Drawbacks

Drawbacks (What)

Drawbacks: A drawback is anything that decreases the likelihood of an action being taken or being repeated.

A drawback can be a negative consequence, a downside, or something similar.

Actions have desirable consequences (rewards) and undesirable consequences (drawbacks).

Rewards: A reward is anything that increases the likelihood of an action being repeated.

Examples of Drawbacks

When I buy a new car, I would prefer to not have to pay for it. Thus, the cost of the car is a drawback. I would also prefer to not have to pay for insurance, so the cost of insurance is a drawback.

Every action has drawbacks. For example, if I go to Hawaii for a week in February, one drawback is that I’ll miss a week of skiing, which is my favorite sport.

Learning statistics has drawbacks. * Takes a lot of time. * Can be frustrating. * Can seem like its not worth learning.

  1. A person gets burned while cooking.

  2. A person doing math homework gets frustrated.

  3. You speak up at a meeting and get shot down.

  4. A company spends $XXX on marketing but only gets half this amount back. The net effect is a loss of money.

  5. You play guitar and get criticized.

  6. A manager tries to help an managee who is struggling, but the manager gets abused and yelled at by the managee. Not only is the discussion awful, but it takes a long time, over an hour.

  7. A mountain bike rider is not paying enough attention on a drop off. They crash and break their collar bone. No more biking for many week.

  8. A person who is super busy does a required task that is not particularly important. This task take a lot of time which the person does not have and it also causes stress.

Rationale

Here are some reasons why is worthwhile to understand drawbacks and rewards and to be able to effectively manage them.

  1. People. Understand why people behave as they do.

  2. Habits. Understand how habits form. Effectively grow healthy habits and extinct unhealthy habits.

  3. Management: Effectively manage people.

  4. Motivation: Key to keeping sustained motivation