Communication is key to better performance

Regrettably many incentive programmes fail to deliver due to lack of communication of the programme objectives or failure to inform all stakeholders of the programme's existence. This is hard to understand when you consider the relative ease of executing the communication plan compared to goal setting, performance reporting or even arranging the rewards. As you embark on planning your next incentive programme consider who needs to know about the programme and in what form. For instance: l Senior managers need to have the programme outline including investment and expected outcomes. l Administration people need to know requirements to track and report results accurately and on a timely basis. l Enrolees need to know programme rules, qualification criteria and the reward on offer. The most important of these groups are the programme enrolees; these people need to be the target of well-planned stimulating communication. Apart from telling them what they need to do to qualify for the reward, you need to tell them how they are progressing. "Standings" reports listing in order of merit all the enrolee's results is one way to do this, another is to provide individual performance reports, sometimes combining both works. Finally, and very importantly, in uncertain times, all of us suffer from reduced attention span, lack of focus and therefore less resolve when it comes to reaching our goals. Consider sustaining motivation by reducing the time over which people qualify for an incentive reward and simplify the goals. To maintain interest in the programme you need to increase frequency of communication even more, in other words, constant reinforcement. Mr Nigel Gaunt is the managing director of Mint Motivation E-mail: nigel.gaunt@mintorg.com