I was fascinated to hear the former RoyalNavy seaman’s story about how top brass introduced an incentive scheme that caught the imaginations of hundreds of sailors, saving the RN £325,000……but look what happened when the short sighted bosses decided to reverse the policy the following year! One of the Navy’s ‘pen pushers’ came up with an excellent money saving idea. What if the Navy were to give two weeks extra leave to the squadron saving the most money that year? There were seven and each had a budget of arond £500,000.
“The challenge was on,” he said. “Squadron leaders put us under strict instructions to turn off lights and do anything that would get costs down. By the end of the year each of the 7 squadrons had saved, on average, around £45,000 each which was amazing. Everyone had ‘done their bit’ and, in due course, the winners got their extra leave.
“Great we thought, we’ll do better next time and win it.” Only there wasn’t a next time! In their great wisdom Navy management decided that if the boys on the boats had done it once, they would probably do it again WITHOUT AN INCENTIVE! How wrong they were. The following year the savings dropped to an average of £28,000 per squadron….or £119,000 less in savings across the board
People respond to incentives and, the second you treat them as units of production, you take away the human element and it goes horribly wrong. Never forget, it all starts and ends with people and when they work together they move mountains but, break or dilute the tribe’s spirit and you will quickly have a malfunctioning, dispirited team.
