These are taken from an article by the highly regarded Jeffrey Pfeffer (Stanford Graduate School of Business) in the Nov-Dec 2008 edition of Management Today, published by the Australian Institute of Management.

Myth: Just because a manangement practice is popular is evidence it works.
Reality: There are numerous examples of management practices advocated by executives and consultants, where sytematic empirical evidence for their ineffectiveness is overwhelming

Myth: Individual pay-for-performance enhances organisational operations
Reality: Evidence says that assumption does not hold in most organisations

Myth: Evidence on the effectiveness of individual pay-for-performance is overwhelming.
Reality: Evidence is mixed, at best. Frequently such systems effectively motivate the wrong behaviour. The best way to encourage performance is to build a high-performance culture, with investment in training and development, an egalitarian culture, delegated decision making and high pay to reduce staff turnover.

Performance Management and Reward systems again…. I feel like this is all I’m writing about lately – perhaps it’s just what I’m drawn to. Organisations of all sizes could benefit from reviewing their assumptions on what motivates people to perform well, and what drives results. 

Is team based reward a better option? Or should reward be based on business performance? I continue to explore…..