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Now the Buck$ Doesn’t Work!

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Motivating The Team

The last 20 years has seen the monetisation of just about everything – including motivating and ‘engaging’ staff (and I use the term loosely).  What was once the preserve of  salesmen and factory workers on ‘bit rate’ has since become the norm across the public, private and 3rd sector.

But are we ‘richer’ for these practices?  My conclusion is an unequivocal “NO”!  Leaders and managers purchasing productivity are in danger of turning their business into a middle of the road mediocracy.

Change lanes now!

Driving output through reward is not a new concept.  Paying “bonuses” in return for targets met or exceeded to ‘incentivise’ higher output for greater stakeholder gain has been with us for some time.  However, performance related bonuses have evolved and morphed into hygiene factors – their presence will no longer motivate but their absence will de-motivate.

Organisations have become hogtied into making these payments for less than exemplar work and the message being conveyed is that you want more of the same!  (You’re paying the bonus aren’t you?)

Getting it wrong

Reward routine behaviour and you’ll get more routine behaviour.  Want more from your staff?  They’ll now expect more in return as you’ve been rewarding mediocrity previously.

Stop the bonus payments and they’ll become de-motivated, withholding all discretionary effort and most likely affecting your business’ bottom line.  De-motivated and disengaged staff are a destructive force.

Getting it right

Real engagement is achieved without the short burst of endorphines a bonus cheque creates.

Trade in the rusty old vehicle for long term career development; alignment between organisational and personal values and aspirations; increased responsibility, accountability, recognition and more autonomy; your team want to be heard and respected; enfranchised and valued.

Great leaders are not ‘transactional’ but ‘transformational’; they don’t buy effort from their team, they positively inspire it.

Financial rewards are simply not sophisticated enough to achieve that.

Flatter, more compressed management structures; intra-communications and ease of connectivity means a personal message recognising the efforts of the individual as part of the team is not only desireable – it’s unquestionably achievable.

Leaders need to orate what ‘success’ looks like and managers need to design simple yet comprehensive systems that measure inputs as well as outputs and outcomes; rewards should be linked to behaviours as well as results.

Motivating without money

  • Have incremental non-financial rewards such as invitations onto work panels or groups; more autonomous working; more trust; sponsored time off to follow a pursuit they enjoy;
  • Sponsor further academic studies;
  • Demonstrate you know your staff – give rewards that will mean something to them personally;
  • Make it clear that you’re rewarding the inputs as well as the outputs and outcomes – there are clear rules and a code of conduct which must be observed; this is about behaviours as well as results;
  • Catch people doing it right – during the process hold up a few shining examples of the kinds of behaviour and activity you’re expecting, this will act as a ‘reality check’ for the others;
  • Be as good as your word – if the reward was earned, then give it no matter how much it costs;
  • If the reward wasn’t earned, explain why and make sure the misunderstanding doesn’t lie with you;
  • Be prepared to challenge inappropriate or wrong behaviour along the way too. Organisational culture can be affected as much by behaviour which isn’t challenged as it can by behaviour which is rewarded!

Engagement is about more than a few bucks on the bottom line – a truly engaged and highly motivated workforce will strain every sinew to ensure your business remains viable because they believe in it.

About

Chairman of Glasgow CMI; EFQM Business Excellence Practitioner & Accredited Assessor; Official Ambassador for the CMI; Head of Operations at CRBS in Scotland.

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{ 12 Responses }

  1. Ryan Biddulph says:
    Hi Colin, Great points all around. Focus on being a supreme source of inspiration for others. Be a high energy, world changing personality. View yourself as this type of person and move into inspired action to become this person. You will have to do little to motivate your troops when you inspire them with your acts, and you certainly won't have to buy their industriousness off. Thanks for sharing your insight Colin. RB
    • Colin Millar says:
      Thanks Ryan! Leading from the front is so important yet most people misinterpret that as "don't ask people to do something you can't / won't do yourself" which completely misses the sentiment of "leading"! You're completely right, leading is about generating energy and buzz; motivation and focus; vision, drive, determination to do the right things at the right time and in the right way for the right reasons and distilling that into your team too. It's about recognising that you need to motivate the component parts to create the sum and that you can do that without having to pay bonuses. Great comment, thanks.
  2. Wes says:
    However, performance related bonuses have evolved and morphed into hygiene factors – their presence will no longer motivate but their absence will de-motivate.
    Unfortunately, this seems to be the standard not only in business, but in the general US population as well. An exploding sector is getting so used to government hand-outs they have no motivation left to work for anything themselves.
    • Colin Millar says:
      Hi Wes, absolutely, I live in the UK but the concept and issues raised in the blog are almost global (I say almost because we do still have some countries where capitalism is not the established norm, wages are kept low and 'bonuses' would be alien to their culture). I've also started a discussion paper to examine whether there's a correlation between the prevalent cultures in business and those in our educational establishments. This has been written from a primarily Scottish perspective with all subjects and experiences being of Scottish dissent and education but I'd love to hear the views of a much wider group from around the world. In essence, part of the thesis is that as we've moved from an education system concerned with conformity driven through 'threat', we now have a culture of incentivisation and rewards for all and this has recently become reflected in business through the regular hand out of bonues. If you'd be interested in joining the 'education' discussion, please let me know and I'll forward a link but essentially, yes I completely agree with you that we've lost the ability to motivate at a much deeper and more engaging level - an art we should re-learn.
  3. Colin Millar says:
    Priyangshu - I don't charge for my blogs, I only blog for the other joys I get such as sharing views and ideas and I seek to inspire and be inspired by others. Traffic Coleman - great point and another fundemental of motivation, visualise a goal and then aspire to achieve it. Happy customers are a great goal to aim for. DiTesco - thanks for the feedback, totally agree. Humans are very deep, emotional and complex beings (and we're great for it) and we need to start tapping into the deeper motivations through alignment between personal and professional values; shared visions and goals etc. Dave Lucas - many thanks for the feedback, again totally agree with your excellent points.
  4. david says:
    The part where you said to give rewards that would mean something to the person in a personal way made me laugh -- I used to have a boss that had a potato farm, and he used to give his favorite people a bag of potatoes. Um, I think I would have preferred cash... ha ha
    • Colin Millar says:
      Ah your boss with the potato farm made a fundemental mistake - he rewarded people with a token that was of value to him rather than thinking about whether it was valuable or meaningful to the people receiving the reward. If you replaced the potatoes gift with something like an iPad2; a few circuits in a Ferarri Testarosa; a trip in a hot air balloon; a week-end away for 2 then the reward may have been more meaningful. But it doesn't need to be a big reward - many of these things could be 'gifted' by a sponsor company or you could do small things like give people a personalised note of appreciation citing some excellent work they've done, showing you know what's going on and the vital role they play in your organisation. I once had a boss make my department a Banana Cake - seems like a strange reward but it was his recognising the efforts they'd made and we'd went from the worst to best performing in the whole of Scotland. The roles and employers we were with meant we couldn't do financial rewards but the mere recognition of their attainment was enough to inspire them.
  5. Priyangshu says:
    Yeah , we should not run after money but money is the thing that motivates every blogger and heads them towards success !
  6. Dave Lucas says:
    Colin, I love what you said about leadership. And there are many many ways to motivate people besides dangling the "money carrot" in front of them! It's also a good idea to give everyone a good "mind map" of what is expected of them and how best they can achieve their goals!
  7. DiTesco says:
    I can't agree with you more. Behavioral management is extremely complicated as you are dealing with a human workforce and in most cases, each one of them is a case by case basis. However, there are indeed motivational "rewards" that you can give them as a "token" of a job well done, that does not necessarily mean, money in their pocket. proving an "added" education although is not "a monetary" compensation per se, is indirectly a form, as they would most like not do it if they have budgetary concerns. As you said, a demotivated workforce is a "destructive" power and in my opinion a "disaster" waiting to happen. Not easy, but definitely doable.
  8. TrafficColeman says:
    Money should not always be your targeted goal..you should think about gong after making the customers happy. "Black Seo Guy "Signing Off"
    • Colin Millar says:
      Absolutely agree - money is actually a very basic and poor motivator. Great leaders know this and are able to meet the needs and desires of their teams in other ways, giving far greater motivation than could ever be bought.