Fantastic! Here’s your reward stories

[ChevronB19]

Stories?

I’m sure there are far, far worse than mine, and I know a bonus is better than no bonus.

Example: At the time i was earning 35k per annum, in a highly specialised scientific job. However, because they found out I was good at writing contract proposals, I ended up doing that most of the time, which really wasn’t my thing. I was quite good at it, and ‘won’ a load of the bread and butter jobs, which I inevitably ended up having to do (the science and pm bit) as the resource I was promised never (ever) materialised.

So my workload changed from a ‘pretty busy’ full time week into an utterly intolerable one.

Anyway. In 2008 I won a 2M contract for scientific services. For the FTSE company I worked for, this was a pretty good success, especially as it had been started by, pursued and delivered by a scientist (me), with no contract or legal experience and whose job it wasn’t to do in the first place.

My reward was a £20 gift voucher. My next performance review criticised me for ‘taking credit for the success of others’ (in other words, the ‘success’ of the business manager several levels above who signed the gift voucher and who had nothing to do with the contract in any way).

I left a week after the ‘performance review’ (15 years ago). In retrospect I should’ve sued for constructive dismissal etc., but frankly I just wanted out, which I think is what a lot of these places rely on.

Any other tales of joy?

[Steviesam]

I led a team that saved the company £65m on a £400m contract.

None of us (5 of us) got anything.

[Sporky]

Not quite at that scale, but two jobs ago a customer decided they wanted domestic tellies instead of the commercial grade screens they'd bought from us. Managed to persuade them to pay for the commercial tellies, and a restocking fee on the commercial grade screens.

The whole sales team (including design/tech sales) was offered £50 in bonus bonds to whoever sold the most of the commercial grade ones. I sold the entire lot back to the same customer that morning for what they'd originally paid for them (minus the restocking which they'd already paid) - so no cost to us to pack them and ship them back - and the MD said it didn't count so I didn't get the bonus. He had a couple of grand of the things in his desk drawer - they were a sunk cost. I didn't stay long after that.

[CarCrazyDad]

Typical for a senior member of staff to take credit

I'd prefer no gift than some paltry low value gift voucher -

I think many companies do not care that much about their employees if that's how they are treated

I got a £2000 bonus for completing a project 6 weeks ahead of schedule which meant that our company received a £100,0000 rebate due to something to do with timescales that was in a contract, that was nice

At the same time if I received £200 I'd have felt a bit insulted!

[littlebasher]

I did a piece of work off my own back, that saved my employer 500K a year and freed up a load of valuable space in a data centre.

My efforts were rewarded with a £15 WHSmiths voucher, which i told them to keep. So in the end, i guess i got nothing hehe

[GT03ROB]

So what do people feel is an appropriate reward structure? When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

[Sporky]

GT03ROB said:

When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

Ignoring sales commission, I'd say not much does. However, doing something extra or innovative that results in the company being significantly better off should be rewarded, because that encourages people to do that sort of thing.

[Muzzer79]

GT03ROB said:

So what do people feel is an appropriate reward structure? When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

I feel compelled to ask the same.

It’s clear that some of things thread should have been on some kind of commission structure, but that brings negatives too.

But saving the company money…..is your job?

[Seventyseven7]

GT03ROB said:

So what do people feel is an appropriate reward structure? When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

This.

‘I saved the company x amount doing the job I’m employed to do and they didn’t give me a bonus, they just paid me my salary. Left a week later’

[QJumper]

Muzzer79 said:

I feel compelled to ask the same.

It’s clear that some of things thread should have been on some kind of commission structure, but that brings negatives too.

But saving the company money…..is your job?

To some extent that's true, but an employee who makes savings over and above normal expectations, through his own ideas/innovation, is often no better rewarded than one who just does his job as specified in his job description. In fact, in many large organisations, improvements/suggestions are expected to come from the top down, with most workers just expected to do as instructed. One notable exception is Toyota, who encourage individuals and teams to come up with improvements, and reward teams for doing so.

Even worse though, is when a significant improvement is rewarded with a £50 voucher, whilst a senior manager/director might get a substantial bonus for his team's improved performance. Worse still is that many companies will happily pay external consultants hundreds of thousands for similar similar suggestions.

I'm sure businesses could make far greater savings if they actively promoted reward schemes that better reflected the value of any improvement, as it would not only incentivise people to look for improvements, but make them feel part of the organisation rather than just a drone.

[Ouroboros]

I worked for a distribution company on behalf of a home hardware company. I used sap, learnt a lot, was on low money, just an admin.

I noticed the category buyer had make a mistake, I emailed him a few times but he disregarded me. 6 months passed and the problem came to light, impacting thousands of home delivery orders. It was funny when the site manager got him on a phone call and he admitted he had messed up.

Took a team of 30 ringing thousands of customers, then changing the sap SKU. It was funny as I noticed there was an issue again, I didn't say anything as was leaving by now l.
For all this I got a free pizza, the buyer got moved.

It is funny really when you are a lowly admin and you spot big mistakes and no one listens or cares until it is too late. The impact was hundreds of thousands of not millions in cost.

[Geffg]

If that’s part of your job to look into ways to save them money then I wouldn’t expect to be rewarded, but if you come up with an idea that helps then yes a reward would be nice. A paltry £20 or something I find is insulting, but it needn’t be thousands either. Just something in between.
Good work should be rewarded for going above and beyond as it helps the company out and to succeed more. To give a menial amount is just saying to the employee we really aren’t arsed about our workforce.
Like with payrises, where I last worked we got the letter saying how grateful they are of our work, made good money etc etc and glad to give you a 1% pay rise which amounted to about 13p an hour which was an insult. Cant stand the over the top of saying good work, we’ve done well etc so we’re glad to give you this amount and thinking we should be grateful and go above and beyond because of it.

[21TonyK]

I was booked to do a couple of weeks consultancy at a stupidly high day rate. They had a major IT failure which I managed to sort out before production was affected (about $3M a day). I was thanked by the companies owner and asked to stay on to make sure nothing else was going to happen. I did for nearly ten years. On a day rate.

[shtu]

The current one is that my employer hasn't awarded pay rises the past couple of years. However, they're now offering retention deals, partly because the current project is a monumental clusterfk and they can't afford to lose people.

To qualify, you have to stay for two years, and payments only start at end of the first year. If you leave at any point in the two years, they claw back anything that's been paid.

I worked out that the retention was worth £135 per month. Less than if they had paid rate-of-inflation pay rises, which would also be permanent, and pensionable.

Cheapskates.

[soad]

Got rewarded with a canteen voucher once, does that count?

[ChevronB19]

GT03ROB said:

So what do people feel is an appropriate reward structure? When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

In my case, I was doing the job I was not paid to do.

[CarCrazyDad]

GT03ROB said:

So what do people feel is an appropriate reward structure? When does doing the job you are paid to do become something that justifies extra?

It's a hard question to answer

If you're purchasing manager for a companion spending 100 million a year but you find a way to save the company 10 million that no one else would have ever thought of then I don't think that comes in line with your £75,000 salary.

I think that's well over and above.
Then again it all comes back to employer v employee relationships...

Lower, usually harder working staff not getting regular pay rises where as the senior management rake it in.

Then the whole £20 gift voucher, it is insulting. There is a point where lack of a gift or reward is better than a miniscule gift or reward.

[Muzzer79]

Geffg said:

If that’s part of your job to look into ways to save them money then I wouldn’t expect to be rewarded, but if you come up with an idea that helps then yes a reward would be nice. A paltry £20 or something I find is insulting, but it needn’t be thousands either. Just something in between.
.

Still no-one has quantified these rewards.

Let’s use an example.

You, as a theoretical ‘lowly’ employee come up with something that saves a company £300,000. Company turnover is £100m

What should your reward be?

[Red9zero]

A very long time ago my Father got the company he worked for the contract to supply all the meter boxes for the MEB. He got his company car upgraded to a Marina TC.

[Sporky]

Muzzer79 said:

Still no-one has quantified these rewards.

I don't think it's that simple. In your example, 1% of the saving occurs to me (not that I've given it due consideration). But saving a much bigger company £400M might not merit 1%. And a £4M bonus might result in losing the employee.