Episode 9: OBM and Leadership with Sara Lalani

so okay let me take a quick backward step here just to make sure that everyone's at work.

So you were using some words that I don't know if the average BCBA would know what some of these things are.

So can you explain to us what is a lottery system and what is that scorecard and pinpoint? What was your study and tell them why does that fit within behavior analysis?

Absolutely.

So I'll start with the scorecard lottery system since those came first and it's a little bit easier to start chronologically there for me at least.

So performance scorecards are a very objective way to measure different targets within an organization.

So if we are looking at employee performance, we can look at multiple areas and gauge performance based off of a weighted system.

So there's a targeted performance area and you're measuring if somebody is under the target, over the target, or right in the middle.

And then you're able to take that information, you assign weight to each area, and then you're able to come up with a total score.

And typically people have an average score that they're looking for.

So if it's a hundred point system, maybe I want the employees to collectively have 80 points or maybe I want specific criteria in each section of each performance target that I'm looking at.

So it's a really cool system to be able to look, like I said, at multiple areas and have a very objective way because you can outline each area very specifically for what you're looking for.

And with that, the lottery systems are not quite what you typically would think.

In behavior analysis, it's really all about a probabilistic reward system.

So looking at in the workplace, if you have employees, if they engage in a specific behavior that you're looking for, you can give them an entry ticket into a lottery system and then after a period of time draw some names and then that individual can get some sort of reward so it is somewhat similar to what we experience in everyday life but i don't know i hear lottery and i think like the power bowl or like scratch off tickets so it aligns a little bit with that um but I think it's really cool that in the science of behavior analysis, there are a lot of different components that can make up a lottery system and a lot of factors that we need to consider in order to determine if it's constructed in a way that's actually going to be as effective as possible.

I do have a follow up here again, because I want to make sure that people understand kind of what we're getting at, because this is something that's very different than I think what we typically do.

We typically see in, you know, kind of behavior analysis property and where people are used to doing things with the token boards and you have these tokens, you can exchange these on a fixed schedule.

So this is more of an intermittent reinforcement schedule.

There's no guarantee that if I get this particular thing, I will get the reinforcer, right? So am I understanding that correctly with how the lottery system works? That it's no guarantee that, okay, yeah, I did the thing.

I did my job the way I'm supposed to.

I'm supposed to get this reinforcer, but that reinforcer might not ever come.

So why does that work then as a strategy?

Yeah, and that's a great question.

So to address the first part, there's actually some debate on if it's actually an intermittent schedule of reinforcement or if it's more of just a gambling system that's brought into the workplace.

Because typically with intermittent reinforcement, you are going to contact reinforcement at some point.

so okay let me take a quick backward step here just to make sure that everyone's at work.

So you were using some words that I don't know if the average BCBA would know what some of these things are.

So can you explain to us what is a lottery system and what is that scorecard and pinpoint? What was your study and tell them why does that fit within behavior analysis?

Absolutely.

So I'll start with the scorecard lottery system since those came first and it's a little bit easier to start chronologically there for me at least.

So performance scorecards are a very objective way to measure different targets within an organization.

So if we are looking at employee performance, we can look at multiple areas and gauge performance based off of a weighted system.

So there's a targeted performance area and you're measuring if somebody is under the target, over the target, or right in the middle.

And then you're able to take that information, you assign weight to each area, and then you're able to come up with a total score.

And typically people have an average score that they're looking for.

So if it's a hundred point system, maybe I want the employees to collectively have 80 points or maybe I want specific criteria in each section of each performance target that I'm looking at.

So it's a really cool system to be able to look, like I said, at multiple areas and have a very objective way because you can outline each area very specifically for what you're looking for.

And with that, the lottery systems are not quite what you typically would think.

In behavior analysis, it's really all about a probabilistic reward system.

So looking at in the workplace, if you have employees, if they engage in a specific behavior that you're looking for, you can give them an entry ticket into a lottery system and then after a period of time draw some names and then that individual can get some sort of reward so it is somewhat similar to what we experience in everyday life but i don't know i hear lottery and i think like the power bowl or like scratch off tickets so it aligns a little bit with that um but I think it's really cool that in the science of behavior analysis, there are a lot of different components that can make up a lottery system and a lot of factors that we need to consider in order to determine if it's constructed in a way that's actually going to be as effective as possible.

I do have a follow up here again, because I want to make sure that people understand kind of what we're getting at, because this is something that's very different than I think what we typically do.

We typically see in, you know, kind of behavior analysis property and where people are used to doing things with the token boards and you have these tokens, you can exchange these on a fixed schedule.

So this is more of an intermittent reinforcement schedule.

There's no guarantee that if I get this particular thing, I will get the reinforcer, right? So am I understanding that correctly with how the lottery system works? That it's no guarantee that, okay, yeah, I did the thing.

I did my job the way I'm supposed to.

I'm supposed to get this reinforcer, but that reinforcer might not ever come.

So why does that work then as a strategy?

Yeah, and that's a great question.

So to address the first part, there's actually some debate on if it's actually an intermittent schedule of reinforcement or if it's more of just a gambling system that's brought into the workplace.

Because typically with intermittent reinforcement, you are going to contact reinforcement at some point.