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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?
That sounds like enough of an incentive to me.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
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.
Not the best for productivity but best incentive that works for Secret service agents, presidents, politicians and ceo's.
$ = Money
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.
http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2011-12-21
You want to know why folks work their asses off to create shit for free and goof off at work when they're being paid for it?
1. The free shit they do is shit they find interesting. Whether the programming is interesting or challenging or they are wrting software that solves a problem that means something to them.
2. The work they are doing for your company is either unchallenging, does something meaningless in their opinion, or both.
All the high pay, pizzas, games, massages, or any other motivational tricks you got from a book (or worse from a know-nothing managment consultant) will not work - at least over the long term.
Here's what you do: start hiring entry level people to learn the system. The entry levels will find that work challenging and rewarding for a couple of years. You can pay them shit.
The current crop? Start letting some of them go. The best and brightest have already left.
That's all you can do.
>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.
Although a lot of companies would like to invest in their people, and give them incentives and so forth, one big problem in the IT arena is:
How to should you invest in your workers? I.e., send them to training. Or even let them just educate themselves about Java/Hadoop/NoSQL/whatever without working on a project for a few months. That in itself is great incentive instead of focusing on billable hours all the time.
The desire of the company is that you're investing in the future of the developer. But the problem is once they're all well and trained, they can simply jump ship, and the company isn't able to recoup their investment.
So what ends up happening is companies don't provide training, leading to the phenomenon of IT people having to read 2 hours of material every night just to keep up.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
I applaud the pro-active nature of the organization on this, and appreciate your efforts to have a strong preference of carrot over stick.
I have been managing IT Operations teams for ~10yrs now (with a rooted background in SysAdmin), and more often than not, in my own experience, it is the organizational culture that often strongly correlates to the work output of a collective team. I have worked on companies that paid absolutely ass and were not overly generous with there employees, yet people understood the purpose, the mission, and their role, and gave 110%. I have worked at companies that were more than generous with payroll and side benefits, and folks slacked off.
Without knowing you or your background (nor the respective company), I can say that folks are often cognizant of the extremes they can get away with at work. If you (or the company as a whole) conveys an easy-going atmosphere where even the slackers are well tolerated, well, water sinks to the lowest point. This can often be detrimental to others around them, as it results in "Well if they aren't going the extra mile, why should I?" I believe just about anyone who is reading this has had that very thought cross their mind at one point or another, and it can be a valid one. Giving someone free massages, or cupcakes, or even a hooker aren't exactly motivational items - actually, they work the other way, in that encouraging folks to "take a break" from things, these same folks who even when working you are suggesting aren't putting in a sound effort.
Solution? Again, without know you or the org, do away with the massages, and most other extraordinary benefits that cost the company money, and instead convert this to regular financial bonus incentive. Make a big point on how performance relates to money, and more times than not, I find folks will go above and beyond to earn the extra incentive. You may have a few bad apples you clearly need the stick, but between the two, I'd suggest you may be on the way to success.
Best of luck!
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
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.
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".
There are two things that motivate me, and the one can't do without the other, both motivation condition must be met for me to thrive at work:
1) A good salary, so I can work and save towards my biggest dreams, I have to have something to chase.
2) An interesting assignment, an interesting project. This is what makes me WANT to go to work every day.
Here is what works, and what doesn't work:
What doesn't work:
Telling me that every job is interesting, and that I should be interested when I am not.
Faking interest.
Fake team spirit. (I'd like to work with MOTIVATED co-workers that actually take a great interest in their job, passion if you like!)
Fake motivation. Don't even try, your employees can see through you like you're made of glass, the only reason they smile at your ideas are that you are directly responsible for their paychecks.
What DOES work:
Honesty, above all. Always be 100% honest towards your employees, fail at this, and we will be sure to look elsewhere, and one day you'll fail severely because your ego blinds your eyes. So keep honest, always share everything, don't fake, lie or hide. People are more forgiving than you may think.
Interesting projects. What's interesting to you may not be that interesting to me, sure - I am a professional, so I'll do the job regardless, but don't ask me to fake interest. Just trust me that I'll do a good job anyway, because I can and will...which brings us to the next level:
Trust me, trust your employees. The single best thing you can do for your employees are to really trust them. If they deliver, they deliver, nothing magical about that. We're all in this boat called YOUR Company anyway, and no one of us have ANY interest in letting it sink, so why should we perform worse if you don't constantly nag, create reports and call into personal meetings?
Don't believe that we'll sit there and surf the web because we really want to surf the web, this is something most of us can do at home, and if we do it at work, it is to relieve stress, and to keep up to date with an otherwise perhaps important network...yes...this could potentially be your next employee even. Many of us keep up to date with technology this way, we're paid professionals, just don't expect us to do that work at home too, we do it because it's our passion. Force is NOT the way.
Remember, a little understanding *and DO NOT TRY TO FAKE UNDERSTANDING* will go a really long way. Most IT workers are above average when it comes to intelligence (albeit, in some cases...one can really dispute and wonder about this). So when you try to explain to us why you have to cut back on bonuses, perks or whatever - tell the TRUTH, especially if you know the truth is going to sting a bit, if we discover that you lied, oh boy...mistake!
That's it really, some clean honesty.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
If there's one thing that I've learned from my time in management positions after being in non-management positions, it's that incentives have to be personalized. I've given someone a 50 dollar bonus and saw no productivity increase, and given the same person a gift certificate for a pizza outing for her family, and she was overwhelmed with appreciation, as well as a major increase in productivity for the week following the gift certificate.
Reason being, she couldn't spend the 50 bucks on anything she wanted when she was a single mom who had to spend time with her kids every night and figure out dinner when she came home from work. When I didn't know she was a single mother, I didn't give her any incentive that she'd respond to. Knowing that she was a single mother, meant I could give her an incentive that she knew she'd be able to use and would make her life easier or better.
Until you can give your employees something that will help them out personally, they're just going to see that as a bonus, not a motivator. Give your management some leeway on what they give as an incentive, while you focus on the why . This forces your management to know their personnel somewhat personally, allows them to look good for giving the people something specifically useful to them, the company for giving management enough leeway, and the employee will want to earn incentives that (s)he knows is useful to them.
"Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup." ~ohcrapitssteve
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
Pay them more money.
Anything else is an insult to their intelligence. "Cake Day"? Jesus. Are you fucking kidding?
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.
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.
The flexibility in hours being the strong point. Exactly why I started my own company. I get to choose when I work, and how much I work (that tends to be more work, but I'm happier doing it, because well I reap the rewards). People like to be respected for their work. I know a lot of developers (beside myself), that get really pissed of when they do this excellent piece of software that generates $$$ for the company and don't get even a pat on the back in return, bonuses, massages and such are SF to bossess/managers that are like that. So the bottom line is, respect your people, value their knowledge and resourcefulness and give them money. Share the profits, or give them raises, but it has to be cash in these times. Teambuildings don't put bread on your table.
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Having both makes one a genius.
There are only four motivators for human behavior including writing good software. They are:
Money
Sex
Power
Fear
Money: Figure out the minimum amount of money your programmer will NEED to continue to work for you writing your code. Start him at 50% higher than that number. IF version 1.0 works, then increase his salary to 100% more than the minimum amount that he needs.
Sex: Hire lots of cute young girls without husbands to work in your office. *Very sensitively* approach the subject to them that they can earn signifiant salary bonuses if they have inter-office affairs with the programmers. If you're not sure how to approach this subject sensitively then don't bring it up all, even as a joke. You don't need any sexual harassment lawsuit and the young ladies will probably figure your company policy out by themselves.
Power: Every dork programmer had some asshole in high school bully them. Tell your programming staff that if version 1.0 ships without major programming errors then you'll hire some local goons to track down the jerks who made their lives miserable and beat the fuck out them. All on high-definition video for their entertainment (or as supplemental erotic stimulation while they're boffing the administrative assistants)
Fear: Joseph Stalin told the nuclear physicists of the Soviet Union in 1946 that they would either deliver an atomic bomb in five years or spend the rest of their sweet short lives in the Arctic Salt Mine Gulag. He got his bomb. Then gave 'hero of the Soviet motherland' medals to all of them. He killed about 10000000 people and died peacefully in his sleep. He understood Fear.
What's wrong with looking outside your own office to see what other people are doing?
There are two things you can do which will matter
1) Don't disincentivize -- If an employee is willing to put in 55 hours, pay immediately for 55 hours of work. Don't make it "bounty pay" or "year end bonus" or some other form of unpaid overtime or delayed reward. This is rare and a great boon for a motivated developer.
2) Do a variant of what Google does -- allow people to work on prototypes and proofs of concept (of their own choosing, perhaps vetted by the company) either on company time or their own time. Provide a wide (and serious) audience for such demonstrations (a monthly "demo pitch" meeting for the whole company, perhaps). We would MUCH rather do something that might matter than read (or write on) Slashdot. It's the promise of achieving something larger than themselves which keeps the more interesting developers going. (The ones doing it solely for the paycheck are unlikely to be good. If they are, see #1). While the main purpose of this would be to keep your employees interested and focused on your company, you are bound to end up with several interesting and worthwhile projects in the end -- projects which you could NOT have bought with money alone.
(One of the most valuable experiences I've had in my career was such an opportunity given to us by a forward thinking company owner).
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.
While I agree with this sentiment up to a point, it goes far beyond just cold hard cash. I worked in IT for 15 years until I was black-balled by the Powers That Be for public criticism of the Bush regime post-9/11 (don't ask). Cash may be king, but it hardly begins to cover what makes for a productive, energetic IT work-force. I know, because I have been there. Let me elucidate:
Respect: Respect is a 2-way street. Bosses that treat their employees with a modicum of respect for their prior knowledge and insights to problem resolution will get more effort out of their workers.
Variety: Variety of job assignments, particularly time-sharing between multiple assignments, keep workers alert and fresh.
Mentoring: Provide employees with at least quasi-confidential mentoring by more senior staff. Every job is a learning experience to some extent, and public ridicule for minor gaffes can ruin a career.
Education: Employers that offer discounted or free courseware for continuing education will benefit both the employee and the company long-term. HR should invest the time to help employees keep their CVs up-to-date.
Flex-Time: Unless you are running a Chinese Foxconn facility, flex-time provides for accommodating the individual needs of employees who might actually have a life outside the job.
Vacations: Vacations should begin with a 2 week minimum, and increase with the time vested with the company. Not only does it help employees let off steam and recuperate away from the company, but it will also help the company to discover weaknesses in the overlap in employee skills. It will also serve to remind employees that they are not irreplaceable. No one in a corporation, from janitor to CEO is irreplaceable.
Bonuses/Awards: Bonuses should be generous and tied to specific projects and project milestones. Awards, even tacky awards, that acknowledge the efforts of workers are appreciated.
Profit-sharing: If your company isn't offering profit-sharing awarded quarterly, then you are insulating management rewards from those of your employees, which will create unnecessary divisions in team-based corporate goals.
Activities: Outside activities that bring employees and families of employees together build corporate identity and unity. Even a semi-annual catered barbeque held in the corporate parking lot would do -- reservations at a theme park would be even better.
Benefits: Companies that are not stingy with health, family health, and term life insurance will have happier, healthier employees. Companies that subscribe to quality daycare facilities for the young children of employees demonstrate an interest in the well-being of the employees families, and helps build loyalty.
401Ks: Companies must offer employees a decent selection of retirement investments, preferably with vested corporate contributions. A 401K that only invests in company stock isn't a retirement plan -- it's a scam.
Not every company can offer all of the things that I have listed above, particularly smaller companies. But those that do manage to offer many of these items will have a happy, loyal, and energetic workforce that will willingly go above and beyond to help the company when needed. Merely offering top dollar in wages to employees does not build loyalty, only a mercenary attitude that will hurt the company most when the company is vulnerable.
Anyway, that's my $00.02 worth.
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.