Apr 5, 2012

Who’s really effective at the office?

Posted by Wendy Weber

…so begins a piece by Rachel Emma Silverman for the Wall Street Journal entitled “My Colleague, My Paymaster.”

She outlines a new concept in which some bosses are taking decision-making power out of the executive suite and asking employees to help identify-and reward-talent by experimenting with internal markets in which workers “invest” in co-workers’ performance and ideas.

Workers are granted “stock options” to distribute among co-workers in whatever way they choose, with the goal of rewarding people that management might not otherwise recognize. Highly visible employees; or those with “big titles” are not always the biggest contributors…in one company, the largest bonus was awarded to a remote developer who handles small tasks and spends a lot of time helping others.

Although a distribution curve of all the bonus grants may be made public so that workers can see what the highest and lowest bonuses were, names are not attached.

Interesting way to determine who your superstars are!

In