The One Thing We All Have in Common
One of the great challenges that many businesses face is how to motivate people in a way that is fair and will deliver consistent results. This is particularly difficult because people are motivated by such a different array of things. Many companies have tried bonus schemes to varying degrees of success. One of the prerequisites of a successful bonus scheme is making sure that it is well understood, transparent and that individual people can see how their efforts directly relate to the bonus that they get.
Other challenges of bonus schemes is that once started it becomes hard to stop them (as people feel something is being taken away); getting the wrong metrics can be disastrous as people focus their efforts on what they have worked out will benefit them personally, and they have limited application with research showing that the more mentally complex something is the greater risk is that a bonus will actually reduce performance effectiveness. Author Daniel Pink pointed out in “Drive”, his book on motivation, that human motivation is largely intrinsic, and that the aspects of this motivation can be divided into autonomy, mastery, and purpose.
A clue as to how to motivate people lies outside of work in looking at what people do with their free time and resources. Many people will invest hours into a sport, hobby or cause that they love and feel passionate about. People will even invest large amounts of money into their hobbies and interests. What is the attraction that sport and hobbies have that people will willingly invest time, effort, energy and resources into them and how do we take this learning into work?
While I have seen many approaches to applying this learning, I think the book “The Great Game of Business” by Jack Stack, best captures my personal experience and learnings, and that is that people love to win. It is something we all have in common across all people, positions and cultures. If you can create an environment where people feel like they're coming to work every day and that they are winning in their role as an individual, a team and a company then you create something people want to be a part of. People want to be part of a winning team.
Are you winning as a business? Is this something that you know for certain? If so, are you sharing that information with your team? (And if you are not, are you drawing on the team strength to see what you need to do differently?) Do individuals within your team know whether they are winning and whether their contribution is making a significant difference to the overall success of the company? As business owners and managers it is our responsibility to ensure that our team has a scoreboard that shows what winning looks like and records how close the team is to winning every moment of the day. When we can do this we allow people to take autonomy, master their skills and proactively help the organisation to make a difference. If people believe in our purpose and believe in their part in that purpose, then you're well on the way to creating an exceptional company, where both you and your team want to come to work every day and to give your very best - bonus scheme or not!
