Leadership’s opinion about role of punishment in sculpturing organizational behavior can define the type of leadership an organization has. From perspective of many managers, punishment is a legitimate and effective tool to deter people from unwanted behavior. Ayesha, however does not agree with the the idea of punishment being an effective tool for achieving desired behavioral goals in an organization. Punishment is not a recommendable human resource behavior management tool, and must be avoided at all costs because the effects of punishment are temporary and not permanent, as soon as the fear of punishment is over, the bad behavior might return with added zeal as unwanted behavior will be seen as a forbidden fruit now. The role of punishment in organizational behavior might seem intuitive to a layman but from business management perspective, it is impractical because requires constant presence of an enforcer who must monitor, observe and punish people on constant basis which is not practical.
Stopping a bad behavior does not guarantee a productive and desirable behavior and the employee might just be even more unproductive despite the punishment and deterrence from bad behavior. The fear generated due to bad behavior can result in lack of productivity and lack of creativity. When there is an atmosphere of fear around an organization everyone tries to avoid responsibility and people shy away from taking a proactive approach to the things and rather prefer to do as less as required so nothing wrong is intentionally or unintentionally done by them or ascribed to them and they are not punished for anything assumed to be done wrong by them. This type of behavior manipulation can create depression and workplace stress in the employees and also suppress any voluntary positive behavior from the employees. Since all employees do not react to the punishments in a similar manner, punishments can spur feelings of aggression in some employees and might also make them vent out their frustration by punishing their subordinate’s irrespective of behaviors. Similarly, if the culture of punishment is pervasive in the organization, the seniors might start punishing employees without any reason or for personal reasons. The role of punishment in organizational behavior is negative and the use of punishment as human resource management tool is toxic and counterproductive. Punishment based human resource management strategies are shortsighted and have harmful impact on the organizational culture and business goals.
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- Podsakoff, P. M., & Todor, W. D. (1985). Relationships between leader reward and punishment behavior and group processes and productivity. Journal of Management, 11(1), 55-73.