CDLA · Module 1 — Performance consulting and action mapping
The Behavior Engineering Model (1978): diagnose environment first. Training lives in one cell — knowledge.
About 22 min
Practice in the lesson player
Sorting, matching, quizzes, and the module gate stay behind a free account so scored answers are not public. The teaching notes below are the same cited curriculum.
01
Thomas Gilbert’s Behavior Engineering Model (Human Competence, 1978) is a 2×3 matrix. The top row is environmental support: data (information and feedback), instruments (tools and processes), and incentives. The bottom row is the person’s repertoire: knowledge, capacity, and motives. Gilbert’s practical claim, later supported by HPT writers such as Binder, is that environmental cells usually offer more leverage than sending people to a course.
02
Open each cell. Notice that only Knowledge is a training problem. The other five are usually job design, management, or selection.
Data (environment): Clear expectations, guides, and timely, specific feedback. If people cannot see the standard, training will not invent it.
Instruments (environment): Tools, time, materials, and processes that make the work possible. A broken CRM is not a “CRM skills” course.
Incentives (environment): Consequences that support the desired behavior. If the bonus pays for speed and the course preaches quality, the bonus wins.
Knowledge (person): Skills and information the person does not yet have. This is the only cell where a course, a job aid, or coaching is the primary fix.
Capacity (person): Whether the person can physically or cognitively do the work with reasonable support. Selection and assignment, not a slide deck.
Motives (person): Fit between the person and the work. Pumping “motivation training” while the other five cells are broken rarely lasts.
03
Behavior Engineering Model (BEM): Gilbert’s 1978 six-cell diagnostic. Not the same as Carl Binder’s later “Six Boxes®” adaptation, though Binder builds on Gilbert.
Performance consulting: Partnering with the business to improve results, not to fill a catalog. Training is one possible intervention.
Job aid: Information used in the flow of work (checklist, decision tree). Often cheaper and more reliable than memorization.