Employer and
maid sometimes have difficulties. They frequently go to Maid Agencies in Malaysia
for counselling. No matter the nationality of the helper whether she is from
Philippine or Indonesia. Majority of issues fall in the category of 1). Attitude
problem 2). Poor performance. Do these problems have relationship to each other,
if so, how? It is proven that attitude is a predictor of achievement even more
than IQ.
Attitude is defined as “a predisposition or a tendency to respond
positively or negatively towards a certain idea, object, person, or situation.”
In fact, the way of thinking or feeling about a person or a situation reflect
the behaviour. An attitude is a pattern of thought. It affects how people approach
everything they do. However attitudes have developed from past experiences;
changing behaviour, patterns of thought and outlook will result in a change attitude.
Attitude can be changed but it really need strong commitment and if it so
changed in positive way, it will be a major factor for the level of success.
Attitudes fall into one of two categories: a fixed mind-set and
a growth mind-set. A fixed mind-set person believes nothing can be changed.
This creates problems when there is a challenge since anything that appears to
be more than it can handle so it bounds to hopeless and overwhelmed. Employers
encounter more issue with such a fix mind-set maid during the employment
contract. Maid doesn’t want to adjust herself with new environment and change
her attitude and behaviour to learn about the new situation. For example, a domestic helper with a fix
min-set won’t try to cope with her homesickness issue and very seldom can
finish her contract. Bad attitudes are often the outcome of past experiences
and practices so it won’t easily change.
As a matter of fact, maids generally don’t have high level of attitude
awareness. They usually have less ability on handling their attitude. Their
poor attitude creates low self-esteem,
stress, fear, offence, anger and an inability to handle changes. Domestic
helpers usually don’t fail because of lack of skills. It is usually bad
behaviour, bad actions, or bad attitude. There is a strong link between
attitude and performance
In contrast; a domestic helper with a growth mind-set believe
that they can improve with effort. They outperform than those with a fixed
mind-set, even when they have a lower IQ, because they embrace challenges,
treating themselves as opportunities to learn something new. In fact, the best
attitude in life is the way of thinking “I can do”. A maid with a positive
attitude always has better performance since constantly embraces each challenge
as a learning experience. According to new research positive attitude may help more than IQ.
All in all, attitude is
everything and has very important impact on performance. All involved recruitment agencies especially source
countries as well as employers should find a way to know the attitude of their maids if she is optimistic or
pessimistic. However, knowing attitude is timely, complicated and multiplex
conditions are involved. Mostly maids show their best behaviour when they are
interviewed or during the training period and arrival. In spite of that, by recognizing
habits and behaviour, attitude can be predicted so they can find a way to enlighten
the maid and help her to improve and adjust in the best way. At last, good
attitude must be reciprocal in which employer’s approach can effect on maid
attitude so that consequently the performance of the maid will be improved and
a successful employment will be expected.
Agensi Pekerjaan Danu Gemilang Sdn Bhd
Foreign Domestic Worker Agency, Malaysia
Website: www.dgmaidagency.com.my
Telephone & Fax No.: +60 3 87406041
Mobile No: +60 129813365 / +60125383365
Email Add: ap.danugemilang@mail.com / info@dgmaidagency.com.my
