This document provides an overview of feedback, rewards, and positive reinforcement for improving job performance. It discusses the functions and sources of feedback, as well as tips for providing effective feedback. Intrinsic and extrinsic rewards are defined, and it is noted that rewards often fail to motivate due to various factors. The concepts of positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, punishment, and extinction from behavioral psychology are explained. Methods for effectively shaping behaviors through reinforcement schedules and contingencies are also outlined.

2. Improving Performance with
Feedback, Rewards, and
Positive Reinforcement
Chapter Eight
Copyright © 2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
McGraw-Hill/Irwin
Organizational Behavior: Key Concepts, Skills & Best Practices, 3/e

3. 8-3
After reading the material in this chapter,
you should be able to:
• Specify the two basic functions of feedback and
three sources of feedback.
• Define upward feedback and 360-degree
feedback, and summarize the general tips for
giving good feedback.
• Distinguish between extrinsic and intrinsic
rewards, and give a job-related example of each

4. 8-4
After reading the material in this chapter,
you should be able to:
• Summarize the research lessons about pay for
performance, and explain why rewards often fail
to motivate employees.
• State Thorndike’s “law of effect” and explain
Skinner’s distinction between respondent and
operant behavior.
• Demonstrate your knowledge of positive
reinforcement, negative reinforcement,
punishment, and extinction and explain behavior
shaping

5. 8-5
Bolstering the Job Performance Cycle with
Feedback, Rewards, and Reinforcement
Figure 8-1

6. 8-6
Providing Effective Feedback
• Feedback – objective
information about
individual or collective
performance shared
with those in a position
to improve the
situation

7. 8-7
Two Functions of Feedback
• Instructional - clarifies roles or teaches
new behaviors
• Motivational – serves as a reward or
promise of a reward
- Can be significantly enhanced by pairing
specific, challenging goals with specific
feedback about results

8. 8-8
Sources of Feedback
• Others –
- peers, supervisors, lower-level employees,
and outsiders
• Task
• Oneself
- Self-serving bias and other perceptual
problems can contaminate this source

9. 8-9
Behavioral Outcomes of Feedback
• Direction
• Effort
• Persistence
• Resistance

10. 8-10
Nontraditional Feedback
• Upward feedback –
- employees evaluate their boss
• 360-Degree feedback –
- comparison of anonymous feedback from
one’s superior, subordinates, and peers with
self-perceptions
• Typically involve multiple sources of
feedback

11. 8-11
Popularity of Nontraditional Feedback
1. Traditional performance appraisal
systems have created widespread
dissatisfaction.
2. Team-based organization structures are
replacing traditional hierarchies.
3. Multiple-rater systems are said to make
feedback more valid than single-source
feedback.

12. 8-12
Popularity of Nontraditional Feedback
4. Advanced computer network technology (the
Internet and company Intranets) greatly
facilitates multiple-rater systems.
5. Bottom-up feedback meshes nicely with the
trend toward participative management and
employee empowerment.
6. Co-workers and lower-level employees are
said to know more about a manager’s
strengths and limitations than the boss.

13. 8-13
Upward Feedback
• Managers resist upward feedbacks
programs because they believe it erodes
their authority
• Anonymous upward feedback can become
little more than a personality contest

14. 8-14
Practical Recommendations
• Research evidence on upward and 360-
degree feedback favors anonymity and
discourages use for pay and promotion
decisions

15. 8-15
How to Make Sure Feedback Gets
Results
• Relate feedback to existing performance
goals and clear expectations.
• Give specific feedback tied to observable
behavior or measurable results.
• Channel feedback toward key result areas.
• Give feedback as soon as possible.

16. 8-16
How to Make Sure Feedback Gets
Results
• Give positive feedback for improvement,
not just final results.
• Focus feedback on performance, not
personalities.
• Base feedback on accurate and credible
information.

17. 8-17
Why Feedback Often Fails
1. Feedback is used to punish, embarrass,
or put down employees.
2. Those receiving the feedback see it as
irrelevant to their work.
3. Feedback information is provided too
late to do any good.

18. 8-18
Why Feedback Often Fails
4. People receiving feedback believe it
relates to matters beyond their control.
5. Employees complain about wasting too
much time collecting and recording
feedback data.
6. Feedback recipients complain about
feedback being too complex or difficult to
understand.

19. 8-19
Key Factors in Organizational
Reward Systems
Figure 8-2

20. 8-20
Question?
What type of reward is a self-granted
reward?
A. Distinguished
B. Extrinsic
C. Instinctive
D. Intrinsic

21. 8-21
Types of Rewards
• Extrinsic rewards
– financial, material,
or social rewards
from the
environment
• Intrinsic rewards –
self-granted,
psychic rewards

22. 8-22
Distribution Criteria
• Performance: results –
- tangible outcomes
• Performance: actions and behaviors –
- teamwork, cooperation, risk-taking
• Non-performance considerations –
- contractual

23. 8-23
Pay for Performance
• Pay for
performance –
monetary incentives
tied to one’s results
or accomplishments

24. 8-24
Why Rewards Fail to Motivate
1. Too much emphasis on monetary
rewards
2. Rewards lack an “appreciation effect”
3. Extensive benefits become entitlements
4. Counterproductive behavior is rewarded
5. Too long a delay between performance
and rewards

25. 8-25
Why Rewards Fail to Motivate
6. Too many one-size-fits-all rewards
7. Use of one-shot rewards with a short-
lived motivational impact
8. Continued use of demotivating practices
such as layoffs, across-the-board raises
and cuts, and excessive executive
compensation

26. 8-26
Positive Reinforcement
• Respondent behavior – Skinner’s term for
unlearned stimulus-response reflexes
• Operant behavior – Skinner’s term for
learned, consequence-shaped behavior

27. 8-27
Thorndike’s Law of Effect
• Behavior with favorable consequences is
repeated; behavior with unfavorable
consequences disappears
Read an article on the “Law
of Effect”

28. 8-28
Contingent Consequences in
Operant Conditioning
Figure 8-3

29. 8-29
Question?
What does one use to make behavior occur
less often by ignoring it?
A. Positive reinforcement
B. Punishment
C. Negative reinforcement
D. Extinction

30. 8-30
Contingent Consequences
• Positive reinforcement – making
behavior occur more often by contingently
presenting something positive
• Negative reinforcement – making
behavior occur more often by contingently
withdrawing something negative

31. 8-31
Contingent Consequences
• Punishment – making behavior occur less
often by contingently presenting something
negative or withdrawing something positive
• Extinction – making behavior occur less
often by ignoring or not reinforcing it

32. 8-32
Schedules of Reinforcement
• Continuous reinforcement – reinforcing
every instance of a behavior
• Intermittent reinforcement – reinforcing
some but not all instances of behavior
- Fixed ratio
- Variable ratio
- Fixed interval
- Variable interval

33. 8-33
How to Effectively
Shape Job Behavior
1. Accommodate the process of behavioral
change.
2. Define new behavior patterns
specifically.
3. Give individuals feedback on their
performance.
4. Reinforce behavior as quickly as
possible.
5. Use powerful reinforcement.

34. 8-34
How to Effectively
Shape Job Behavior
6. Use a continuous reinforcement
schedule.
7. Use a variable reinforcement schedule
for maintenance.
8. Reward teamwork—not competition.
9. Make all rewards contingent on
performance.
10.Never take good performance for
granted.

35. 8-35
Shaping Behavior
• Shaping – reinforcing closer and closer
approximations to a target behavior

36. 8-36
Video: Childcare Help
See BWTV discuss
how IBM has
helped employees
with onsite child
care. (3:13)