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A
Conversation with Paul Brown
By Marco
D. Tomasi (email: tomasi@psy.fsu.edu)
Dr. Paul L. Brown is an Adjunct
Professor of Psychology at the State University
of New York (SUNY) at New Paltz, and co-founder
of Instructional Design Associates, Inc. Dr.
Brown has served as a consultant to companies
such as American Express, 3M, Exxon-Mobil, Chevron-Texaco,
Aetna Financial Services, Dow Chemical, The Kroger
Company, LensCrafters, LEGO Systems, Verizon
and Philips.
Dr
Brown further contributes to the development
of the field of behavior-based management as
Vice President of the Association of Business
Executives (London, England) and as a member
of the Board of Editors of the Journal of Organizational
Behavior Management. He is also the author of
Managing Behavior on the Job (published by John
Wiley & Sons) and the
Coaching for Team Effectiveness™ leadership
skills development workshop (published by Instructional
Design).
Case Study 1: Dr.
Brown was recently contacted by a U.S.-based
chemical company that wanted to create a vision
of an "injury-free
work environment." After further probing,
this general goal was operationalized to be a reduction
in the number of OSHA recordable. The company already
had a sophisticated safety program in place, and
was recognized as a safety leader in its field.
They had an internal safety department of 50-150
employees, and followed a behavioral approach to
safety. But some challenges still remained, as
the safety teams primarily focused on training
and diagnostics, and some workers still saw safety
as the responsibility of the safety department,
and not their own. The company employed 50,000
people in a number of chemical plants. To test
Dr. Brown’s approach, a plant responsible
for the production of a specific chemical was selected.
This plant employed between 50 and 100 workers.
The intervention used in this case was to educate all, or at least as many
employees as possible, in the principles of Applied Behavior Analysis, and
how to use ABA to reduce the number of OSHA. It was Dr. Brown’s belief
that the cumulative total of change in behavior by each of the individual
workers would result in overall reductions in OSHA recordables reported each
year. To facilitate this, a workshop was designed. Skills such as pinpointing,
tracking, and ABC analysis were taught, and sublimated with Coaching Action
Plans. The Coaching Action Plans were worksheets that aided employees in
the systematic diagnosis of problems and in designing their own behavioral
solutions. Following the workhops, Dr. Brown’s role shifted from instructor,
to advisor, to guide the teams of workers as they practiced applying the
Coaching Action Plans to everyday problems. At first, teams focused on trying
to use their Coaching Action Plans to analyze and reduce unsafe behaviors.
In fact, these were the same types of behaviors the safety department had
previously focused upon before seeking outside help. It was at this point
Dr. Brown suggested trying to achieve a balance in between the negative and
the positive. To be exact, increasing the number of action plans focusing
on the increasing of safe behaviors.
Two months were needed to train all 150 employees and have them proficient
in the use of the Coaching Action Plans. In the seven months following the
training period, the company reported injury rates below the historical average
(3.52 incidents per 200,000 hours of work, versus the 3 year historical average
of 5.73 incidents per 200,000 hours of work). This seven month period was followed
by a stretch of zero injuries that lasted an additional six months (a feat
never before achieved in the history of the site).
Case Study 2: In contrast to
the safety-related nature of the previous case
study, this project fell under the larger umbrella
of performance improvement. This case took place
in the finance/accounting department of a large
computer software and hardware manufacturing
company. The strategic business measures the
company was concerned with was the high volume
of overtime incurred by the department. At the
root of this need for overtime was a 30% error
and rework level in forms filed (as measured
by processes already in place).
With 900-1000 employees, having the consultant analyze the behavior of each
worker was not realistic. Therefore, the intervention involved educating 100
employees at a time, in the basic tenets of applied behavior analysis as well
as how to apply the Coaching Action Plan to these tenets. Over a sixteen month
period following the instructional sessions, dozens of action plans were created
and implemented. Step by step, the employees, under the guidance of the consultant,
found that the existing policies were really antecedent-only, and replaced
them with contingencies that utilized both antecedents and consequences. Moreover,
the employees themselves began posting data and finding creative ways to reinforce
behavior on their own. Tangible reinforcers were used at first, but over the
sixteen month period workers found more and more ways to substitute these with
social reinforcers. Also, during this period following education, the error
rate dropped to 3%. By the end of the sixteen month period, the error rate
was at 1.5%, and eventually decreased to near zero.
Contact information:
Paul L. Brown, Ph.D.
President
Instructional Design Associates, Inc.
1 Robin Court
New Paltz, New York
845 255-8827 Phone & Fax
PBrown4082@aol.com
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