Designing Your Company Incentives

People are inherently self-interested.

1. Your employees would rather make $X more than what you're paying them.
2. Your employees would rather take longer breaks than what's expected.
3. Your employees would rather take more unpaid days off than what you allow.

How then do you design incentives that cater to people's self-interests?

Examples:

• Sales team: Discouraging incentives for low sales; motivating incentives for more sales (e.g., low base, high commission).
• Engineering team: Discouraging incentives for delayed projects;  motivating incentives for projects completed before deadlines.
• PR team: Discouraging incentives for no press reports; motivating incentives for more positive press mentions.

Design incentives where pursuing one's self-interests mutually benefits your company.

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