I come from the military where traditional bonuses don’t exist.
Our incentive for joining the military was exciting work (we were young) and serving our nation.
Very quickly our incentives became and remain, the well-being of our team mates, our esprit de corps, and our interest in our work.
Do You Recognise This?
My first experience of bonuses in commerce confused me. I joined this company (identity withheld) three quarters of the way through the financial year.
My division (seven members) had performed well and at the end of the financial year we were told we’d be getting a significant bonus that would be shared equally amongst the division members.
I queried the fairness of this, saying that I had just arrived and didn’t deserve any bonus, and that my bonus could be shared by the division.
I was told to ‘keep my mouth shut and cop it sweet’.
When I further queried this with other members of the division, they just smiled and said ‘Hey welcome aboard!’
A very short time later I discovered the company had never made a profit, being owned by a multi-national.
Now I’m not an expert in tax law or finance, but this didn’t feel right.
The company wasn’t making a profit and nobody cared. And bonuses were being paid!
High performance was rewarded at divisional level, clearly passing the tax on to the recipients of the bonus. And the recipients understood and took it. I didn’t stay long.
Another Example
Many years later, when the Global Financial Crisis struck, I saw some bankers and high corporate executives getting massive pay and bonuses for stuffing up their businesses and the finance of their nations, seriously damaging the middle class who were sold a dream (own your home) that they couldn’t afford, with the full knowledge of the bankers and high corporates.
A Harsh Truth
Valid social science clearly shows that monetary incentives don’t work where people are employed to utilise their cognitive thinking skills – those people include executives.
The pay ratio now between lower paid members of a corporation and the senior executives is in the order of 200 times. It’s actually higher in some areas.
The people who do the work that make the revenue are not the executive. Nor are the executive necessarily effective. Gallop says that 82% of management are the wrong fit.
Yet they still get bonuses well over that which they have honourably earned.
Now What?
I’m a committed capitalist and I believe in reward for performance – but fairly (equitably) and honourably.
I don’t see it happening much, particularly in the finance sector and massive corporations, and it concerns me greatly.
However I do have great clients who do reward honourably.
A Sad Reality
When we consider the reality of money, created by banks out of thin air and loaned with interest payable, we have a monetarily enslaved working population.
The middle class is shrinking (becoming poor) and the few powerful are getting richer.
And nobody from any side of politics is doing anything meaningful about it.
The practice is culturally embedded and not understood, denied, or ignored by too many people.
Possibility
I dream of a time when every enterprise is owned by the people working in it, both management and worker.
I dream of a time where reward is individualised and measured not only by work contribution, but also by living the agreed shared values, caring for each other, customers, suppliers and community.
I dream of a time when fund managers are no longer allowed to harass companies to perform in the short term for the fund managers’ quarterly bonus.
I dream of a time when corporations, banks and governments alike are led by honourable, smart, visionary, caring leaders who know that their success is not measured only by their own wealth but also by the wealth and happiness of their community.
I’m working on my dream, one person at a time.
What do you think?
