Perceptions of Performance Improvement Factors in an Emerging Market Environment

This study explored the relevance of Thomas Gilbert's Behavior Engineering Model (BEM) in an emerging market environment. Gilbert's BEM has been a popular instrument for identifying factors affecting performance in the workplace. Its application has been generally consistent in ranking the relative importance of the six categories of factors for improving performance in the following order: Data (Information), Instruments (Resources), Incentives, Knowledge, Capacity, and Motives. The BEM, as a cause analysis model supporting the performance improvement (PI) process, was developed in the context of U.S. business organizations. PI practitioners have questioned whether the BEM would be applicable in a different cultural environment. This mixed methods case study of a commercial bank in Afghanistan found a different ranking of factors for improving performance, indicating Incentives, not Information, as most important. The results support the contention that culture matters and suggest the need to include economic conditions in the unique environmental context.