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Ask Slashdot: Best Incentives For IT Workers?
New submitter Guru Jim writes "Our company is currently looking at our incentives program and are wondering what is out there that helps motivate IT workers. We have engineers/sys admins as well as developers. With both teams, we have guns who are great and really engaged in looking after the customers, but some of the team struggle. Sometimes it is easy to say that there isn't too much work on and goof off and read Slashdot all day. This puts more pressure on some of the team. Management is being more proactive in making sure the work is shared equally, but we are wondering what can be out there that is more carrot than stick? We already have cake day, corporate massage day, bonuses for exams and profit share, but what is out there that is innovative and helps build a great workplace?" If you're reading this, the odds are good that you work in or around IT (or hope to); what would you most like to see your workplace implement?
Every day, each employee e-mails a short report of what s/he did that day. It doesn't take too long, and it encourages mutual accountability, even if only a few co-workers read them regularly.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Fire 'certified jerk' managers - that'll do wonders.
I will skip the obvious free drinks/food/social events and financial incentives.
When it comes to work, it is about this: Autonomy, mastery, purpose.
Give everyone meaningful, important and challenging work, so that their head is just above the water.
Let them be responsible for their work and reach the goal with their means and in their style as much as possible.
Let them improve themselves by doing so, send them on courses as well.
Automatise everything that can automated to get rid of repetitive, boring work.
Optimise anything, and challenge people to go back to the beginning.
Demand innovation, and allow time for it by doing "innovation time off" / "hack time" / 10 percent time.
rational and transparent decision making processes
merit based rewards structure
aggressive correction and eventual culling of counterproductive employees
pay me enough that I can get my own massages, keep your stupid toys out of my office, and
run an effective business
Good hardware, good monitors, good tools, allow them to pick some of their own (IDEs, OS, editors, etc). Keep up to date with technologies. Treat people like people, not "resources". After that, use some agile/XP principles like scrums to enable problems to be out in the open, and pair programming to get the weaker people improving. Give bonuses for outstanding quality and quantity of work. Listen to what people complain about and try to fix it.
>Management is being more proactive...
Ok, you're a marketing person. I'll forgive you. But never say proactive again.
>We already have cake day, corporate massage day
Your company obviously has too much turnover and you're trying desperately to reduce it. The problem is not going to be that you don't have enough cake days. The problem is going to be that it apparently sucks to work at your company. Cut down on the number of mandatory meetings, make sure everybody has a decent computer, get the damned boss to stop subverting the code check-in system, and... your programmers don't actually need to wear suits, do they? Stop that.
Give them flexible working hours.
There's nothing worse than coming to work in the morning and trying to "work" after your kid puked the entire night and you haven't had half an hour of solid sleep, or if you have a splitting headache that just refuses to go away on its own, but would likely go away if you could nap or walk for a couple of hours (depends on the person).
IT is a line of work where flexible hours are possible. Give them that, but still keep work clocked every week.
Best incentive of all:
Treat your employees like the human beings they are and appreciate what they do for you, and pay them accordingly. The golden rule as applied to the workforce.
It's not fucking rocket science.
It's just that "human resources management" these days, at its core, treats employees as overhead and cost centers instead of how a business earns its money.
--
BMO
Sounds like some old fashioned management and coaching is required, not incentives. Management needs to talk to the under performing staff and find out what the underlying issues are and if they can be fixed. Maybe something is happening in their personal life, maybe they need training, maybe they need more challenging work?
Anarchists never rule
People need meaningful work. Not all your work is meaningful. Cycle people in and out of the shit jobs. By the way, some folks definition of a shit job doesn't match others. I'm perfectly happy to bring the shred bin out to the shred truck for $40/hr. Some of my guys, however, are absolutely offended when I ask them if they'd take the shred out.
Flex time is the other "thing". We're pretty generous. I don't really care when you work, as long as your work gets done. As long as it doesn't screw up the team, we'll give you a roughly arbitrary amount of unpaid time off, and going to the doctor's office or picking up a sick kid is not a problem. Still need to hit deadlines and what, but I really don't want you at work if you're angry or sick.
Short-term cashflow problems are much easier to take care of with the sabatical, too. Right now, work is hard to find, and people are scared. Given the option of staying on at 5 hours/week of telecommuting + health care, versus getting laid off, we do pretty well. It's also helped our unemployment insurance, since folks who see the writing on the wall can get a new job while still technically employed, and we don't have to deal with firing them.
There really are pointy haired bosses and ClickOnThis is one of them.
Nobody reads daily reports, they are useless. And if you need to read them, you are useless.
You see, in a real company and not in manager lala-land, people got their tasks and they are given them by other people. Only those people really need to know. If you need to know about an activity, you need to know in advance and if you don't need to know, you don't need to know. And nobody is going to spend hours after the office closed reading what other people did. And do it in the morning? Then you are one of those time wasters.
The only people that think daily reports are useful are clueless managers who have no idea what is going on but are re-assured that since they get a list each day, something must have happened. The trick is to just fill such reports with enough random activity to look busy without taking to much time to generate and then concentrate on whatever you are doing for real. In a big enough company, it don't even matter. It is better to be thought spending weeks on a dozen trivial tasks then a single day working on one important one. Daily reports are not valued by their accuracy, but by their length. And be sure to put ANY tasks you possibly might get any time in the future,is part of the TODO list, it makes you look on top of things.
I fear one day getting a competent manager, I wouldn't know what to do. Luckily the changes of that happening are zero.
Ten to one ClickOnThis will one day introduce the daily report at the end of the day and the breakfast standup.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
If you haven't come across this already, this is a good place to start: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9137708/Opinion_The_unspoken_truth_about_managing_geeks?taxonomyName=Management&taxonomyId=14
As an IT worker myself, one of the most difficult things I struggle with is the frequent lack of acknowledgement and respect. I don't mean simple 'thanks for helping me' responses - although those do count, and workplaces where all employees belittle IT will experience a lot of IT turnover - but for the big things. When we break out all the stops to achieve some huge project, or put in extra unpaid time - we're often salaried, after all - to help someone, the reward is sometimes to have expectations raised, rather than to understand that was an exceptional effort. That discourages us from trying so hard next time.
It's difficult for management to understand what we do, and what they don't understand, they sometimes don't respect. Bonuses are nice, as is comp time. But I really just want to keep things working, and it is distinctly aggravating when I can't prevent a recurring problem because it requires changing the behavior of someone superior to me that doesn't care to make a change, as I'll always be there to clean up their mess. In some cases, it feels like not bothering to install toilets in a restroom because that's what the janitor is for.
All of that said, when it comes to weeding out those that aren't contributing anything... some sort of tracking system is essential, for techs to keep tabs on what they've done. They'll rightfully treat it with skepticism if such a system comes from On High, as the plausible reasoning is to find out how much they can shrink the department. But when brought in with the cooperation of the staff and their immediate management, it can be trusted more. It's also a tool to demonstrate to upper management just how much work we ARE doing, and to justify extra manpower. Simply saying that you need an extra hand often goes nowhere, since IT is frequently seen as a money pit.
And, of course, listen to the techs, the experienced ones in particular. They're the ones that can feel that a piece of software isn't working properly, or that a piece of infrastructure is not up to the task. You don't need to do what they're talking about, but consider their opinion. They're here to understand, fix, and instruct people in how to use technology. Knowing that they're being heard, and seeing visible changes in response to that feedback, does a lot to make a tech feel valued.
this only works if there is trust with management. I use to work for a company that did this and the upper management always picked goals that miraculously never could be met. This happened for years....
If you've given people everything they could reasonably ask for, including profit share, and they still aren't performing, then chances are they're just lazy.
Not everyone can count as one of the stars. Yes, he should ditch the outright slackers; but the guys who just come in to do a fair day's work to get paid and go home? Sorry, but in any organization, they will form the vast majority of the workforce. Unless your entire organization can live with a "team" of one superstar, you just don't have the option of having all stars.
As for reaching for the stick to try make people into something they can never become, it will just hurt morale for no real gain. Don't go that route. I've seen it tried several times, and it always backfires.
Do your best to keep people happy, keep them wanting to come to work every day, and just stoically accept the fact that over half the team really doesn't give a shit outside "get the job done, get paid".
Generally, three things motivate people:
1. Autonomy - can they at least sometimes discover something on their own that needs doing/fixing and go ahead and do it without okaying it with management?
2. Mastery - can they devote enough time to new things (e.g. technology) to feel that they are learning something *and* spending enough time on it to lead to mastery?
3. Purpose - do they have a sense of belonging to something larger than themselves (as opposed to in name only: "there are six people in this group, therefore they are a team!")
These things drive most people and are completely lacking in my workplace. Search YouTube for "RSA Animate drive" for a better description than I gave.
I always equivocate. Well, almost always.
You get more with the carrot than with the stick, so unless you're employing a group of starving donkeys I suggest cold, hard cash.
This is obviously true. Unfortunately, giving pennies to lots of peons would mean fewer dollars for senior management to plunder^W uh, award themselves in well-deserved hard-earned bonuses. The stick is what you'll get, because carrots are reserved for management.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Your slackers probably get more massages and cake than the hard workers
What makes it even worse is increasing workplace friction. Admin's a reactive job so they've got little/no control over their schedule, so they cannot get a massage perhaps because they're comp timing it or went home early because they've got a 11pm rollout scheduled, devs a proactive job so they can stop at any moment and get a massage. So you've just strongly preferentially rewarded one business group over another, increasing bad feelings. Even worse the most stressed group isn't getting the stress reducer. That's just not gonna end well.
The only thing worse than preferential rewards is out of the office stuff. My life is overscheduled/stressful enough, mandatory bar night/movie night/team building night/WTF night is just going to piss me off.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
If nothing's getting done on days employees are working from home, that smacks of bad management. When I work from home, I have to give my manager a report on what I've done that day. He's happy because he knows I'm getting my work done, and I'm happy because I didn't have to commute that day.
If, at your company, "work from home" is a euphemism for "take a day off"... why pretend? The company should just state "if you're above your execution rate for an entire week, you can take a day off the following week".
#DeleteChrome
Pay them more money.
Anything else is an insult to their intelligence. "Cake Day"? Jesus. Are you fucking kidding?
Of course you're right. This isn't chinese algebra. It's a pretty simple equation. Reasonable compensation, reasonable working hours and being treated with a modicum of respect is all most people want out of a job.
The rest is bullshit.
One of the ways this country got into trouble is when companies started looking for innovative ways to screw employees: They thought they were clever when they gave workers "benefits" like health care and pensions instead of simply giving them pay raises, and oops, people started living longer. They sold workers on 401k plans and "matching" instead of fixed-income pensions and oops, we're going to have a generation of senior citizens in poverty.
There are tales of CEOs so insightful that they realized by paying workers a living wage it would create a prosperous middle class that would fuel the most robust consumer economy ever, but apparently those CEOs are long gone. Today, they believe that somehow they can continue to degrade workers' incomes and it will not ever effect their own bottom line, so we have corporations that are looking for income streams that have nothing to do with their core business and it fucks everything up.
I've lived through the most amazing social transformation: from a vibrant, prosperous middle class to a burgeoning class of working poor. And there's no sign of it turning around.
It's not a political problem, or a government problem. It's a problem of an economic elite that has been allowed to exempt themselves from all the social rules and expectations. It's not that corporations are people, but that people are becoming corporations, and in doing so are allowed to become completely amoral. They have obliterated the social contract that raised so much of the world out of backbreaking wage-slavery and are now on an express train toward neo-feudalism.
You are welcome on my lawn.
No, the other kind...
Simple, straightforward, honest thanks for getting the job done, particularly in times of limited resources and increasing demands.
Of course this implies management that knows what's going on, who is doing it, and actually gives a sh*t. That may be a problem.
But even in that situation, you can help your cow-orkers by letting them know when they've done a good job; recognition by your peers can be a big help.
"Guru" Jim is asking the wrong people.
If he really wants to know what incentive structure would be better for his IT staff, he should ask them to design one for him. Give them a budget limitation, as appropriate.
Seriously, they'll be happy to do it and they'll do a much better job than either his management or someone answering generically who doesn't understand his employees and his business.
If he calls the people he considers his best workers "guns" and so on from the question, he doesn't understand IT well enough to create a good environment on his own anyway. However, I'm sure the experienced folks in his IT department know exactly who is worth their salary in the department and how to measure that for the managers to be able to figure it out also.
You've hired experts in the field, and you're asking on the web for how to manage them? They're supposed to be the experts on the IT needs of your company. Try asking them. Of course, I suppose that's a little too obvious and may produce too much information that reflects poorly on their management. So Caveat Emptor!
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
Quite bizarrely I see the same results in my west European country that used to be rich but is becoming less so every day. You blame it on raw capitalism, but here the ever increasingly socialist policies are sucking a part of the middle class (the part that is still working in a productive sector) bone dry to the benefit of lazy bureaucrats and entitlements for public teat suckers.
It seems that in both environments disrespect for those who actually create value is the reason for the downturn.
Flourescent (adj): smelling like ground wheat.
What's even more distracting for me personally is that, for some reason, the hottest female in the office decided a few months back that we were lunch buddies. (I dunno, maybe I'm the only guy there who hasn't hit on her, or something.)
Maybe in her not-so-subtle way she's trying to get you to rectify that oversight?
Anything that is not money is not an incentive. For example; no money, no training, no promotion, no job mobility, are not in fact incentives. Also yearly or semi annual self appraisals where every single bullet item is handed to you by management and then you're supposed to write a book report on each one 'quantifying' even though that's impossible to do, on how strenuously you adhere to the corporate goals, that's not an incentive either. And of course when you're done with that massive effort and the manager gets everyone together for a team review and the bottom line is that there's no money and no one's getting an increase again, for the 12th year in a row, that's not an incentive either. And when you don't allow lateral movement in the company because you have no ability to fill that job vacancy because we're all such special snowflakes and unless you find your own replacement, who in turn has to find their own replacement and so on, you can't even apply for that job, that's not an incentive either.
But mostly it's about money. Don't let anyone con you. My former CEO was given a 41 million dollar bonus in his next to last year for sending 50,000 US jobs to Asia and his retirement agreement is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The VP level officers of this company are millionaires, on paper. But these losers can't even reimburse the staff for their home office expenses like a telephone. So it's just about the money. Get as much money as you can for as long as you can and don't pay attention to any stupid team building bullshit or internal conventions or seminars on feeling good about feeling good about it. And always remember; HR is your enemy. Their job is to hate you and treat you like shit so you leave and they can replace you with someone 10 cents cheaper if they even replace you at all. Because to them the perfect company is one with zero employees. You're nothing but an overpriced replaceable part to them.
Money. It's about the money. Real money - cash or stocks that can be sold that day. Options aren't money. Promises aren't money. Fake job titles aren't money. Deferred comp contingent on you growing a fucking unicorn horn on your head in the year 2031 aren't money. And to be brutally honest, not even pensions are money - not any more. More and more companies are wriggling their way out of paying those too. So fuck them and sweet sounding bullshit they blather. It's the money. Documented in writing put in your hand money.
Except no fucking substitutes.
Assuming a 40 hour workweek, a 3% "above and beyond" incentive *should* mean they only expect an additional hour and 12 minutes out of you every week. In my experience, a comparable pay increase often comes with the expectation that you're going to be putting in another 10-15 hours per week, and then these fools wonder why no one wants to take them up on such a "great deal".
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
I think the problem may lie with the fact "Guru" Jim had to ask total strangers what his employees need as motivation. I'd suggest management get out and "manage by walking around"...talk to your people and see what motivates them or demotivates them and take it from there.
Look again at who ends up with all the money. Sure the bureaucrats get more then most workers - they get a middle class salary. The workers who are supposed to get the same don't, since the executives and owners keep all the profit for themselves - and the laws support this - often the middle class will be in the highest tax bracket along with the people earning millions.
So there are two basic solutions: either lower the public employee salaries, then watch what demand there is left in the marketplace drop like a stone OR start taxing the rich at higher lvls again (I think France is about to do this).
Talking about how the rich are the people who create jobs is strange, since they don't seem to be investing much of their money at the moment. And why is that? Simply said, there is not enough buying power in the population to afford many (domestic) products or luxuries. When people are barely surviving they will of course opt for buying cheap Chinese crap instead of a slightly more expensive local product. And the rich simply can't replace the demand of a healthy middle class, no matter how much money you give them. No person can use more then a few thousand new dresses/suits/cars per year.
What's wrong with looking outside your own office to see what other people are doing?
Well, isn't it kind of natural to feel "left out" when you see someone else get something and you didn't?
Geez, I would not even do that to my cats. If I feed one and don't feed the other one, I am guaranteed a fullbore catfight, and I will probably lose one cat.
It is really insulting to see bonuses distributed among management for their skill of getting me to work for peanuts.
It really makes me feel really stupid and taken advantage of to put in long hours, only to see someone else reap the benefit.
And to add insult to injury, the other guy got the benefit for the skill of talking me into the long hours. At that point I am finally so disgusted I can not keep my mind on my work - I just feel like a stupid patsy. I figure I am in the wrong place, unappreciated and unneeded, and ready to leave at the first opportunity, and let the suited and tied shakers of the hand make the damm thing work.
They seem to have gobs of money and authority - maybe they can go to the machine, wave their pens and threaten a bad review if the machine won't fix itself.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
Socialism is not the problem. The most successful OECD country in the world over the last 15 years (economically) is perhaps Norway. They're running nearly $0.5 trillion budget surplus, yet have almost 100% coverage for subsidized housing, government healthcare, etc.
Greece or Italy on the other hand, is bogged down in crony politics, where vested interests control the purse strings and wealthy individuals, corporations and families dominate politics. They "buy" the electorate with elaborate schemes. That's not capitalism, nor socialism. It's a gross sort of plutocracy.
"Creating value" is a misnomer, at least in how you're framing it. The middle class "creates value" in a post-industrial society. This is painfully obvious when you look at the fact that the relative economic strength of post-industrial economies is almost exactly in line with the percentage of the population within the "middle class" as broadly defined as capable of sustaining modern living standards (owning a house, car, etc) within their means, while having a limited surplus of disposable income, given regional living standards and prices.
Norway has an especially large middle class. Places such as the US and Canada have an average sized one, and places such as Italy have a smaller sized one, when using similar standards.
Cities in Norway are almost 70% middle class, by the same standards, the middle class of the US has decreased from 65% in the 1970s to around 50% today.
Inter-generational mobility is also much higher in Europe than in the US and Britain, who have a more "market oriented" approach to this topic.
I think it's pretty hare to make conclusions about which policies cause the downturns and income inequality.
As a consultant, I've had the opportunity to see a lot of different environments over the past 10 year or so. Here are the things that stand out to me the most:
First and foremost, get your shit together. No amount of workplace benefits will make up for a dysfunctional working environment. You can offer the worlds best benefits, but if people are stressed out at work, and constantly beating their heads against the wall to get things done, they aren't going to want to work there.
That will tend to attract people:
1. Competitive salary, and benefits. This is basic. You may have a fully stocked snack bar, but ultimately, people want work to support the rest of their lives. Fun environment, cheap wages works great for the people who are new to the industry. Vets are probably more interested in a competitive employment package.
2. Growth opportunities. Promoting from within, offering opportunities to people who have the passion and talent, but perhaps not every bullet point on the job listing, is a good way to get up and coming talent in the door. If someone thinks that your company will take their career the way they want it to go, they are much more likely to want to work with you.
3. Training opportunities. Certifications, etc. can be time consuming and expensive. A good educational program is a great way to keep people at the company, and also to upskill your employees. This is a great selling point.
4. Opportunities to pursue ideas. Having a lab, or equipment dedicated to trying new stuff is also a good way to attract and maintain talent. Anyone who has passion has a technology they want to get their hands on. Virtualization makes offering this easy. Giving people the opportunity to sell and prove their ideas is huge.