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Often, but not always, I have staff who think they should get more pay if they are doing more tasks...especially when it comes to lower level staff who are getting an hourly wage.

My response to them is: "Well, we are not paying you for each task, rather we are paying for your time and level of work required. In order to get a raise, you will need to take on more _responsibility_ and work that has higher _value add_ to the organization (not that your work isn't appreciated our valuable)." I then sometimes jokingly say if they really want to be paid by task, we could look into an appropriate fee structure for each item they do, but they would no longer get paid a flat fee if there is downtime.

I am just curious if others get asked for "more pay for more work" and what your responses are? I think I heard M&M say in a recent podcast how they often have conversations about this.

Regards,

Tony

ctomasi's picture

The line that sticks in my mind from MT is "We don't pay you to do stuff, we pay you for results." More results = more pay.

AManagerTool's picture

I have heard that one before. In fact, I probably muttered it myself a few times in my younger and more rash days. My managers usually relpied like this:

[i]How bout "no pay for no work"? Like if we don't do the work that the business requires of us, we won't have jobs. And I do mean we because I'd get fired too. BTW, did I ever tell you how much I like to eat and live in my house? I'm pretty defensive about that sort of thing. I have a policy that I remove threats to my addiction to food, clothing and shelter. Are you a threat to my addiction?[/i]

Of course they weren't manager tools managers like myself, but it really drove home the idea to me. I think that I now smile and state that we work in a competative business that requires this work out of us. If we constantly refuse to do more work without more pay the company becomes less competative and we all lose. I would then give them all sorts of feedback about the many things that are wrong with making a statement like that.

tokyotony's picture

I sometimes use the example "Okay, we can start paying by task, if you wish, so if there is any downtime, then we can simply not pay."