Motivation

From my consulting days, I talked about the First Law of Rewards: people do what is rewarded; if people aren’t doing what you want, it’s because they’re doing what they think is more rewarding.

The mistake is that CEOs nearly always say “but our pay and benefits are better than average” (or varients, like “in the top quintile”, or even “better than anyone in the industry.”)  The problem is, money isn’t the only motivator:

Pop quiz: in a unionized workplace, with strict work rules and narrow work categories, what is rewarded?