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For Employees Only

Guest post by: Betsey Nash

Article Overview: Ever been disappointed with your year-end bonus? Ever felt like you got less than you deserved? Betsey addresses this issue with a real life example.

For Employees Only

What would you do if your bonus was reduced at the end of the year, when your coworkers’ were not? You knew the company did much better this year, and yet your reward for participating in that rebound was less than you expected. What would you do?

Here are some choices:

1. Get mad
2. Demand to know why
3. Get mad and then get over it and ask what you need to do to earn that bonus
4. Find out exactly what the boss is looking for from you
5. Keep in the bosses’ face with your accomplishments and completed projects until he or she acknowledges you have again proven yourself
6. Tell your immediate supervisor that you will not work on anything until the boss sits down with you to discuss your pay

Raise your hand if you chose #6. Of course you didn’t. But that was exactly the response that a client called me about the other day. And they wanted to know how they should proceed.

First, I asked if the employee was 6 years old. Learning that she was not, and was, in fact a member of middle management, I asked about the way in which the year-end bonus information was transmitted to her. Was she told directly, in person, via memo, or an email? Was she told where she had failed, and/or in what areas she had to improve before her pay would be reevaluated, or was she told “tough beans until next year?”

Turns out the boss did the right thing: called the employee in and was direct and very clear about the mediocre performance and unmet goals that they had discussed throughout the year. Oh, the boss got extra points from me for that one, “….that they had discussed throughout the year.” But the employee got mad and left without asking any questions. Understandable. I would have suggested letting the employee cool off for a couple of days and then calling her back in to lay out a plan for improvement.

One might ask why the boss had to do all the work in this: why didn’t the employee make the effort? And that’s really my point: why didn’t she? Isn’t her job at stake? But the boss has an equally critical investment at stake, and after all – and this is a reminder to bosses – the goal is performance improvement, not humiliation or power or pouting or replacing an employee when goals aren’t met.

But back to the employee: there she sits – on her thumbs, I guess -- waiting for the boss to call. Hasn’t she read the unemployment figures? Why any employee is not making themselves indispensable, I can’t imagine. We talked about it when jobs were dropping like flies at the end of 2008 – make sure you’re not the one picked. In this case, we have a manager who is not only not getting their work done but serving as a horrible example to her subordinates.

At her next job interview, she can’t get away with saying she was laid off. I am going to come back with: “Why you?”

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Article Tags: angry, bonus, deserved, employee, life example, overlooked, salary



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