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Tips for Motivating IT Workers? 68

Posted by Cliff from the if-speeches-don't-work-try-burning-bushes dept.
RexCelestis asks: "I work for a small (35 employees) tech company that provides consulting and software to law firms of all sizes. Last year, our company moved from rewards based on the fulfillment of personal goals to a more general reward, based almost strictly on sales. Outside of the sales staff, very few of us have felt motivated by this plan. As we near the annual meeting, I'd like to offer a few alternative methods to help motivate employees outside of sales. Can anyone offer any suggestions to help drive a development team, support staff, and/or consulting group towards greater success?"
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Tips for Motivating IT Workers? More

Tips for Motivating IT Workers?

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  • How about sending polls to your customers regarding their satisfaction? I know it's not the best idea; they probably don't give enough of a damn to fill out a survey.
    • I work for a consulting company (quality assurance) as a consultant and part of our bonuses are determined by customer satisfaction. The way we get customers to give actual feedback is by making it part of the contract; they're surprisingly willing to take the time to tick boxes when the whole scheme is explained to them, and the consultants are sure to bug their clients to do it, too.

  • Wasn't a similar question asked not so long ago? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ... and wasn't it the consensus that the best motivators were beer and pornography?
  • Specifically, Adderall.

  • There is no IT in MoTIvate (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    When Paul Newman asked Hitchcock about the motivation of his
    character in 'Torn Curtain', Hitchcock is reported to have replied,
    "Your motivation, Mr Newman, is the $250,000 you're being paid."

  • How big are the rewards? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by toddbu ( 748790 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @12:59AM (#14253574)
    Outside of the sales staff, very few of us have felt motivated by this plan.

    You really have to look at two factors here:

    • How big are the rewards? If the rewards are low relative to the size of your regular income, you probably won't care much about them. If they're like 50% of your take home pay then you probably will.
    • What kind of people are you hiring? If you're not hiring the right people then your plan is less likely to work. Let me ask you - would you be more motivated by a new iPod or a check for $1,000? It's sad, really, that many people aren't smart enough to do the math and tell you that they could take the grand, buy the iPod, and have money to spare. They like flashy, sexy stuff over functional things. This is why many newly minted managers take on a whole bunch of additional responsibility in exchange for a new title and an upgraded parking spot. Me? I'm motivated by cash, because it's universal. But that's just not the norm in the tech world.
    • If you get an iPod, then it is your toy to keep. If you get $1000, then your wife will start planning how to spend the money on home improvements or the like, and you won't get to spend it on what you want. Even if you don't have that kind of wife, you will still feel compelled to save some of it, and think carefully about how to spend the rest.

      For myself, I would probably still take the $1000, but if it was only $400, then I would probably take the iPod, as that way I have the toy without having to justify
      • Not to mention you won't get taxed on the iPod right away.

        Sure, you are *ahem* supported to file the value of it as income when you do your taxes, but even if you actually do, its still way better than getting a huge chunk of your bonus removed right away.

      • lol... I once was speaking to a friend who received a $500 bonus the same day her boyfriend received $30,000. I was like "you got more, because your boyfriend has to save this huge, serious, amount of money for your eventual house, and you get to go blow the $500 shopping."
      • > your wife will start planning how to spend the money

        Mistake #1 - telling your wife about the $1000
      • I do a few jobs per year on the side. When I get paid, the check goes straight to my wife and I never see any of it. After one grueling job, I had them pay me in beer — 25 six-packs and I got every drop of it. So I know the feeling.

        I once worked for a place that would set an annual sales goal. If we met that goal (as a company), we would get a 1% bonus. Yep, you read that correctly: work hard all year and we will give you 1%. And being the low guy on the totem pole (and pay scale), my 1% was a lot lo

      • If they gave me the choice, I'd obviously take the $1000.

        But if I was a manager trying to figure out how best to motivate my team, I'd probably give iPods. Frankly, at the pay level we're at, the gov't takes 50% of any money we make. That leaves me with $500. I make more than that on a pay in overtime/pager. To me, an iPod would be much more appreciated, espeically if came with some free iTunes or something - it's something tangible, in my hands, not just another number on my paycheck that the governmen

  • obligatory? (Score:5, Funny)

    by stuuf ( 587464 ) <[sac+sd] [at] [atomicradi.us]> on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @01:15AM (#14253653) Homepage Journal
    It's not that they're lazy, it's that they just don't care....

  • Bonuses? (Score:1, Redundant)

    by saden1 ( 581102 )
    How about you give them all a Christmas bonus based on sales.

  • Well... (Score:4, Funny)

    by daeley ( 126313 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @01:30AM (#14253710) Homepage
    Can anyone offer any suggestions to help drive a development team, support staff, and/or consulting group towards greater success?

    * Hawaiian Shirt Day
    * Red Swingline staplers[1]
    * Music played at a reasonable volume.[2]
    * Some kind of a stock option equity sharing program.[3]
    * And of course, lots of followup regarding TPS Reports.

    [1] Management only.
    [2] From 9 to 11.
    [3] This is hypothetical.

  • Whores (Score:2, Funny)

    by Jah-Wren Ryel ( 80510 )
    Some firms like to provide free chair massages to their technical staff, particularly the ones who work the support lines. Take your company to the next level - include a "happy ending" with each massage.

    After all your clients are the real whores, you need to balance out the corporate karma and employ the kind of whores that actually make people happy.

  • My concern (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sedyn ( 880034 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @01:58AM (#14253846)
    My biggest concern is that the current system rewards expansion, potientially at the expense of maintaining both the products and the relationships with the customer.

    A happy customer can sometimes inform potiential customers about your service. Likewise, a dissatisfied customer may be more trouble than any software problem you could ever have.

    Therefore, at the very least, maintaining relations should be considered on par with selling. Meaning that the support staff is just as important.

    Furthermore, maintaining relations also includes those people that may never see the customers. Developers are cruicial here. If they do a bad job, everyone else is either selling shit or having to spend resources and good will to maintain it.

    This is much like a waiter being the only one who gets a tip when the chef prepared the meal. Not a good way to motivate people (and may have the opposite effect of critical people feeling under appriciated).

    Then again, I'm just a 21 year old CS student... What do I know about the business world?
  • Donuts, and the promise of more donuts in the future.

    That's all it takes, I swear!

    • Donuts?

      Maybe in America. We like pizza here!

      Give the employees lots of pizza - that works wonders for motivation. Make sure you give them something to wipe their hands on though, or you might end up with lots of typos in the code.

      -- Steve

  • Proper Motivation (Score:4, Funny)

    by kmahan ( 80459 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @02:11AM (#14253913)
    You might check with Dr. Kersten and his company http://despair.com/ [despair.com] -- he has lots of suggestions. Your conference room might benefit from a few of these lithographs.

  • Every step of the way (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Jorkapp ( 684095 ) <jorkapp&hotmail,com> on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @02:13AM (#14253928)
    As someone who has done military training in leadership and motivation, let me tell you that I have found most traditional management "motivation" strategies to be quite flawed. Permit me to elaborate with suggestions for improvement:

    Accomplishment/Completion bonuses/prizes/etc:
    Not a bad idea, but more designed to be coupled with something else. Continue reading for suggestions.

    Performance evaluations:
    You have to be careful with these. Most workers hate knowing that their performace is being evaluated constantly. These are most effective when the environment is positive. Eliminate the negative focus and focus more on positivity and learning.

    Take for example, if a small part of a project was scrapped 2 days in due to the worker finding it too difficult or not-feasible. Instead of wrapping your head around why they wasted 2 days of company time on something impossible, focus on what they may have learned from what they worked on, and if any of their new knowledge may further the rest of the project in any way.

    Be sure that evaluations are done in a relaxing environment. Offer coffee and donuts or other light fare, keep the door open, and seat them in a comfy chair. It goes a long way - and that's experience talking. If they've had outstanding performance, then consider offering a prize/bonus (nothing too expensive/elaborate though).

    Effort rewards:
    These are used synonymously with performance evaluations. These don't have to be anything too significant, and can be given to a team as a whole. If the team has shown some good performance for the past week or so, take them all out to dinner at some place nice but casual (optional: pool-tables, karaoke or other games may help enhance the fun). Tell them to leave their PDA's and laptops at home, and come just to relax and have a good time. This quite often raises team spirit and can also raise their respect for management. If you feel that an individual deserves a reward, give it to them privately, and make sure it isn't worth too much bragging about.

    One-on-One:
    Much like a performance evaluation, but different. Instead of monitoring individual performance, only monitor team performance. With a One-on-One, you speak to each team member individually, and have them report to you on how they think they are doing. With this, they can set their own goals, and put plans in place that fit with them, which eases their levels of stress. As with a performance eval, keep the environment relaxed and follow the guidelines mentioned in for performance evaluations.

    General tactics:
    Here are some general leadership and motivation tactics to help out:
    * Don't assign impossible tasks. As well, don't assign a task and then change it without due reason. Undue changes will cause your workers to lose confidence in your abilities.
    * Comfort counts. If during the summer months your workers are constantly overheating, spend the money to get each of them a desk-sized oscillating fan and offer them cold drinks periodically. During winter months, offer them coffee to warm them up from the cold. Minimal expendadures such as those can do wonders to raise productivity.
    * Keep yourself motivated. An unmotivated leader will demoralize everyone.
    * If someone is in a slump, work with them to get them back on track. Maybe they just need a talking to, in which you should remind them of their past successes. Perhaps they need a little time off. Being treated well and like a human being will garner a sense of loyalty. Nothing can be more valuable to a company than a loyal worker.

    Good luck. If you need any more tips, feel free to email me.

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @02:35AM (#14254016)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Those were some rather good guidelines. One part I do not personally like though. You suggested taking the staff out to dinner. I always hate situations like that. I spend enough time at work as it is. I would much rather get home to my family instead when I am done with work.

      Now taking the staff out to lunch, that would not conflict with that as much, but it still would not be much of a reward. Hey I would be eating lunch with the same people I do everyday, just probably at a "casual" place that none of us
      • But sometimes it's fun to go hang out with "the guys" from work. Although I guess this only applies if you're legitimately friends with your co-workers, instead of being "just" co-workers. Anyway, given my druthers, I'd like to work in a place where I genuinely like my co-workers; and that occassionally takes the crew out to dinner. Although I do agree with what someone else said: make it optional, and not a CLM to skip.

        And to be considerate to folks like yourself, who have families and would rather go to

    • Little things mean a lot. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Phreakiture ( 547094 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @10:46AM (#14255845) Homepage

      Say hello to your employees every morning, individually, greeting them by their name. Take fifteen minutes and walk the cube farm, stopping at each employee's cube. Say hello. Banter for a moment. Do not discuss work in these rounds unless it is an emergency; it will spoil the effect.

      When an employee does well, recognise this. You don't have to give them anything physical, but a public "thank you" at the next departmental meeting can be very valueable, especially if your boss is there.

      Don't do stupid shit. For example, if you've been providing broadband to people's homes to enable working remotely, don't cut it off while still spending $$$ on conference calls. It pisses people off. If you need to cut (hey, it happens), cut evenly.

      Provide your employees with some space to socialise, and don't prevent them from doing so. It makes the workplace more bearable.

      Offer to take employees to lunch once in a while. Don't make it a CLM if they decline.

      Greet new employees with a welcome luncheon. Send off departing employees with a farewell luncheon. It gives everyone a chance to say hello and goodbye.

      Don't hold meetings unless they are needed and productive. Nothing kills morale like wasting time in a meeting where nothing pertains to you.

      Find a way to dispatch your employees' complaints efficiently, effectively, and reasonably. If it is something you can't do anything about, at least give the employee a sympathetic ear.

      Go to bat for your people.

    • As someone who has done military training in leadership and motivation, let me tell you that I have found most traditional management "motivation" strategies to be quite flawed. Permit me to elaborate with suggestions for improvement:

      You're saying management should threatent to shoot the workers for treason if they don't do as they're told? Or just shout and scream at them in a domineering and aggressive way in order to make themselves feel like big men to make up for their personal inadequacies? Oh wait co
  • Profit sharing would be more effective because it motivates on both the cost and the revenue side of things. If the team feels like it can't directly contribute to improving sales (revenue), then perhaps they will be motivated to reduce costs. In order for this to work, the company cannot use a command-and-control method of management. Individuals must be given leeway to independently take action to make improvements. If these two things aren't in place then it will all just lead to apathy and cynicism.

  • Reward them (Score:4, Insightful)

    by np_bernstein ( 453840 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @02:28AM (#14253991) Homepage
    You want your people to work harder? Make them:

    1. understand how what they are doing impacts things
    2. give them projects that they enjoy
    3. encourage them to make their own projects
    4. set aside money to encourage things:
            "steve, I wanted to let you know we appreciated you staying late and working on x last week, so we put $300 extra in your paycheck"
    5. have them interact w/ people outside of dev. If your developers interact with customers they understand how what they're doing impacts things and they get to see the rewards of people being satisfied by their good work.

    Oh, and say "Thank you".... a lot.

    6. Lastly: Ask them what you could to to make their job better and more productive.
    • 2. give them projects that they enjoy


      What happens when there is one job that nobody seems to enjoy?
      I seriously doubt there is just one unenjoyable task.
      But letting even one go undone reaks of failure.
      Failure of management and the assigned worker.
      Shit rolling down hill and all, who takes the heat?
    • 1. understand how what they are doing impacts things
      5. have them interact w/ people outside of dev. If your developers interact with customers they understand how what they're doing impacts things and they get to see the rewards of people being satisfied by their good work.

      These two items go hand-in-hand. And they are very, very important for a lot of developers, especially younger ones. Personally speaking, I would be much, much, MUCH more satisfied with my work experience if I knew anything about th

  • Motivation and Money (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward

    At least one study has shown that providing increased monetary rewards will encourage staff to become money-hungry.

    Motivation often works best when you can provide varied rewards. It is quite natural to receive a $1000 bonus one year, and think "Great!" and then receive another $1000 the following year and think "So I didn't improve at all?" even though your actual salary may have improved. And of course it's even worse if the second year bonus is $700...

    Sales staff are often in the game because they ar

  • "Managing programmers is like herding cats", so think "cats":

    • Cats love NEW toys, so do many programmers. All this shiny new stuff with those shiny cases, fancy buttons, wheels, displays, and new features (drool). If you can't give them the money, give them their new toys. Some toys that may be useful later (like a new compact PC or a hackable NAS), some toys that are just for their private fun (like iPods, but they are OLD toys). Look at thinkgeek.com for a lot of toys ...
    • Relaxed dress code. Do you know those old ladys carrying their mini-dogs in fancy dresses (dog-cinderella, dog-ballerina, dog-barbie, ...)? Did you ever see a cat wearing such a stupid dress (for more than 5 minutes)? Allow (almost) any dress that covers the private parts, because pin striped suits are at least as stupid as those dog ballerina dresses for real programmers.
    • Cats aren't always hunting, they spend a lot time of the day relaxing. For me, having some time for surfing slashdot.org, heise.de, freshmeat.net, and cpan.org is very relaxing, and I always took that time.
    • Cats can play with almost anything, sometimes, a leaf can be a toy for half an hour. Allow smaller, private projects. I built a web-controlled FM radio from an ISA radio card, an old PC and some Linux tools. It is now running for years and anyone in the team can control it from his computer.

    Also have a look at Googles way [google.com] of motivating their "cats".

    Tux2000

  • Get this book [amazon.com].

  • I worked for a large computer company where there were countless promotions for the employees to get extra rewards. I never participated in them. They made me feel cheap. Every time there was a promotion everyone would run around like chickens trying to get their $25 gift cards, ipod nanos, or gift certificates.

    My advice to you is to quit whining and do they job you agreed to do when you were hired for the amount of money you were promised.

    This is what you're saying: "I'm paid a salary for my job, b

  • Ugh!!! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ed Almos ( 584864 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @06:35AM (#14254815)
    The last place I worked at had a bonus scheme, the only problem was that performance levels were set impossibly high and the resulting bonus worked out at about 5% of your pay. I finally realized that it wasn't worth the stress, gray hair and ulcers so I just did my job and didn't bother busting a gut for little reward.

    Here's a hint, if you want to setup a bonus scheme then ask your staff what they want as rewards.

    Ed Almos
    • I really liked what the parent's thread said:

      I finally realized that it (reward) wasn't worth the stress

      This is exactly what has happened to the corporation I work for. The rewards are not worth the extra effort you have to put in to get it. It's amazing what my corporation expects just to get a 5% raise. No one is going to work 40% more to get a 5% raise. Especially when the person next to you is doing half as much as you and gets a 2% raise. So in reality, if you work 40% more, you only get 3% mo
  • As Joel said it : Incentive Pay Considered Harmful [joelonsoftware.com]
  • IMO the most important thing is lack of frustration, and meaningful work. Coders will self-motivate if they can strive with sufficient resources and without unreasonable interruption towards a project whose design they understand and whose output they expect to be used. Perks are nowhere near as important. Therefore, hire a really good project manager.
  • It sounds like they were motivated until you took away their bonuses. You'll never get them back to that level with donuts, occasional free beer, casual Fridays, leftover marketing swag, etc. Even bringing back their original bonus plan won't undo the damage you've already inflicted on moral. In your next company, don't do that. It's cheaper in the long run to pay bonuses to your core people even when times are bad. How can you fix the current situation? You need to make the developers and other techi

  • Tawny Roberts... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by stan_freedom ( 454935 ) on Wednesday December 14, 2005 @11:25AM (#14256142) Homepage
    OK, I was just using sex to advertise my less-than-sexy post.

    There are two ways of improving the bottom line. The most obvious is to increase sales. The second is to reduce costs. Unless you are directly involved in sales, it is difficult to influence sales, and even harder to convince management to pay you a commission for those sales. On the other hand, anyone can reduce costs through improving the operational efficiency of the company. So, how does a company reward cost reduction? Just as with sales, they pay a commission for cost reduction.

    My first real job was working as a tool designer at Boeing. They had an Employee Suggestion program that allowed anyone to submit a suggestion for saving the company money. The suggestor had to include a basic ROI with the suggestion. Management evaluated the suggestion and if it could be implemented, the suggestor received 10% of the savings. I had a nice little revenue stream from submitting suggestions, many of which had to do with creating custom macros for our CAD system. In a nut shell, I got a "commission" for improving Boeing's bottom line.

    One of the fringe benefits of this program was that employees were constantly analyzing every aspect of every business process, looking for opportunities to improve efficiency, even if it wasn't in their core area of expertise. One guy won big for submitting a suggestion that the company switch from standard toilet paper rolls to giant rolls. Seems kind of stupid, but when you have 100,000 people wiping their asses 250 days a year, it adds up. Estimate: 2 feet of toilet paper per employee per day = 50,000,000 million feet per year. Cost per foot for standard roll = $.010 Cost per foot for giant roll = $.008 Savings per year = .002 * 50,000,000 = $100,000. A 10% commission on $100,000 = $10,000. Obviously there would be additional costs and savings to calculate, such as cost of converting to larger carriers, savings by having to change rolls less frequently, etc.

    Employee suggestion programs are generally viewed as cheap management tricks, but if they have a financial kick to them, they can be effective tools for rewarding employees. If they are pitched as commission for non-sales employees, they will have a better chance of taking off.
  • One of the best explanations of how employee motivation occurs is the Harvard Business Journal's "One More Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?" Unfortunately, it doesn't specifically say how to motivate IT workers, but it gives you a plan on how to determine what changes will create long term motivation instead of making them look for the next bonus or perk.

    http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/b02/ en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=388X [harvard.edu]

    I would also recommend "Rapid Development" by Steve McConnell. It
  • You got 3 options, first there's donuts:

    Mr. Scorpio says productivity is up two percent, and it's all because of
    my motivational techniques! Like, donuts. And a possibility of more
    donuts to come.

    Two, asking nicely:

    Hank: I'm gonna leave everything to you. We're on a tight schedule. You keep them motivated.
    Homer: [to staff] Are you guys working?
    Man 1: Yes, sir, Mr. Simpson. [typing]
    Homer: Could you, um... work any harder than this?
    Man 2: Sure thing, boss! [typing faster]
    Homer: Hey, call me Homer.

    When all else
  • Used to take us to a football game each year. One year, they had to fly us to an away game, cause they couldn't get home tickets.

    Other company outings were, trip downtown to the theatre, a ski trip, etc.

    In summary, anytime you take the company out and buy drinks and dinner, it is a motivating factor.

    It is the season, take the whole company, including significant others, out to dinner at a fancy place.
  • The things I'm going to say could panic some people's pet incentives but still need to be said so I'm ready for a little backlash.

    The best technical people aren't motivated by the same things as salesmen and managers. Sales people (in general) can use their personality and people skills to win money. The eye is on the money and the skills develop to support that. That is fine, business needs that. However, managers tend to reflect owners desire for the business to make money and apply incentives like every

  • It takes a few simple tricks to make a top motivated company.

    1) Make them owners. Pay them partly with shares.
    2) Pay everybody the same cash amount.
    3) Let them chose there own management.

    http://www.thenewagesite.com/jjdewey/molecular/bus iness1.php [thenewagesite.com]

  • David Brent is your hero. Follow his examples for the best in motivational leadership.
  • Best manager I ever worked for knew what people were doing. She asked. Set deadlines with input. Didn't do meetings, took you to lunch (or breakfast) and chatted about the project(s) one on one.

    Drive me to Fry's this afternoon? I need to pick up x y & z. Mileage plus a time out.

    Chased away sales and marketing slime when there was a problem, sometimes took them away so we could fix things, rudely if required.

    You've been really busy, take Friday afternoon off if you're all caught up.

    This is

  • Back when I was a team leader, the best motivator I found was either 1)Cookies, or 2)M&Ms!!

    No, I'm serious....

    Depending on which the developer liked

    If a developer did something cool, or busted his (or her - yes we had some female type programmers) butt, or anything else that was "above the bar", that afternoon, around 2pm (after lunch) - I would walk over to their cube, with a tray - with a cup of coffee form them, and a snack - and a little hand written "Thanks" note. The company supplied the coffee,
  • Just ask management to show up to meetings with Chinese or Indian white papers. You know the ones that say productivity over there is high (that is something I never understood, USA workers are the MOST productive workers in the word, but if you move you JOB to India you job productivity INCREASES). OK go figure

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