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What kinds of problems would an ABA professional who specializes in organizational behavior deal with?

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1. What kinds of problems would an ABA professional who specializes in organizational behavior deal with? How can the principles of behavior be applied to the problems that organizations face?

2. How would you envision a "behavior change plan" looking when developed for a staff member? What would the similarities and differences be between this behavior plan and a more traditional plan developed by a behavior analyst?

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The solution discusses the kinds of problems that an ABA professional who specializes in organizational behavior would deal with.

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I have provided some general ideas for question 2, however the more I think about it, the more I realize that the "macro" approach to organizational behavior is universal, and does not exist just with formal institutions. Our behavior is partly social, and hence, is automatically organizational.

What kinds of problems would an ABA professional who specializes in organizational behavior deal with? How can the principles of behavior be applied to the problems that organizations face?

First, let's define ABA. This will then lead us into the sub-field of organizational behavior. ABA is the systematic application of principles of behavior to an individual. Notice here this implies a value judgment. There is no "objective" behavior. This is to encourage socially acceptable behavior (speaking generally). This is awfully broad, but it includes all elements that affect behavior from drugs to organizational structure and incentives.

Relative to organizations, ABA will seek to improve satisfaction in achieving the group's goals largely based on empirical observation. Several judgments are made here: first, that the group's goals are neutral and comparable. Second, that there is a general concept of satisfaction that hovers somewhere around the vague universe of happiness on the job. Third, it assumes that theory is not essentially important (except for the above) and our empirical observations can be detached and objective.

The basic problems that a professional here might face are just as broad and encompassing: labor efficiency, satisfaction, time management, training, safety, performance and customer satisfaction. We're bordering on Taylorism here. Speaking more broadly, ABA in this setting deals with analysis of function and its relation to goals, assessment, seeking out preferences of key actors and using them as baseline data, self-monitoring and the nature of hierarchy. Of course, Taylorism was the original social scientific approach to organizations. Taylor's key concept: "In the past the man has been first; in the future the system must be first."

Now, again, these assume many things: formal hierarchy (that is, power as ...

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