Pavlov's theory works with maids too

By Madhurie Singh, March 26, 2013

Pavlov’s theory works with maids too. Seriously!

Maids and cleaners in India will take you for ride whatever strategy you try. If you think you are smart, wait till your maid proves you wrong by acting dumb and making you work!

My maid used to be really a naive one who would obediently finish all the chores until she found a couple of more works.

So naturally a few chores started getting neglected pretty regularly.

Since I detest the idea of roaming behind the maids while they work, they naturally would take advantage of it. Then it would become a habit. And that’s when I would realize, blow the top when there would be dirty fans, formation of cobwebs, smudgy doors or patchy switch boards.

No amount of explaining, patience lecture, loud reminders or noisy threats would do good. My maid seemed to suddenly follow Buddhism to the core!

Then I thought of this idea which is called Pavlov’s theory. As you all know Pavlov successfully showed that repeating the experiment of ringing a bell followed by serving food to the dog, made it drool when it heard the bell ring any time next!

So I told my maid that when she wanted her salary, she needs to clean the fans. That will be like a reminder for me to get the monies out from the ATM for her. And on the salary day, she needs to clean the doors and switches.

It’s been only 3rd month of this experiment and she is hooked on to cleaning without any reminder!

Now if you read between the lines, it would occur to you that there are 2  dogs here in this experiment . 😉

My next experiment will be with my kids.

 

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