Leadership of Motivation: The Ethics and Practicality of Incentives
(Reprint from Leadership in a New Era, New Leader Press, John Renesch editor, June 1994, book reviewed in Servant Leader Newsletter)
Probably one of the most erroneous notions sold to business leadership today is the idea that incentives are the best medicine for improving low productivity and bottom line return. Incentives are those experiences we have that generate in us the fear of punishment or the expectation of reward, thereby inciting us to action or effort. For the last forty years increasingly, refinements and enhancements have been made to incentive programs with the belief that incentives are the foundation of motivation. In fact it is so prevalent that incentives have become the cornerstone of a culture themselves, an incentive culture so to speak.
This e-book offers ethical and faster ways to turn around motivation than incentives can produce and explains why the incentives do not work long-term or ubiquitously. 24 pgs
Reimagining Responsibility.
How can a company become responsible?
» View more video presentations
Acknowledgement
"Seventh Generation’s work with Carol Sanford made me a better values-based leader."
-Jeffrey Hollender, Co-Founder,
Seventh Generation,
Author,
The Responsibility Revolution
with Bill Breen
"Carol is a very early thought leader, way beyond the pack. She has an exceedingly high level of intelligence for working on very complex subjects, with workable approaches. I have engaged with this work for decades in several successful ventures."
-Pravin Jain, Serial Entrepreneur,
CEO & Founder, Synergen Energy