4 ms·
What kind of incentives are possible in your average tech work environment? A raise? A bonus? Raises usually come with more responsibility. I'm not familiar wit
by timcobb 7mo ago
What kind of incentives are possible in your average tech work environment? A raise? A bonus? Raises usually come with more responsibility. I'm not familiar with tech companies doing bonuses.
- kabdib 7mo ago"The reward for winning is the opportunity to play again"
- timcobb 7mo agoThat's what it seems like :)
- quirkot 7mo agoMoney is the sledgehammer of incentives. Above a reasonable amount of pay, it's overkill and makes lots of collateral problems. The really effective incentives are status based and situational to the group dynamic
- timcobb 7mo agoCan you give an example please. How do you do this without introducing bad vibes?
- recursive 7mo agoHours of PTO?
- timcobb 7mo agoWhat if you have "unlimited" PTO
- recursive 7mo agoFirst step is to stop living a lie. Maybe there's someone who prefers "unlimited" PTO, but I think most would rather know the real limits. See "unlimited" data offered by mobile carriers a decade or two ago. (Is that still going on?)
- timcobb 7mo agoFWIW at this job I don't feel like PTO days are a limitation. The limitation is my ability to plan and execute well, and I appreciate the flexibility of not having to deal w/ counting or thinking in terms of days in that way.
- recursive 7mo agoYeah, that's fair. I have a prescribed quantity of vacation. To be honest, I never think about it either, because I have more than I use. I guess when I leave, I'll get it paid out? Or take a 4 month vacation when I leave? I'd probably announce my intent to do that. In any case, I'm comforted by knowing that there is some quantity. But I guess I'm undercutting my own point here. PTO is probably not that motivating to me either. I guess I don't know.
- timcobb 7mo ago> I guess when I leave, I'll get it paid out? yeah in my opinion this is the big question on whether you're getting screwed by unlimited PTO. But I don't manage other aspects of my finances so tightly, so it's kind of an "eh" for me. > PTO is probably not that motivating to me either. Yep, same here...
- paradox460 7mo agoSure, you did a great job on that last project, we've added 8 hours of PTO for you. No, you can't take it any time soon, we're far too busy for you to take any time off
- GVIrish 7mo agoStarts with how you evaluate employees for bonuses and promotion. Do you evaluate people on the impact of what was delivered? How fast they delivered feature work? The quality level of what they delivered? How well they worked with others? The answers to basic questions like that already starts to shape behavior. If you pay zero attention to how people behave, and only look at impact of what was delivered you may promote people who optimize for their own work, but make others miserable. If you don't properly weight quality, especially now with AI code gen, you'll promote people who move fast break more things than is reasonable. We can easily find examples of suboptimal behavior that arises out of poorly shaped rewards incentives at companies. Empire building is one behavior that is the result of managers getting promoted based on headcount. Stack ranking can and has led to people limiting collaboration with peers because someone has to fail in order for someone else to get a favorable rating. Or people avoid riskier work because failure can put you on the hot seat.
- anon7725 7mo agoFrom the article: > You're part of a team, you're contributing, you're also (measurably) pulling less hard than you would if the rope were yours alone There’s a perfectly rational reason for this. Success is collective, but failure is individual. Rewards for the success accrue to the person who represents it to the right people (usually those with the shortest path to the organization root). For all intents and purposes, the person who gives the presentation did the work.