Keyword: motivation

When the discussion of how to compensate and reward employees comes up, almost invariably someone comes up with the idea of the “employee of the month” award.  Sometimes the name of the award is less tired, maybe it’s outstanding associate of the year.  Or the top achiever of the quarter.  It doesn’t matter what you call them, these kind of awards are a bad idea.

Every time I tell people not to fall for this easy trap in the employee compensation world, they object.  They complain that I’m harping on them all the time to think of ways to reward employees that don’t involve money.  They say: “here’s a great way to reward people for good performance, it’s cheap, what more could you want?”  And there are hundreds of companies that proclaim to make “tools to motivate employees” who push this junk (here’s a link to one).

For the first clue as to what’s wrong with these kind of awards, walk into your local fast-food joint, distribution company, or supermarket.  There, over in the corner, you’ll see it.  The dusty brown frame with little brass name plates, and maybe faded photos taken from employee badges.  The employee of the month award plaque.  Look carefully.  What’s the most recent date?  If you’re lucky it will only be six months ago.  I’ve seen some as old as three years, with not an update since.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen one with more than ten months on it.

The first and most obvious problem is that it’s hard to keep up the momentum with these things.  With all the things you have to do to run a business every month, this inevitably falls to the bottom of the list.  So for a couple of months you wrestle with it to get it done at the last minute, then you find yourself a month or two behind, finally it just falls by the wayside.  What a message this sends to the employees: you can’t even find time for this simple little form of recognition.

Employee of the Month

Another problem is also obvious.  Look closely at that plaque.  See any patterns?  Yes, you see the same couple of employees over and over again.  And why is that?  Because you really only have two choices when awarding these things: 1) be honest and give it to the best employees, or 2) rotate it around and give it to everyone once.  In the first case, the same few employees will consistently rise to the top.  In the other case, the award becomes a joke to the employees.  Which is why it’s always done the first way.  And the pattern is inevitable.  What a wonderful message it sends to your employees, that only a handful of them are worth recognition.

Which brings us around to the effect of these awards on the employees.  Does it really reward the winner?  Or do they feel awkward for being singled out in this beauty contest that really doesn’t mean anything?  They know there is no money in it, they know the choice wasn’t really objective (more on that later), and they know you’re not recognizing them because you want to, but because it’s the end of the month and someone has to get the silly thing.  They also know they are either going to get a lot of grief from their friends for winning it, or a bunch of resentment from others who didn’t.  So they sheepishly accept it, and the flaccid applause of the folks gathered in the lunch room, and go back to work.

What do the non-winners (the other 99% of the employees) think about it?  More often than not, they feel like…  losers.  To make themselves feel less like losers, they badmouth the award, and tell everyone that only idiots and suckups get it.  And they probably give the winner a hard time for winning it.  They certainly don’t say to themselves: “gee how do I get one of those?”

Which brings me around to the final point: how do you make this decision?  If the choice is truly objective (top sales, lowest complaints, etc.) you need to resign yourself to the fact that you have no control over the award.  And constant repeat winners are inevitable.  And the losers, who already know they are losers, certainly don’t need this award to rub their noses into it.

Or, you can make the award be more subjective: “most eager”, “best team player”, or maybe “best overall”.  This puts you back in control, but then it introduces a number of problems.  Like accusations of favoritism.  Or having it seem arbitrary.  Or second-guessing from all corners about why you chose who you did that make a baseball argument look like a picnic.  Ugh…

The more you think about employee awards, the less you’ll think they are a good idea.  I have a number of thoughts on better ways to reward and recognize your employees.  Stay tuned to CLWill.com for more.

Mike Rowe

Recently I discovered a fun television show, Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe on the A&E cable network.  In this show, Mike travels the world to spend a day with people doing “dirty jobs”.  As the seasons have progressed (it’s in the third season now, celebrating its 100th episode on Sept. 5th), the jobs have become more obscure, and needless to say, more dirty.  He has done everything from the obvious garbage collector and sewer worker to more obscure jobs such as “avian vomitologist” (owl vomit collector — no I don’t know why).

Mike always gets dirty, always manages to have fun, and is usually a good sport when the people who hold these jobs make him do the most disgusting parts of the job.  But most importantly, through it all, Mike always manages to treat the people who actually do the job with respect.  As they say in the promos, these are the people who hold the jobs that make modern civilized life possible.  So, even though he jokes with them, they always come off as people with dignity — even when covered in poop.

Watching this show is certainly a “dirty little secret” for me, but it’s more than simply that.  I find myself watching this show and wondering why the people who do these jobs continue to do them.  How do their managers motivate them?  What kind of incentives can you give someone to climb in a pen with 250 five-foot long alligators, day in and day out?

Most of the people aren’t just doing this for a summer job from college, they are, often as not, long-time veterans.  These are people who not only do these jobs most of us wouldn’t even touch, but they do them for decades.  How is that possible?  And what does that teach the rest of the managers in the world about motivating our teams?

I don’t think it’s about the money.  Certainly there is evidence that you can get people to endure lousy jobs in horrible places for lots of cash.  The oil fields of Iraq or northern Alaska come to mind.  But most of the jobs Mike looks at are not these jobs.  These are regular folks doing nasty jobs for reasonable money.  It has to be about something other than money.

And I don’t think it’s because it’s the only job available, or even the only job they know.  Quite often, the people who are doing the jobs are college graduates, who have a choice of job and location.  They have chosen this work!

No, these people are doing it because there is something about these jobs they really enjoy.  Maybe it’s because they get to work outdoors, or work quite independently, or work with their hands, or work with people they like, or perhaps do something at which they know they are the best in the world.

In fact, I think this show teaches a very important lesson to managers: people choose to work at their job for quite individual and personal reasons.  And it’s extremely important for their manager to understand those reasons if they want to keep them happy and motivated in the long term.

As a manager, it can help to ask yourself why you are working there, and try to reflect carefully on why your people are there.  Perhaps you work in a non-profit where there are altruistic motives that help, but there are also many other factors: organizational climate, intellectual challenge, comraderie, industry reputation, and yes, money.  And it’s different for every person there.  It’s truly important that you know what makes your people tick, if you want to keep them there and motivated in the long term.

So, when you are trying to figure out how to make your team run better, perhaps you can take a lesson from Mike Rowe and look for the place of respect.  Look for that something in everyone that makes them want to climb out of bed and come to work.  And work to make that one thing better for each of them every day.

One of my favorite TV shows is AMC’s Sunday Morning Shootout.  It is a show about the movie business that delves deep inside in a way that is not gossipy, but explores what makes the business tick.  Hosted by two veterans, there is no gloss, just meat.  I love it.

Stephen Spielberg was on recently, talking about the start of his career and the amazing filmography he has developed over the years.  One of the subjects was the role of “pressure” in the development of movies.  He talked about the making of Jaws that was budgetted for $3.5m and 50 days of shooting.  Compare that with today’s $200m movies with schedules that last the better part of a year.  He told of being called reckless for coming in at $10m and 120 days.  But it was a hit, and that started the blockbuster era.  But that’s not really the issue I want to examine.

Stephen Spielberg

Spielberg said that the “best thing that ever happened to me was doing five years of episodic television.”  He feels that directors who come out of that world, where you have to develop and shoot a complete story in a matter of days, are far better off that those who come out of the world of MTV or commercials.  Those people, he feels, become drunk with the freedom of the longer shooting schedule of movies, and get completely out of control.  He summarized by saying:

Pressure is the greatest thing, I think, to give us directors some direction in how to economize our storytelling, and to end up with as little as possible on the cutting room floor.

From my experience in the world of the software business, where deadlines are commonplace, and often absurd, I feel that Stephen is right — to a point.  Well thought out, crisp deadlines that force a team into a focused economy mode, are excellent.  They help to get everyone on the mission of eliminating noise, and focus, focus, focus.  Good stuff.  But arbitrary deadlines, and especially ones that no one believes are set for a legitimate reason, are worse than no deadline at all.

I’ve seen teams that have deadlines that are real and meaningful (such as an immovable conference date) that seem to perform miracles in the weeks and days before the deadline.  Under these circumstances, I’ve seen groups that are able to reject random inputs, clarify their goals, and truly bond as a team, relying on each other in ways that seemed otherwise impossible.  Some of the best work I’ve seen has been done under these kind of schedules.

On the other hand, I’ve seen many managers who witness this kind of reaction, and attempt to artificially create this level of intensity.  They set arbitrary dates, dates that are often absurdly ambitious, and threaten doom if the date is not met.  They don’t bother to explain the significance of the date (if there is one) but expect the team to meet it, apparently out of fear of consequences alone.

Worse yet, they will later back off on the date, or even let the dates pass without notice, almost with a “just kidding” kind of attitude.  This is terrible for the team.  The ones who actually worked themselves to death will be filled with resentment, and the wiser ones who detected the ruse will get more cynical yet.  In all, nothing good comes of this, and the team is demoralized.

The worst managers get furious at this behavior, can’t believe the team simply ignored their mandate, and get more bellicose and belligerent.  This begets a death spiral, the team gets more downtrodden, the manager gets more upset at the team morale…  and as the saying goes: the beatings continue until morale improves.

But when used effectively, budget restrictions and meaningful deadlines can do marvelous things to enhance team building.  Some of the best teams in existence were forged from the crucible of seemingly impossible deadlines.  Just don’t fake it, and expect it to work.