Companies struggle to hire and retain talent. Throwing more career promises and money/bonus at it did not solve this challenge. It's a flawed idea. Why?

TL;DR: This may work for people early in their career, or some one that needs the money now.
People that come for the cash or title will leave again for money and title … or a more pleasant workplace with more purpose.

You can buy commitment for some time - with cold cash and a mean contract.
But an organisation must earn loyalty and exceptional performance from its members.


Recently, I heard from two corporations that they struggle to attract talent and - even worse - to retain them. This no different for small companies, btw.

Salary increases, bonuses, stock options, part-time work, presents for Xmas/New Year, company events, summer parties, you name it … all that stuff just does not to cut it. You get some "fun" side-effects that sometimes make the press … (looking also at you, banks 👀).


This approach may have worked (somewhat) in an employers'-market - firms handed out candy and people flock to them. 👑🍬
When it turned into an employee-market, firms found themselves in the middle of an empty road disappointed with their pants down: people are not loving them back despite all the candy. 👖

"Leadership" teams are wondering what do employees want? What shall we offer to keep 'em happy? Bigger party? More goodies? Fruit baskets? Career coaching/assessment? Off-sites? …

What.Shall.We.Do!?

Let's try and see what might be off-putting, first (🚁-level)

The underlying assumption of the good old "carrot & stick" schema seem to be: Unless there is a material incentive, people are not motivated to do a good job, nor to improve their own skill sets.

A great, winning message right? Hmmm, no. Not so much.

Bonus: You can not fix underperformance by raising salary, or paying a bonus when people do better. It will not change efforts or level of commitment before nor after the fact. This puts many uncontrollable factors between the a person's performance and the effective salary paid. Seems fair? Not to me.

Career / title: Promises of career progression are illusions for the vast majority. A firm can not promote all great performers. Disregarding the obvious lack of sufficient positions on top of a pyramid and related cost implications, who'd do all the great work when the great people get promoted? Hello again, Peter Principle!

Still, that carrot gets hung in front of everybody. But it does not help improve engagement and retention.

These approaches neglect intrinsic motivation of people to do a good job, improve & expand one's skills, enjoy working with others and have a lasting impact in a purposeful project.


Finally, those who get lucky* due to circumstances (i.e. right face, right background, right time, right place) and good enough effort get promoted / cash a bonus. They start to believe they deserve that due to their very own doing. Hello, Tyranny Of Merit! Did that help keep the less lucky talents happy in the past? Not so much.


What then? - Remember how much fun it was to build and play as kids? No salary, no bonus. Just pure joy of creating something new and having memorable experiences together (exciting, funny, scary, frightening, …).

While the salary thingy is kinda mandatory to put food on the table, the rest didn't change.

More on my view how to tackle that … next time.

Hang on to that cliff hanger 😅  🤙


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Inspired my post: Courtesy of Corporate Rebels