Employee Incentive Plans: Manipulative and Ineffective?

are a common tactic that employers use to motivate and engage their employees. The question that many have, however, is: ‘Are employee incentive plans effective?’

In this article, we will discuss whether employee incentive plans are effective or manipulative. And ineffective. Unpacking the reality of this is vital for employers to make decisions on whether to implement employee incentive plans or not. Let’s begin by looking at the argument against employee incentive plans.

The Argument Against Employee Incentive Plans

Offering rewards like a dangling carrot to motivate employees can seem like a band-aid for a lack of engagement. Instead of fostering real engagement, you are instead looking to temporarily boost productivity or sales with some shallow motivation.

Employees can often see right through employee incentive plans. They know that instead of a genuine reward, employers are trying to squeeze as much work out of their employees. This can damage the trust and morale of your workers as they feel like cogs in a machine.

Employee incentive plans can also promote selfish behavior among your workforce. Instead of collaborating, employees will instead compete with others to get ahead. If this mentality is in place among your workers, it can destroy company culture.

The last argument we will make against employee incentive plans is that they often backfire. Employees can try to game the system and take shortcuts that will earn them rewards quicker. On the other hand, they may burn themselves out trying to reach these rewards. Whichever way you frame it, the quality of work suffers.

As you can see, there are many manipulative tactics that employers can use when it comes to employee incentive plans. Instead of engaging workers, it can cause distrust, division, and poor work quality. There is a counterargument to this, however, so let’s have a look at the potential benefits of employee incentive plans.

The Counterargument – Potential Benefits of Employee Incentive Plans

While employee incentive plans can have downsides, when done correctly there are some benefits that employers and employees can experience. These benefits include:

Making Employees Feel Valued

Employee incentive plans offer incentives like bonuses, raises, extra time off, or more. This shows appreciation to your employees and lets them feel that their work is meaningful. A result of this is a boost in job satisfaction and loyalty as it inspires employees to commit to the organization.

Teamwork Improves

In some cases, employee incentive plans can foster collaboration among employees. Some rewards can encourage employees to work together to achieve their goals and reap the rewards. This can strengthen the team dynamics and camaraderie within the workplace.

Accomplishing Targets and Goals

Employee incentive plans are typically tied to goals and targets. This gives employees concrete goals to work toward. This is a win-win as the organization also benefits when an employee achieves a goal.

Sparking Creativity Among Your Employees

Incentives can drive people to come up with ideas that are innovative. When rewards are at stake, it can provide an environment where employees come up with their best ideas.

An employee incentive plan is at its best when organizations implement it correctly. This can be done by consulting employees to see what their needs are and addressing them in an employee incentive plan. With the right approach, incentives and motivation can work hand in hand.

Strike a Balance

When creating effective employee incentive plans, you need to find the right balance in motivating employees without coming across as manipulative.  This is done by finding out which incentives benefit both the organization and its workers. It is also important to align employee incentive plans with your company’s values and mission.

If effective, the results will speak for themselves. The main thing is to make your employees feel trusted, respected and cared for. This is what will truly motivate them to do their best work.