Page 369 - The Handbook for Quality Management a Complete Guide to Operational Excellence

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the effects of rewards, that people who receive the rewards as well as
those who hand them out suffer a loss of incentive—hardly the goal of the
exercise!
Rather than provide cookbook solutions to the problem of rewards
and incentives, Kohn offers some simple guidelines to consider when
designing reward systems.
1. Abolish incentive pay (something Deming advocated as well). Hertzberg’s
hygiene theory tells us that money is not a motivator, but it can be
a de-motivator. Pay people generously and equitably; then do
everything in your power to put money out of the employee’s mind.
2. Reevaluate evaluation. Review Chap. 20 for information on per-
formance appraisals and alternatives.
3. Create conditions for authentic motivation. Money is no substitute for
the real thing—interesting work. Here are some principles to use
to make work more interesting:
a. Design interesting jobs. Give teams projects that are intrinsically
motivating, for example, projects that are meaningful, challen-
ging, and achievable.
b. Encourage collaboration. Help employees work together, then
provide the support needed to make it possible for the teams to
accomplish their goals.
c. Provide freedom. Trust people to make the right choices. Encourage
them when they make mistakes.

Training

When quality improvement plans are implemented, the nature of the
work being done changes. People involved in or impacted by the new
approach must receive two different types of training: conceptual and
task-based.
Conceptual training involves explanation of the principles driving the
change and a shift from an internal, product-based perspective to a cus tomer
and process-based focus. Rather than viewing their jobs in isolation, employ-
ees must be taught to see all work as a process, connected to other processes in
a system. Rather than pursuing a goal of “control,” where activities are done
the same way indefinitely, employees learn that continuous improvement is
to be the norm, with processes constantly being changed for the better. The
PDCA cycle discussed in Chap. 12 is helpful. Such ideas are radically dif ferent
and difficult to assimilate. Patient repetition and “walking the talk” are essen-
tial elements of such training.
Conceptual training also involves teaching employees the basics of
prob lem-solving. Data-driven process improvement demands an under-
standing of the fundamentals of data collection and analysis. In Six Sigma

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