ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to introduce managing people to the ideas of cognitive dissonance and relative deprivation in understanding negative behaviour. It explains the ways of handling negative feelings and shows managing people why these are important in managing people. The theory of cognitive dissonance may suggest a helpful framework for understanding the unreliable relationship between feeling and behaviour. Pre-requisite of feeling psychological discomfort is to be aware of some adverse conditions. In considering how a person responds to a feeling of psychological discomfort, two adaption processes are important: distortion and dilution. Individuals may endure abject deprivation, they may rationalise their grievance away, and their resultant behaviour may be more strategic than relevant to their feelings. The relationship is unreliable, and it would be wrong to trust it when managing people are faced only with behaviour. Manager is trying to motivate a person who is anxious, they simply will not respond, because they will not see what managing people are doing.
