Tag Archives: attitude

49 not out – what about you?

Generation X-it

Can we afford to retire … with the work half-done? A blog relating the prospect of retirement, possibility of resignation from role, and the need to carry-on

Boris is done – surely – the rogue that some love but who many more have come to hate. If there is one undeniable truth – two words not quickly associated with his testimony – it is that he never gives up on himself.

My first question tonight is just how different is he from the leaders we may each aspire to be? We of similar age, if not similar bravado and self-belief. Boris, 58 years old – born June 1964 – represents the last of the baby-boomers by category of age (baby-boomers born 1946-1964). I am firmly within generation X (born 1965-1980), and by age alone it is now we whose time of life sees us amassing towards those top-most roles. So are we going to be the first of better, or the worst that there has been? We who grew-up to the mantra of greed is good, into low inflation and cheap flights, distracted by new tech and toys, and the internet of disposable things, when millionaires were the wealthy, not anyone with a maxed out pension pot. Are we set to be the most self-serving, self-righteous, and guilty in possibility of being the keenest to call time of any generation before? Is Boris the last, or the first of more to come?

Control of narrative or action?

I took the time to watch Boris’ testimony at the liaison select committee today {here}. His excuses extended to suggesting a culture of alcohol abuse in government {here 1:47:01}. No indication that lessons learnt in this latest episode include the appropriate checks of or support to candidates for government roles. In response to being asked what system is in place to help people with behavioural problems or alcohol, there was no offer of explanation beyond “we all have a duty as colleagues to look out for each other and to try and help people” (ibid ~1:48:03). There was curiously little suggestion that serious allegations of sexual misconduct sit long in his memory. Nor much indication that the vague recollection of parties which required an independent enquiry to help him recall, were being supported by any more rigorous means of decision-making assurance via record keeping or data control. Related or unrelated, such facts seem to reflect outdated cultural norms. Truth engineering or political spin, what his tenure exposes is an infection or pandemic of woeful attitudes, actions, and beliefs that exist alongside a lack of interest in critical controls, scrutiny of people or process, or even the basic expectations of recall of what to most would be stand-out moments of concern.

Boris does not stand and fall alone in this, but his leadership does stand apart for its sheer audaciousness in its disregard. Whilst I do not seriously think baby-boomers or generation X are suitably tarred with that one brush, it is we, generation X, who have every chance to be equally complicit and be remembered with similar disgrace if our own interest in those we serve and the wider communities we are part are not held higher in our priority of care.

Rewiring or retiring?

This I now present in its wider context. The world stage of which we are each now citizen actors upon. Change is upon us, environmental and socio-economic. Whether we are to blame or not is now irrelevant. The world need has changed, or at least our awareness of it has become more complete. It is with the constructive criticism and reflection of the likes of Boris Johnson that I think it this generation of proxy leaders, generation X, that is most in need to respond to what comes next. Not because we took more, or gave less, but just because we must.

Leadership is landing in the laps of many who may never have wanted it. For others it is reward for 30 years of work that has come before. Nest eggs, houses accruing value, or simply a realisation that the work can soon come to an end. We are now that generation that sets the culture in our workplace. And hearing Boris acknowledge an integrity vacuum under his watch, but to then present alcohol abuse as a cause not an effect, offers new insight into just how loose his hand upon the reins have been, and how undignified his grip now is. The flippant question may be where is his stewardship of those he serves beyond the garden G&Ts? The more serious observation is where is the control environment he should be the champion of, to aid his memory and not his sleaze?

Control environments can assist the management of actions, at least to a point. But what of attitude? And is our attitude, generation X, really so different in that respect? Whether we are a leader or labourer, this is our time. To first of all demand better from our peers. Second of all to take ownership of what mess we now preside over, even if not ours made. In my opinion there is plenty who need to rewire their thinking, their behaviour, and their beliefs. But most of all, we are now either the last generation to lead for ourselves, or the first to lead for the next. That’s the attitude rewiring we may be forced to make.

Next is the question of retirement. A rather recent societal expectation in historic terms, and one that seems rather 20th Century in a time of longer life and longer debt. Retirement seems to me the last thing we should be aiming for, despite it now being within our grasp. For some I fear that is perhaps already not a choice. But it seems to me what the world needs right now is all the help it can get. And if it’s help that is required, maybe we are the generation that now needs to show what leadership is in deed, not reward for making it to the lucrative top step. Many of us have lived our whole lives in debt, but what we are borrowing most of all, is the future planetary health for the next.

If Boris and his party bus is demonstrating anything to us – his real peers – it is that leadership is action, not title. And deed is assessed by those whom one is serving, not by those to who the perks are being served. If leadership feeds a machine that serves itself, the disorder and disrespect that spreads to all is absolute. Boris’ time in charge should stand for that. A caricature from which generation X should note, reflect upon, and seek to be opposed. But wider still is that me first attitude, the consume today pay tomorrow, the dispose and disregard, we have all become culturally attached. It is from this expectation that politics is permitted to be about the now, and therein the never never.

If there is money to retire, there is money to do more whilst needing to be paid less. Maybe that is a deed that sets the leadership example to the next. Aiming toward a sustainable platform (contribution), not sustenance towards gout (consumption). Generation X-it, becoming generation fix-it.

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Visibility | behaviour | trust

Closing remarks using v|b|t. By such leadership failings it’s getting harder to find places to hide. Yet there seems a whole barracks of generals still strategising over shared greed. It’s a minority but seemingly unaccounted and unopposed. We must be an army of people at the top of their game – generation X now approaching those years that count double – doubling up or halving effort – that could be stepping out armed with the questions that cut deepest in repost. Or being the more selfless leader seeking less but wanting to contribute more.

Maybe it is we, generation X, who secretly eye up the retirement age escape, that should be first to redirect the aim. Seeking out those opportunities to do more. To bring more to the table than we take away. And in acting, so demand more of those in these roles to do the same. Maybe then we can watch our peers with pride. And not cringe in shame, as we see the self-serving lies they try to hide.

Visibility returning to the blindest eyes. Behaviours unbecoming both permitted and rewarded, lies told in defence, blame diverted and scape-goats made. Trust lost even from the closest aides, as the last knot of control by distraction is finally frayed.

Maybe such metric along such lines can indeed be found. Seeking to identify where projection and controls are so desperately unaligned. That one, in some small way in the research I have set out to undertake, I am putting down to me.

To be continued…

Instigating behavioural change

Do we start with behaviour or mind?

My thanks to my friends at Praxis for prompting this blog. I pondered upon this yesterday only because of a Praxis Framework post via LinkedIn yesterday (thanks Adrian). With some ironic confirmation of one argument or the other (you are invited to ponder upon which) I did not even think to blog this answer – I just responded via LinkedIn. It can be inferred that I have fallen out of the habit of daily blogging, so I have been prompted (via intrinsic motivation or external impetus) to respond more fully here.

What was offered is a position outlined by Jon Katzenbach and Douglas Smith:

Start with changing behaviours, not mindsets. It is much easier to ‘act your way into new thinking’ than to ‘think your way into new actions’

Jon Katzenbach and Douglas Smith (1993) via Praxis website

Followed by an invitation for response by anyone who disagreed. I am not committing to disagreeing, but I did have an alternative acadamic perspecive I wanted to share.

This behaviour not mindset approach is in line with behaviourists sentiment. But it would be quite wrong of me to suggest this 1993 book, or even this quote, are behaviourist inspired. As explained in the Praxis summary this quote is advocating a specific “beginning with behaviour” approach to an underperforming or “pseudo” team. Per this same Praxis post this is also referencing Katzenbach et al and their Team Performance Curve. Accordingly, that is not to say Katzenbach et al are advocating behaviour first for already effective or high performing teams. My argument is that this is with good reason.

Social Psychology considerations

This is a prompt to wider psychological consideration of what, in team context, is influencing behaviour, or indeed what behaviour is influencing toward mindset. I (re)introduce below several theories from social psychology, countering particularly considerations of reward and punishment as go-to behavioural controls (cf. BF Skinner’s operant conditioning e.g., here).

I am going to group a number of principles of cognition together into the term mindset. Some latitude is asked therefore as I introduce various abstract notions of cognition. Concepts such as attitude, motivation, intent, or belief. Precisely the abstract and subjective concepts that behaviourists would argue is the reason cognitive psychology is flawed. But also precisely what is, to developmental psychologists, what children from as young as eighteen months are becoming subjectively aware of when they distinguish their perspective from that of another (cf. Theory of Mind e.g., here).

These comments are an expansion of my response on LinkedIn. I have also crossed referenced a number of blogs I have previously offered in this regard.

Behaviourists beware

Intrinsic Motivation (IM) is easily replaced by external incentive – mindset orientation changing behaviour. [This is in reference to Self Determination Theory – see my blog Motivation vs Coercion]. We want to encourage personal ownership and motivation. Throwing cash at a problem, or forcing compliance, can backfire if well functioning teams are suddenly just driven to a big pay-out (how many times do we have to see that…).

Predicting behaviour may necessarily require consideration of attitude. And attitude may be best established against specifics rather than general conditions. Icek Ajzen and Martin Fishbein considering belief, intentions, and actions and in later work surmising that individual sense of control plays a part (cf. Reasoned Action – see my blog).

Context is key. No single factor is going to change behaviour – and beliefs, intentions, or past events have a place within mindset

The Elaboration Likelihood Model would suggest it is only in situations of peripheral attention that low cognitive engagement thresholds will be applied (e.g., fearful or trusting) – an alternative is heuristics. That being the case it is only in conditions of low cognitive engagement that a team is going to accept behavioural change first – accordingly, unless fear is a 21st century tool of choice you can justify, or as leaders you are offering a high level of trust to an underperforming team, simply attempting behavioural correction is not going to bring the central (and cognitive) attention required.

As to persuasion, one may also need to consider who is saying what to whom before accounting for change in mindset or behaviour. [This is in reference to the work of Carl Hovland and Yale in the 1950s which explained propaganda variables and influenced the advertising tactics we still all buy into today]. Persuasion needs a receptive audience, a convincing message, and the right seller to convey what is being sold.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory (Leon Festinger 1947) would suggest changing attitude, cognitive reappraisal, or changing behaviour can each apply to resolving two conflicting perspectives (assuming one has a choice). Which of these is changed may be specific to any of the factors described above. [This sits within a wider notion of the Three Motives Ontology – see my blog Motivated Behaviours. Cognitive Dissonance Theory also sits within the paradigm of attitude, persuasion and change].

In summary

It is important to attend to behaviours. It is critical as a leadership role. But have in mind the many moving parts beyond behaviour itself. Being SMART with you team and instilling an intrinsically motivated team ethos requires the winning of both hearts and minds.

Finally, if you have made it this far – that’s motivated behaviour I cannot help but applaud. Thank you. But if you made it here without checking out Praxis, you really should. Here, let me save you some time.

Bad attitude

In this blog I briefly introduce subject matter concerning behaviour. A summary of lecture notes, wider reading, and dialogue from my MSc Psychology studies last week. All anticipated to be revisited as research methodologies addressing v | b | t .

v | behaviour (attitude, belief, intent) | t

A tentative conclusion, from my readings at this point, is seeing Behaviour (as action) as the output with attitude a variable, alongside beliefs, and intention.  Per Manstead (2000), the relative weighting a person places on each of these three will determine the final act (i.e., behaviour).

Social Psychology

These first notes come from the discipline of Social Psychology. They connect attitude to behaviour. There are many other perspectives, constraints, models, and methods to consider. Biological, cognitive, developmental, individual difference, all presenting psychological context. Wider disciplines of sociology, anthropology, socio-economics, to add too.

This blog therefore one of many I anticipate writing in support of future research intent. The remainder of this blog is a brief examination of some of the key models and complexification of what attitude and corresponding factors offer in consideration of behaviour.

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Attitude as a determining factor of behaviour

Gordon Allport writing in 1935 is where many texts begin. Who considered attitude and its study to being a place that cultural, social, and individual concerns meet (Gross 2015). From my lecture notes:

Attitudes are a mental and neural state of readiness, organised through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individual’s response to all objects and situations with which it is related

Gordon Allport 1935 pp810

Lectures last week presented three periods of increasing complexity of the study of attitude. This early period of the 1930s – dealing with a single component – affect (Thurstone 1931), and a second component of action (Allport 1935) [i.e., behaviour]. A period in the 1950s and 1960s concerned with dynamic change. A third component as belief further complexifying modelling from 1970s. Attitude as a factor of systems interactions with cognitive and social structure from 1980s and 1990s.

Example methodologies intended to explain this relationship:-

The expectancy value technique –  Belief strength measured probabilistically 0-1.  High regard to truth and strong belief in something such as reliability of one option over another.  Evaluation scaled over a five-point scale ranging from -2 to +2.  Combining this strong belief with evaluation capability presenting a high or low likelihood or behaving in a certain way.  Fishbein later expanded this theory with Icek Ajzen (cf Ajzen & Fishbein 2008; Ajzen & Fishbein 1980; Fishbein and Ajzen 1974; )  “most popular model of this type in social psychology is the expectancy–value (EV) model of attitude formation (see Dabholkar, 1999; Feather, 1959, 1982)” Ajzen & Fishbein 2008 pp2223).  Multiplication method argued by them in 2008 (pp2231).  Also note their rejoinder to Ogden 2003 dated 2004.  Specific attitude more relevant than general (Hogg et al 2018 pp163) e.g. attitude towards an exam not attitude towards a subject more broadly.  (cf.  Kraus 1995 meta-analysis)).  Ajzen & Fishbein 1975 do however suggest general attitudes can be of some value as multiple-act criterion – i.e., in predicting multiple behaviours not just one action.

Reasoned Action; Planned action; and motivations to change – Three processes of belief, intention, and action, and include the following components [adapted from Hogg et 2018 pp163]:

Conviction of belief – reasoned action theory –a product of the person’s beliefs about the target behaviour and how these beliefs are evaluated (refer to the cognitive algebra in Table 5.1).  Note that this is an attitude towards behaviour (such as taking a birth control pill in Davidson and Jacard’s study), not towards the object (such as the pill itself).  Here distinction is made between Behavioural intention – an internal declaration to act; and Behaviour – the action performed.  (Hogg et al 2017 pp163-164).  This result expressed in terms of a correlation between expected result and actual pp164

Intentions – Planned Action theory– This introduces the notion of behaviour being under the person’s conscious control.  (cf Ajzen 1989, Ajzen & Madden, 1986).  The perceived behavioural control added to early theory to allow for 20 percent of prospective actual behaviour being attributable to this additional variable of behavioural control (Tony Manstead and Dianne Parker (1995)).  Ajzen arguing that perceived behavioural control can relate to either the behavioural intention or the behaviour itself “the theory of planned behaviour”.  Per Hogg et al 2018, Richard Cooke and Pascal Sheeran (2004) “probably the dominant account of the relationship between cognitions and behaviour in social psychology” (ibid pp159) also citing Ajzen and Fishbein 2005).  See Fig 5.3 pp165 of Hogg et al 2018 for how both theories can be applied together.

Motivation – protective motivation theory– (cf Floyd, Prentice-Dunn, Rogers).  Cognition balancing between perceived threat of illness and one’s capacity to cope with the health regiment.  Two responses are possible.

The maladaptive response is a threat appraisal – which is to take the intrinsic and extrinsic reward, less the severity and deemed vulnerability to the threat.  In other words change is only made if the implications of the change are deemed manageable vs the relative appraisal of threat.

The adaptive response more mature as outcome orientated.  This is of itself an attitudinal determinant, but in my opinion not necessarily at the level of engagement with the object action itself.

All three theories share a view that “motivations towards protection results from a perceived threat and the desire to avoid potential negative outcomes (Floyd, Prentice-Dunn, Rogers 2000)” pp167

By the above examination there is no single factor that can be applied consistently to change behaviour.  This is a contextual examination.  Accordingly, it is perhaps the context itself which is the factor of greater importance.  Context enables the intervention to be applied to the better variable for the situation, and thereby the appropriateness of the control.  By example:

Moral values – past behaviours to indicate future ones based upon someone’s conviction and values (Gorsuch and Ortberg 1983; Manstead, 2000; Pagel and Davidson, 1984; Schwartz 1977)

Normative action– (cf. Norman and Conner 2006)  Habit as a predictor of future behaviour.  Becoming normative.  Safe sex can be normal without consideration or reasoned decision-making (Trafimow 2000), but so too can binge-drinking become normalised and therefore less in mind to be controlled (Norman and Conner, 2006).

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Further reading:

Gross, R. “Psychology : The science of mind and behaviour” 7th Edition, Hodder Education, 2015

Hogg, M., & Vaughan, G. “Social Psychology”, Pearson Education, Limited, 2018

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About Me

In psychology we are required to look beneath the mask. This blog series is attempting to unmask some hidden parts of projects to engender a more collaborative way.

Find my professional mask here:

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