Lottery Bonus Contingencies Can Improve Performance in Human Service Organizations

by Stacey Small and Mark R. Dixon

Primary Topic: Human Performance Systems
Human service organizations often find themselves in a situation where opportunities to generate additional funding are limited, but the need to provide monetary compensation and incentives is high. One solution to this problem is to deliver performance feedback (Reid, Parsons, & Green, 2000) by using very simple principles of behavior analysis. Performance feedback is cost-effective and can potentially be easily maintained without extensive effort from the supervisor (Reid, Rotholz, Parsons, Morris, Braswell, Green, & Schell, 2003). We looked at the performance of supervisors in residential environments that served individuals with developmental disabilities.

Problem: Application of Performance Feedback: Not Always a Success

The application of performance feedback can be affected by a number of variables. That is, the application of performance feedback does not always result in improved employee performance. There is a debate concerning which methods, variables, or formal characteristics of feedback delivery can improve the overall well-being of organizations. Previous research suggests pairing additional consequential mechanisms (bonus incentives, postings) has the potential to improve performance. Research has also established that using feedback alone, or monetary incentives alone will not guarantee increases in desired performance. This is often the case when there are delays in time between the target behavior and feedback, when performance is evaluated among employees, or when feedback is delivered non-contingently.

Lottery incentive programs have been found to result in greater performance than financial incentive programs where bonuses were guaranteed within the same manufacturing environment (Evans, Kienast, and Mitchell, 1988). The lottery system is a cost-contained bonus program that any company could truly afford.

Solution: Implement a Cost-Contained Bonus Program that Anyone Can Afford.

Rather than securing additional funds for each additional employee who reaches performance criteria, the company would need only to allocate financial prizes for the lottery and provide tickets (which are assumed to be conditioned reinforcers). This idea, however, has not been addressed to investigate its efficacy. First, we assessed the performance of direct supervisors in residential environments across regulatory and clinical competencies. Then, we attempted to improve that performance through the use of performance feedback (initially delivered independently and then later as a group). Lastly, we assessed the relative behavior change for these staff when a lottery-based financial incentive program was added to the performance feedback sessions.

A multiple baseline design across participants was used to evaluate effects of the independent variables on paperwork completed. The first treatment was providing verbal feedback alone. The second treatment was verbal feedback plus graphic displays of performance. The third treatment component added a cash lottery.

Results:

Compared to baseline, verbal feedback produced a gradual increase in the targeted performance (completing paperwork). This finding suggests that verbal feedback alone was an effective intervention for increasing performance. The greatest gain in performance, however, was observed when the lottery incentive was added to the use of verbal feedback and graphical performance feedback. No participant scored less than 70% during this condition and one participant reached 95%. The results demonstrated that performance feedback with and without incentives has some effectiveness in increasing performance. All three participants ended the study with higher levels of form completion compared to their respective baselines.

References:
Evans, K. M., Kienast, P., & Mitchell, T. R. (1988). The effects of lottery incentive programs on performance. Journal of Organizational Behavior Management, 9, 113 – 136.

Reid, D. H., Parsons, M. B., & Green, C. W. (2000). Staff management in human services. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas.

Reid, D. H., Rotholz, D. A., Parsons, M. B., Morris, L., Braswell, B. A., Green, C. W., & Schell, R. M. (2003). Training human service supervisors in aspects of PBS: Evaluation of a statewide, performance-based program.Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions, 5, 5-46.

Stacey Small is a doctoral student studying behavior analysis at Southern Illinois University. Stacey has worked in a variety of organizational settings as a behavioral consultant, and is currently a teaching assistant for an industrial / organizational course and a distance learning class on behavioral consultation at SIU.

Dr. Mark R. Dixon is an Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Behavior Analysis and Therapy program at Southern Illinois University. Dr. Dixon also is the director of the Behavioral Consultation Group - a service project of the Behavior Analysis and Therapy program at SIU designed to place graduate students in human service agencies as behavior analysts or organizational consultants.