Arno, I'm sorry my response is so late, but I wanted to add a few
observations based on my twenty years' experience with helping
organizations design reward and appraisal systems.
You said:
Appraisal and rewards can never guarantee certain behavior (as needed for
learning). I do think however, that appraisal and rewards can frustrate
and discourage learning if the wrong incentives are given.
I agree with you, Arno. Most of the reward and appraisal systems that I
see are designed to try to control employees' behaviors and focus the
individual on achievement of short-term outcomes. Some are based on the
individual's job description, some on performance standards or project
objectives, some on demonstration of behavioral traits, and some on a
combination of these factors. Some even include specific developmental
objectives.
Often an organization will talk about the importance of learning, but
money tends to speak louder than words. When employees' pay increases or
bonuses are dependent on fighting today's fires or accomplishing their
MBO's even when they no longer make sense, they quickly forget about
taking the time to think, investigate, explore, read, study, research,
discuss, experiment, etc.
Skill and Competency-based Pay Systems are attempts to use reward and
appraisal to encourage learning. Although our friend, Alfie Kohn, is
adamantly opposed to rewarding for learning, I'm not convinced that these
systems can't work. But as a first step, we must identify and remove the
toxins from our existing systems so that employees' natural love for
learning can re-emerge.
Best regards,
Roxanne
--Roxanne Abbas mailto:rabbas@comp-web.com http://www.comp-web.com
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