in sick and not come in at all. Or consider the chef who is told: "Don't let me catch you with your food cost this high again." On the way out the door, the chef may mutter: "Don't worry, you won't catch me." The result may be actions that suppress rather than eliminate the negative behavior.
There is also the problem of the kinds of communication employees get from management. Consider the last time you heard, "The manager wants to see you." What goes through your mind? Most people say: "What did I do wrong?" Unfortunately, the only time it seems employees hear from management is when they have done something wrong.
Part of this is explained by the concept of management by exception. Performance is set and as long as everything and everyone is going along as expected, no action is taken. Only when something goes wrong (a customer complains, sales targets are not met, food cost is too high) does management act. While some employees prefer to be left alone to do their job, most need feedback. When the only feedback is negative, it creates a negative climate. One answer is a program of positive reinforcement.
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