Psychoactive environment (pSE) is a 'must' for service industry

BY UPALI Gamakumara,

Chairman, Institute of Quality Science Consultants (IQSC).

e-mail: [email protected]

THE conditions of living in developed countries make us feel sorry about our own since there seems to be relatively hassle free living enjoyed by those people.

There are systems and policies in place to create an environment conducive for productivity, where people get on with their lives at workplaces, roads and even in their homes without cursing and shifting blame from one to another for the frustrations that takes precedence over productivity.

As you enter a developed country, you will experience some orderliness from the airport itself, with good cheer where people comply with systems to realise their expectations. You will experience this in queues at post offices and bank, transport and among service providers from the porter to the policeman.

The three qualities have created a discipline to follow rules and norms like in queuing, crossing roads, driving disposing litter and general human courtesy at every level of the society.

Interestingly, you too will be coerced to act in compliance, hence, you will be a more productive person to the host country and to yourself than you would be in your own society here in Sri Lanka.

Now, let us try to understand this phenomenon through the following scenario that depicts clearly, why Sri Lankans become less productive in our societies.

Episode I

Sunil, a loyal officer in a private sector organisation, leaves home one morning, after performing religious rituals and bidding farewells to his family. As he walks to the bus stop, a man in a passing bus spits betel-chew, and a drop makes a tiny stain on Sunil's spotless white shirt. He becomes annoyed but has to keep his patience.

He could not get into the first bus because some hefty people jumped the queue by force, and Sunil and some others were left behind. When he was travelling in the next bus, a heavy bag kept unsecured on the rack, falls on commuters when the driver takes a turn to overtake another bus and manages to avoid a head on collision sustaining a minor damage.

The road is blocked in the ensuing chaos. All passengers start yelling at the driver including Sunil. It took about 20 minutes to settle the matter. Sunil was 40 minutes late to report to work and the boss welcomes him with a complaint for leaving his office and phone unattended.

When he goes to his office, he finds the members of his staff are enjoying a birthday cake given by a young lady member of staff and the fun and laughter drowns the ringing noise of the phone. Sunil loses his temper and shouts at the staff.

The happy atmosphere turns into a hostile and nasty one. As a result Sunil's whole day was full of arguments, quarrels and he was unable to finish his planned work and became a frustrated man by the end of the day.

Introduction

Inspired by a lecture given by a Sri Lankan scholar living in the UK, I began some research of my own to find the reason for the deteriorating state of our society. How can I explain the difference between developed countries and ours?

This was the first question that sprang to mind. Is it lack of 'Discipline', for which no proper solution could be found? Hence, I felt, the most important task is to define the problem in the simplest way so that it could be addressed with a simple solution.

In the process of my research, I observed a phenomenon, which not only could explain the situation more simply, but paves the way to a practical solution too.

First presentation of my discovery was to a small group of intellectuals, professionals and well-wishers at the Management Faculty of University of Colombo.

The highly satisfied audience was of the opinion that the concept deserves greater exposure for application at the operational or ground level like the popular Japanese 5S.

Objective of this paper is to present a synopsis of my findings and suggestions to the public and especially to the business community with a sincere invitation for their comments and suggestions.

Psychoactive Environment (pSE)

Environment affects the behaviour or the mind of a person. Literally, 'Psychoactive Environment' may imply the same meaning.

Nevertheless, I have coined this word 'Psychoactive-Environment' to describe the cyclical nature of the phenomenon that individual's behaviour influences the society creating a Psychoactive Environment and the Psychoactive Environment 'in-turn' affects individual's behaviour and its effects on productivity.

Other than the direct elements of productivity like skills, technology, motivation and industrial engineering aspects, as I see it, Japan identified another element, the physical environment (PE).

It has been introduced as a methodology rather than an element of productivity, popularly known as Japanese 5S. My discovery is the psychoactive element of productivity defined as Psychoactive Environment (pSE).

pSE has three phases, namely positive, negative and neutral. When the pSE is conducive for productivity, we say it is positive and when it is destructive for productivity, we say it is negative.

Until the pSE becomes either positive or negative, it remains neutral and in such situations 'productivity', moves into stagnation followed by depression - a slow dying state - just like a crew (productivity) of a sail ship in doldrums (neutral pSE).

A distinct feature of pSE is that it takes precedence over all the other elements of productivity because pSE is a result of individual's behaviour and attitudes. Activity levels of pSE vary from culture to culture and time to time. Hence, intensified focus on pSE may not be equally needed in every country, as 5S may not so important to United Kingdom.

Causes of pSE to be Bi-Polar

By comparing an individual's behaviour in a positive and a negative pSE situation, we should be able to find what it causes to make pSE either positive or negative. In order to do that, we will take our own example of Sunil's saga, the first part given above and the second part given below.

Episode II

When Sunil went home that evening he was a completely different person to what he was in the morning.

Shama, Sunil's wife, quickly reading Sunil's mind, welcomed him silently with a submissive smile, took his bag without a word, asked the children to attend to school work in a very low voice so that it is not heard by Sunil and tells the son to switch off the TV.

She lets Sunil be alone in the room and rearranges the bathroom making it tidier, picks up small items fallen on the floor making her way to the pantry, and does the minor adjustments to the cutlery on the table and making the place more attractive, she plugs on the kettle.

Sunil, after a wash and a change comes to the pantry. Shama, as if a cat walking towards its master takes a few strides, and still in silence, slowly offers a plate full of pancakes, smiling and adding, "I made it." He smiles and kisses her forehead asking whether the children had their share.

"No, not yet, they were waiting for you!" she says and calls the children. Sunil hugs them and children giggle. The gloomy atmosphere changes as if a light was switched-on, and the home fills with joy.

It is clear that the first episode painted a picture of negative pSE, and the second one, a positive picture. Now, without reasoning out what it caused pSE to become positive or negative, we can pick the 'acts' done by individuals or systems in the two situations.

Acts caused to pSE became negative

N1 spits a betel-chew

N2 jumped the queue by force

N3 bag kept insecurely

N4 turn to avoid collision

N5 took about 20 minutes to settle the matter

N6 staff enjoying a birthday cake

N7 nobody could hear the phone

Acts caused to pSE became positive

P1 quickly reading Sunil's mind

P2 welcomes him silently

P3 submissive smile

P4 takes his bag

P5 in a low voice

P6 switch off the TV

P7 making the pantry more attractive

Now, all those 'acts' can be put into three major categories and again into six sub categories taking into consideration the quality of acts either good or bad, as in the table.

Now we are in a better position to find the cause for pSE to become good or bad, than giving complex and vague explanations like 'discipline', 'behaviour' or 'culture' which no person or a nation will be able to understand in finding a solution.

We see that the people in the first situation where pSE becomes negative, they are not acting intelligently, nicely and actively giving due regard to the appropriateness of place and time.

In the second situation, Sunil's wife (Shama) was acting intelligently, proactively and nicely where the children too had been trained to follow suit.

pSE in Business Management

Today the 'motto' in Business Management is 'delighting the customer'. It is not only delighting the customer by delivering higher quality product and service at a lower price, but also delighting them by creating a pleasant physical and psychoactive environment.

Some companies and trainers have felt the need and improved both PE and pSE but not exactly knowing what to achieve.

Importance of pSE is that it shows what goals should be achieved. Once known what to achieve we can set the scope and boundaries. Progress would be a further expansion of scope and boundaries. It is just like 'customer satisfaction.'

'SRS stores', was a very successful grocery store about two decades ago in the fast urbanizing township of Maharagama. It was a very busy place in almost every evening and especially on Saturdays, it was another 'pola' like that of the busy Maharagama-Pola.

Today, hardly anybody knows of SRS business as a popular one. An MBA student may say downfall of SRS is a result of 'failing to diversify' or a similar theory. How come? They have modernized the service to mini supermarket. His prices are comparatively lower than the prices of other supermarkets.

His 'kolla' helps mahaththayas to take their loads to vehicles. He chats a little bit while settling customers' balances - friendlier than the unknown owners of modern supermarkets. Still people prefer to go to a modern supermarket.

If you think of a similar business, and ask why you don't like the place going on pSE line of thinking, you will find lot of 'not intelligent', 'not nice,' and 'not active' things that are happening in those organisations.

You may have seen a considerable change in Government owned banks in Sri Lanka. Still you will feel that they have failed to make a friendly and pleasant environment similar to that of some private banks.

Why? It is mainly due to negative pSE, still prevailing, which is not recognized. The reason for failure in Government business organisations is nothing but the negative pSE. Main reason is that the officers in charge of such organisations do not know what to change, though they have the willingness.

Like PE, if they get at the correct concept of pSE, they will be able to bring their organisations at least to a higher level.

pSE in Quality Management

In early stages of Quality Management, the focus was to improve the quality of product meant by goods. Later they added the service element and gave a new meaning to 'product' as 'goods and services'.

Now it focuses on a wider area of the business activities and the theme has become 'continual improvement of goods and services to satisfy the customer'. This is the theme of TQM as well as ISO 9000:2000 based Quality Management Systems (QMS).

Yet, they are not talking of Physical Environment (PE) or Psychoactive Environment (pSE). Quality Gurus may have not perceived the concept and importance of PE and pSE due to the fact they all have come from comparatively good and disciplined environments.

However, some professionals in Japan perceived the importance of PE and developed the methodology of 5S to improve PE. Now they have adopted 5S to Quality Management and say the first step to TQM is 5S.

There was no need for Japan to think of making people to be intelligent, nice or active in their social behaviour, because in their long established strong culture they had maintained such qualities.

If you happened to watch the wedding ceremony of the Japanese Prince (heir to the throne) about a decade or two ago, on TV, you will understand what strong discipline they have.

Anyway, as the theme of TQM and QMS is 'Continual improvement' to satisfy the customer, eventually pSE should come into Quality Management like PE has already come into Quality.

pSE in Design and Development of Systems

Systems like Railway, Postal and Hospital in service sector or in any other sector have to be designed to create a positive pSE, at least at the development stages. The distinct difference we see between developed county and ours is the negative pSE prevailing in our systems.

Apparently, there could be other reasons which seems to be more responsible than pSE. But, in the final analysis, you will find it at least is a result of negative pSE in another system that governs the first.

In Sri Lanka, the inefficiency in railway system has created a prolonged negative pSE. This is not compatible with its huge staff, one reason for its inefficiency, is a result of negative pSE prevailing in the system immediately above the first.

BINA

Like the methodology adopted to improve PE is 5S, the methodology adopted to change a negative pSE to a positive one is BINA. BINA simply stands for; Be Intelligent, Nice and Active.

The theory is that people should be developed or trained to act intelligently as opposed to boorish and shallow. Nicely as against arrogant and indifferent behaviour. Perform actively as opposed to lethargy.

Unlike in PE, here the treatment is psychological. It has to be so, because the intention is to forcibly penetrate the concept and create an awareness and a guilty consciousness among the people who do not act or develop systems to Be Intelligent, Nice and Active.

This approach is not a novel or harsh one. It was in our culture. Basically, it was in all cultures. One such concept underlying Asian cultures is (was?) LAJJA - BAYA (shame and fear to do the 'wrong thing'), and that approach disciplined our people for generations.

Imperialists used the same approach to change and create an inferiority complex so that people in their colonies could be easily ruled in subservience.

In early '80s, Local Government authorities of Hong Kong used a similar approach to discipline people's behaviour to follow highway codes, to avoid spitting and littering in public places etc., by displaying a poster, where a beautiful lady is staring at people with a caption 'Hong Kong is watching you'! - a very soft strategy compared to Singapore's strategy to keep public lavatories clean by adopting a system to keep the user locked in the toilet until he flush out the commode, in early '70s!

Therefore, different methods and strategies should be adopted to suit the culture, place, crowd, time etc., when implementing pSE.

Posters, sign boards, cartoons, songs, stories and drama are some of the methods that could be adopted. Among motivational strategies, appreciation, ridicule, awards and competitions to name a few, would bring about the desired change in habits.

What is important is to avoid 'preaching' and 'advising' which have already become empty rhetoric as people tend to miss out on the practicality of the concept.

For example, I have found that the road sign 'If the road ahead is not clear - Do not overtake' has become a joke among bus drivers.

BINA approach is psychological, and may suggest a message challenging the ego-defence of people like; Bull sees no danger but the Driver does, may be with a picture of an old bullock cart.