Motivating Improved Productivity

The academic community and other theorists regularly question whether financial rewards are actually motivational, or just excuses for organizations to manipulate their poor, overworked employees, who would much prefer to be motivated by the implicit value of the work itself.
(See Alfie Kohn: Punished by Rewards.)

Most organizations are very interested in creating ways to manage performance in such a way as to realize productivity and efficiency gains.  This generally becomes a process of establishing individual and/or team goals that support the organization’s overall business plan or mission.

Focusing on productivity also provides a unique opportunity for organizations to improve communications at all levels.  In the workplace, both employees and their supervisors have their own perceptions about their jobs that frequently don’t match.  This, of course, leads to inefficient work habits and less than optimal results.

Developing a system through which performance results are articulated and documented requires participation on the part of all employees.  This involvement in a communication process often leads to improved productivity in and of itself – even before the connection to financial rewards is made.

An organization that has functional, established teams whose members acknowledge them as such can benefit from a pay-for-performance plan that provides meaningful financial rewards for collaborative goal achievement.  In this context, the facilitation of team processes can be enhanced by making sure that all team members participate equally in the payoff, even if some team members are higher-paid, and/or have higher levels of responsibility than others.  In a sense, they all sink or swim together.  This creates more peer pressure to perform, which is one of the fundamental benefits of establishing teams in the first place.

If it can be shown that difficult-to-achieve goals were met and/or exceeded, and that they resulted in greater outcomes or better operating efficiencies, senior management will feel comfortable proposing higher pay levels, at both base pay and incentive levels.

Although there is much to be said for creating meaningful work for employees, financial rewards are, for most people, powerful motivators.

– Shari Dunn, Managing Director

https://companalysis.wordpress.com/

Paying for Performance

There are four primary benefits to linking pay to performance:

• Motivate improved productivity consistent with overall organizational objectives
• Improve communications between supervisors and their employees
• Help facilitate team processes
• Substantiate higher compensation levels

As an employer, you probably assume that paying for performance is something that you should at least try to do.

What is performance?  Chances are it means different things to different individuals in your organization.  To some, it may mean having the tools to achieve results.  To others, it may mean the end results themselves.  This is a critical distinction.

The tools are the means of achievement:  the enablers, if you will.  They include skills, traits, and behavioral competencies.  These are the characteristics of the employees that enable them to produce results.

The end results are what happen as a consequence of the individual’s competencies.  Results include goal achievement, meeting standards, and other accomplishments that can be objectively measured in terms of quantity, quality, and/or timeliness.

Organizations need to define exactly what they mean by performance if they hope to be able to effectively link pay to performance.

– Shari Dunn, Managing Director

https://companalysis.wordpress.com/