Ask Slashdot: Best Incentives For IT Workers? 468
New submitter Guru Jim writes "Our company is currently looking at our incentives program and are wondering what is out there that helps motivate IT workers. We have engineers/sys admins as well as developers. With both teams, we have guns who are great and really engaged in looking after the customers, but some of the team struggle. Sometimes it is easy to say that there isn't too much work on and goof off and read Slashdot all day. This puts more pressure on some of the team. Management is being more proactive in making sure the work is shared equally, but we are wondering what can be out there that is more carrot than stick? We already have cake day, corporate massage day, bonuses for exams and profit share, but what is out there that is innovative and helps build a great workplace?" If you're reading this, the odds are good that you work in or around IT (or hope to); what would you most like to see your workplace implement?
"we have guns" . . . (Score:5, Funny)
That sounds like enough of an incentive to me.
In house escort service (Score:5, Funny)
Not the best for productivity but best incentive that works for Secret service agents, presidents, politicians and ceo's.
Re:one word: blowjobs (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Daily reports (Score:3, Funny)
That approach is misguided, not only because it is a waste of valuable time, but also because employees will be encouraged to add fluff to their daily reports.
Before we took idiot boy(our former boss) out of the picture, he was making us do daily logs of all our work. In a scientific instrument repair shop, this led to employees writing bullshit bullet points like "researched and processed part orders and documentation" when all they did was take a literal minute to fill out an excel sheet and drop it in a box. My favorite bullet point was, I shit you not, "Waited for paint to dry," written by an underperforming tech after he had applied touch-up paint to a finished system.
Now imagine the horrific possibilities of abuse in an IT context. For example, you can look forward to seeing shit like, "Utilized State-of-the-art virtualization to improve performance and disk usage, enabling for easy dynamic expansion. " Just for doing what they do every day. Get the picture?
-- Ethanol-fueled
Re:Too much turnover? (Score:3, Funny)
> your programmers don't actually need to wear suits, do they?
Suit [catb.org] in the jargon file:
suit: n.
1. Ugly and uncomfortable ‘business clothing’ often worn by non-hackers. Invariably worn with a ‘tie’, a strangulation device that partially cuts off the blood supply to the brain. It is thought that this explains much about the behavior of suit-wearers. Compare droid.
2. A person who habitually wears suits, as distinct from a techie or hacker. See pointy-haired, burble, management, Stupids, SNAFU principle, PHB, and brain-damaged.
Re:"we have guns" . . . (Score:4, Funny)
Only four motivators (Score:5, Funny)
There are only four motivators for human behavior including writing good software. They are:
Money
Sex
Power
Fear
Money: Figure out the minimum amount of money your programmer will NEED to continue to work for you writing your code. Start him at 50% higher than that number. IF version 1.0 works, then increase his salary to 100% more than the minimum amount that he needs.
Sex: Hire lots of cute young girls without husbands to work in your office. *Very sensitively* approach the subject to them that they can earn signifiant salary bonuses if they have inter-office affairs with the programmers. If you're not sure how to approach this subject sensitively then don't bring it up all, even as a joke. You don't need any sexual harassment lawsuit and the young ladies will probably figure your company policy out by themselves.
Power: Every dork programmer had some asshole in high school bully them. Tell your programming staff that if version 1.0 ships without major programming errors then you'll hire some local goons to track down the jerks who made their lives miserable and beat the fuck out them. All on high-definition video for their entertainment (or as supplemental erotic stimulation while they're boffing the administrative assistants)
Fear: Joseph Stalin told the nuclear physicists of the Soviet Union in 1946 that they would either deliver an atomic bomb in five years or spend the rest of their sweet short lives in the Arctic Salt Mine Gulag. He got his bomb. Then gave 'hero of the Soviet motherland' medals to all of them. He killed about 10000000 people and died peacefully in his sleep. He understood Fear.