Sunday, January 14, 2007

Pygmalion effect when mentoring

expectations influence results! Expectation leads to reality; a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Its like cheerleading. Make tasks challenging but realistic; communicate a can-do and a belief in your protege.

  • contact: eye contact, tone of voice, body posture
  • feedback: praise more, criticize less to build self-confidence
  • input: more detail shows your investment in a positive outcome
  • output: encourage more challenges down the road

I have a great corporate training video, if you would like to borrow it.

EXAMPLES :
* Dr. Rosenthal (Harvard, Industrial Psychology) : studied pygmalion effect on rats, elementary classroom students, and welding studing.
* Sweeney's Miracle : Dr. Sweeney saw an undeveloped potential in a janitor George Johnson; he trained him to be a computer programmer and even a trainer.
* Movie : My Fair Lady. Prof. Henry Higgins "you squashed cabbage leaf, . . . I can pass you off as the Queen of Sheeba."
* The stock market depression of the 30's
* Beliefs create reality
* Lee Iacocca's work on Chrysler
* Galatea effect : positive self image can lead to success

* Hawthorne effect : Scientists in the 1930's discovered that workers altered their behavior under observation. Whether the plant's lights were turned up or down, the workers productivity improved. People work better in an environment where they are acknowledged, receive feedback, and responsible for an outcome.

* Placebo effect : People can change a situation with a false confidence in an inert solution.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The wise words of Liza Doolittle in My Fair Lady ring true over time. She said, " The difference bewtween a flower girl and a lady is not how she acts but how she is treated." This is, from my experience, true in the class room where some teachers find it easier to judge on appearances and social class rather than finding the true potential of their students. For some who have math anxiety, it may have stemmed from a math teacher who made the judgement that someone could not learn math, so was treated as being dumb. That may have stuck with them for a life time. Dr. Sweeney's experiment with Mr. Johnson is an example of how society also stereotypes blacks, women, and other groups by/through having negative expectations re: their behavior. Lesson: repeat after me: It is not how someone acts, its how they are treated. Negative expectations produce what? Positive expecations produce what?

Program Manager

As a technical leader, I develop a talent pipeline that can deliver client's expectations in a motivating and productive environment.

I have performed multi-discipline engineering on space launch vehicles, satellite command and control software, electronic medical records, and large data center operations.


I am seeking additional opportunities to deliver solutions internationally

resume MBA-Bard Center


I have delivered management and technology consulting solutions for Deloitte, BearingPoint, Department of the Interior, TRICARE Military Health System, Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), Raytheon, Lockheed, Northrop, and Boeing on various projects in manufacturing, software development, systems engineering, testing, and ITIL management.