The Six Boxes Blog

Let the Performer Decide What Works

by Cynthia Riha

This is another of our occasional discussions about using the Six Boxes with family. But I think the point will prove important for all situations, so I hope those without children, or whose years of active parenting are (finally) behind them, will hang with me for a moment.

Being one who lives and breathes the Six Boxes Model, I’m always using it to analyze and solve performance problems at home (my kids would just love being called a performance problem). And following the shoeless-cobbler-kids metaphor, I often default to nagging, begging or screaming. We all know how well that works. So I was happily surprised recently to see a successful example of the use of the approach at home – with highly desirable results.

My youngest son has never liked to brush his teeth. He probably has more sensitive gums than most which makes it unpleasant, but being a parent more interested in the result than his experience, I try to be as insensitive to that as possible. Naturally, my efforts often went nowhere. But as a good performance consultant, many times over the last few years I have tried all the boxes:

Box 1 – calmly explaining how often and why to brush, feed-forwarding when it’s time to do, checking quality, nagging, harassing, feedback on how he did each time, pointing out people with bad teeth

Box 2 – fun toothbrushes, electric toothbrushes, timers, every flavor of toothpaste imaginable

Box 3 – verbal approval, thanking him, and more punishment than I want to admit

Box 4 – diagrams of how to brush, brushing demonstrations

Box 5 – once we decided the gum sensitivity was real, we adjusted his toothbrushes and quit insisting on the electric one

Box 6 – he’s too young to “prefer” not to brush. I’m the mom.

All of this produced limited results, and nothing produced a self-managed kid.

Until he saw a commercial on TV for this “really fun blue mouthwash” that shows you where to brush. I just thought it was consumerism trying once more to get my child to demand yet another useless product, but being somewhat desperate we went for it (actually Dad did).  Happy ending: It worked perfectly and I have never nagged again, and everyone has noticed how much better his teeth look.

At first, I smugly took credit for a great Box 2 (tools and resources) intervention. But the truth is, I had tried many things and in all the boxes. What actually happened was that the performer, left on his own but knowing it was a problem, found something that fit in Box 1 (it showed him both where to brush and when he was finished), Box 2 (it was a perfect tool), Box 3 (he felt a sense of accomplishment getting rid of the blue), and maybe most importantly, Box 6 (it was fun for him and made him feel independent).

As performance consultants, we love to engineer solutions. In reality, we are here to organize the influences on performance in a way that makes sense for the particular performer (or group of performers). The perfectly engineered solution is only perfect if performance is changed. Motives and preferences (Box 6) can’t be changed, but the rest of the system pivots on what they are. The system and the performer are actually one unit – we don’t design a performance system and then plop a performer into it. It’s a fascinating challenge – especially for those of us who love to “engineer” the perfect solution from our desk (or the kitchen table).

Box 2 to the Rescue at Home!

Readers who have attended our workshops or seminars know that I often use examples from family life to illustrate the generality of the Six Boxes Model. We know that the categories represented by the model comprise a comprehensive framework for understanding and managing the variables that influence human behavior. They can apply at home, for managing our own and others' behavior, just as well as in our work lives.

One of the most striking family examples in my recent experience involves my son, Jeremy, who is 10 years old. Like many kids, he doesn't always keep his bedroom neat and tidy. Ha! Any parents out there? Anyway, we have had a "performance problem" for years, defined by the absence of a very specific output: dirty clothes off the floor and into the clothes hamper.

Just about every morning his Mom or I would notice clothes from the night before (or from many nights before) on the floor. We engaged in the usual parental behavior of nagging -- setting expectations (Box 1) that he had better put his clean clothes in the closet and his dirty clothes in the laundry room, and off the floor, or else ....... (Box 3) there would be some sort of terrible consequence!

Usually the consequence was what child behavior management experts would call "overcorrection" – we'd move him through the task of not only cleaning up his floor, but also straightening out the mess on his desk and dresser surfaces, and so on. The idea is to make it better to perform as expected than not, by arranging negative consequences (Box 3). Of course, we also tried providing feedback (Box 1) and praising him with a hug or a pat on the back (Box 3) on those rare occasions when he did take his dirty clothes to the laundry room. But these were clearly not effective consequences. His behavior did not change.

This is one of those things which, as a parent, one can live with up to a point. So our behavior was not very consistent as "managers," and depending on the situation and our mood, we often ignored the problem. In other words, we let the management process for this particular output "drift" -- which is not a good way to establish and support performance in the long term.

Last week I got the bright idea that if we were to provide a nearby hamper (rather than the one downstairs from his room in the laundry area) to stash his dirty clothes, maybe it would help. This is clearly a Box 2 intervention – a tool.

So I ordered an $5 net "hamper" sack that hangs on the back of a door, from Amazon.com. It arrived a couple of days later. Jeremy, who's generally quite appreciative when we do things that he recognizes as helpful, said, "Thanks, Dad!" But I was frankly not optimistic, given the long history.

However, I am amazed and quite happy to report that for three days in a row, with no prompting, nagging, or other input from us, Jeremy has put his dirty clothes in the hamper-sack on the back of his bedroom door, leaving his floor quite neat and tidy.

Reflecting on this outcome, I realized how in business and in personal life as well, we often ignore the power of Box 2 for changing performance. We try to be clear on expectations, and we practice giving feedback. We work hard to find positive consequences matched to the preferences (Box 6) of our performers. And we sometimes invest in expensive processes or systems in Box 2 designed to revolutionize performance in some important way. But we often miss opportunities to provide less dramatic Box 2 interventions. In many cases, simply rearranging the environment, providing an inexpensive prop or or tool, or giving someone a checklist, can have a big and valuable impact on performance.

Of course we need to align that Box 2 intervention with Box 3 consequences and incentives, and with other parts of the overall performance system. But often small Box 2 interventions can make a big impact.

Now let's figure out how to get Jeremy to put dishes in the dishwasher after he finishes a snack....