In an engineering company, Eleanor Valentine and Gary Yardley do pretty much the same job. They are both designers working on the same project, and the Vice President just said that employees who do the best work in their area of expertise will get special bonuses. The problem is that Elly's and Gary's work are so similar to each other that it's hard to tell them apart.
This shows a few things about rewards and recognition:
In an engineering company, Eleanor Valentine and Gary Yardley do pretty much the same job. They are both designers working on the same project, and the Vice President just said that employees who do the best work in their area of expertise will get special bonuses. The problem is that Elly's and Gary's work are so similar to each other that it's hard to tell them apart.
This example shows a few things about rewards and recognition that can make people's tempers get worse and hurt relationships at work. If these things aren't taken care of properly, any reward and recognition system could end up being a management toy that doesn't improve performance or motivation, or it could become an official way for the business to be forced to pay money.
Definition
First, in order to decide if a job was done well, both the supervisors and the workers need to know what the job is, who was supposed to do it, and if it needed to be done at all. After all, when we talk about how well a machine works, we focus on the outputs that are important and useful. For example, a performance car can go from 0 to 60 mph in less than 6 seconds and stop from 60 to 0 in 120 feet. If it can also make cappuccino and cookies, that's not really a measure of its performance.
When it comes to people, though, it's never that easy to know what to expect. Yes, salespeople bring in money, engineers design products, accountants keep track of money, and human resources find skilled workers, but;
don't Salesmen help to prevent bad debt getting worse?
Don't Engineers help figure out what new skills will be needed?
Don't Accountants make the sales process go more smoothly because of how they bill?
Don't Engineers also get training from HR to improve their skills?
People's performance is made up of such a wide range of skills, abilities, and competencies that it is often necessary to clearly define the limits of a job so that people know what their main responsibilities are. People often find parts of another job really appealing, so they add those parts to their own job and take credit for the results. This happens more often than you might think.
From the managers' point of view
You can't say anything general about managers as a group, but when it comes to performance, they can have some worrying habits. For example, they don't always notice where the story stops and starts again. When management is looking at them, employees in larger companies are very good at shifting the focus away from areas where they aren't doing as well. Before making a decision about performance, a thorough manager (yes, they do exist!) will look at every part of the job.
Elly and Gary solved their own problem by agreeing to split any bonus that came their way. However, they still felt that the bonus system was not well thought out.
