Ob Case

Organizational Behavior Case: Volunteers Can’t Be Punished

Jenette Jackson is head of a volunteer agency in a large city, in charge of a volunteer staff of over 25 people. Weekly, she holds a meeting with this group in order to keep them informed and teaches them the specifics of any new laws or changes in state and federal policies and procedures that might affect their work, and she discusses priorities and assignments for the group. This meeting is also a time when members can share some of the problems with and concerns for what they are personally doing and what the agency as a whole is doing.

The meeting is scheduled to begin at 9 A.M sharp every Monday. Lately, the volunteers have been filtering in every five minutes or so until almost 10 A.M Jenette has felt she has to delay the start of the meetings until all the people arrive. The last few weeks the meetings haven’t started until 10 A.M. In fact, at 9.A.M nobody has shown up. Jenette cannot understand what has happened. She feels it is important to start the meetings at 9 A.M so that they can be over before the whole morning is gone. However, she feels that her hands are tied because, after all, the people are volunteers and she can’t push them or make them get to the meetings on time.

1. What advice would you give Jenette? In terms of reinforcement theory, explain what is happening here and what Jenette needs to do to get the meetings started on time.

2. What learning theories (operant, cognitive, and/or social) could be applied to Jenette,s efforts to teach her volunteers the impact of new laws and changes in state and federal policies and procedures?

3. How could someone like Jenette use modeling to train her staff to do a more effective job?

1. What advice would you give Jenette? In terms of reinforcement theory, explain what is happening here and what Jenette needs to do to get the meetings started on time.

Janette should start the meeting at sharp 9.00am as scheduled...