Editor's Note: Let us recount, dear friends, all the ways in which we in HR and the rewards field are our own worst enemies. Fun, yes?
This is inspired by a post with the same title on Seth Godin's blog, which opened on this note:
If you want employees to go job hunting in order to leverage you into giving them a raise to keep them, then by all means, only give them a raise when they go job hunting.
Thinking that this approach lent itself well to employee compensation, where we are constantly shooting ourselves in the feet via the unintended consequences of our poorly construed and sometimes just foolish practices and policies, I came up with the following:
If you want to encourage employees to focus exclusively on getting their own jobs done, to the point of ignoring or even working at cross purposes with colleagues, then incent them heavily on individual results with no counterbalancing rewards or reinforcement practices. Works like a charm!
If you want to spend additional money on employee compensation without generating any impact on outcomes or behaviors, then give employees a bonus based completely on your discretion and tell them only that it is based on your judgment about what they deserve. It's a great way to suck empowerment right out of the workplace!
If you want to actively undermine your FLSA classification practices or at least create internal pressure that runs counter to accurate classification, then design programs and policies that reward exemption status by making it a hurdle that must be crossed in order to get better pay or benefits. Congratulations on creating a class of employees who will now actively lobby (aided by their unwitting bosses) to be made exempt as an acknowledgement of their professionalism and value! I'm sure the Department of Labor will be very empathetic.
If you want to magically turn your bonus plan into an entitlement -- one where employees believe that money is due them no matter what, almost like an extra piece of their base salary -- then pay out the same (or nearly) amount every year whether the organization successfully meets its objectives or not. And for heaven's sake, if you do vary it a little one way or another do not provide a clear and detailed explanation as to why!
If you want to appear two-faced and hypocritical, tell employees that the organization values teamwork, integrity and courage, and then ensure that people whose work interactions are the very antithesis of these values (but who produce desired outcomes) are visibly rewarded and shown appreciation.
I'll bet you've got some of your own. Share them in the comments!
Ann Bares is the Founder and Editor of Compensation Café, Author of Compensation Force and Managing Partner of Altura Consulting Group LLC, where she provides compensation consulting and survey administration services to a wide range of client organizations. She earned her M.B.A. at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School and enjoys reading in her spare time. Follow her on Twitter at @annbares.
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