That’s the conclusion from our most recent blog poll in which we asked “At your company, do employees who do a better job get paid more?”

The results break down like this with the far larger group (58%) of respondents saying No.

It’s not scientific, but it is interesting. Seems to me that the likelihood of one being fully engaged in their job if its felt that others are rewarded more richly for doing lower quality work approaches zero.

Another argument for some sort (any sort) of pay for performance program.

New poll coming shortly.

My favorite SaaS blogger, Phil Wainewright, has a great post from last week about the real benefit of SaaS: It lets everyone focus on results.

He puts it better than I could:

Now, for the first time since that wrong turn the software vendors made all those years ago, on-demand applications are putting business results back into focus. The vendor has already done the implementation before even meeting the customer. The technology is already sorted, and the vendor guarantees to keep it working. What matters is whether the application meets the customer’s business need. The whole conversation revolves around what the customer is trying to achieve, and whether the application can help with that.

Well, isn’t that really what software is meant for in the first place? To get results? It seems quite obvious, but most of our experiences tell us it’s all too rare.

The point he doesn’t make is that we can get to results way faster with SaaS than any traditional software implementation. We don’t need to spend a ton of time or money or effort on the software itself, so we’re free to spend all of our resources pursuing our goals.

It’s kind of like if we had to build a car every time we wanted to go somewhere new. That would clearly be a lot of work. SaaS is like having a car delivered to your door. You still have to drive it to your destination, but don’t have to worry about whether or not (or even how) the car itself works.

Or so Seth Godin seems to say. Here, he advocates for hiring passionate people who may or may not be particularly efficient or effective. Truth be told, I tend to agree with him.

I’m dealing with a situation now with my bank. It involves a lost wire transfer – they sent it, and no one got it. They’ve spent the last two weeks “tracking it” but have yet to “find anything.” How can this be possible?

It’s possible because the people just don’t care. It’s not a big enough amount of money, and I’m not important enough a customer for anyone to really give a hoot about tracking it down.

It reminds me of part of a speech I listened to last week by Jason Fried of 37 signals. In it, he says that hiring “happy people” is more important than hiring for the perfect skill-set. Why? Because happy people come to work everyday ready to do what needs to be done. They bring people up instead of dragging them down.

Seth is right - even if the sales clerk in his article seems overly detailed -  passionate people make all the difference. They go the extra mile to get things done and keep customers happy. And ultimately, customer success matters most.

If you’ve stayed current on Harvard’s leadership difficulties involving President Lawrence Summers’ rocky 5 year tenure, you know that he recently conducted his last commencement. (If you haven’t stayed current, I don’t blame you. Not even a little.)

One would think that Harvard might have seen the writing on the wall around January of last year, when Summers made his feelings on women in the sciences known. That would have given them a good 18 months to start thinking about a succession plan. Alas, this seems to have been far from their minds.

A Harvard alum sent me this letter he recently received soliciting thoughts and opinions on Summers’ replacement. Innocent enough in its appearance, it reveals a fairly serious lack of planning. Have a look. Click the image to blow up a section of the letter.

It’s remarkable how many organizations of every kind don’t think about succession until they’re headless.

Gautam reminds us of an old HR saying –

“A players hire other A players
B players hire C players
C players should never be hiring…”

Any other HR wisdom anyone would like to share? That could be a fun project.

Of course they do? But why? 

Well, according to this McKinsey survey, everyone thinks they matter for reasons like employee attraction and retention, meeting responsibilities to employees and so on. But when asked whether in fact they actually do matter, in other words – whether the results of the benefits programs have ever been measured – the vast majority (78%) of people surveyed said no.

Now, the point of the survey isn’t to say that because the benefits of the benefits aren’t measured, they should be stopped. Rather, it’s to point out that executives don’t understand why the benefits they provide matter to employees. And since thy don’t understand it, they don’t know what levers to pull to help attract and retain talent.

So I pose the question to you – what kinds of benefits do you think are most attractive to top talent? I’m curious to hear your comments, and perhaps we can help sort these unknowing executives out.

Wanted to point you to an interview that DubDubs at systematicHR did with our very own Rob Bernshteyn. He just published the article, but the interview was done a ways back. In any case, I think Dubs picks up one some important points about us (technology, analytics) in the context of the market, and I encourage you to read it.

He’s also done some other great posts recently on the future of HR technology and Does HR technology define HR strategy?

According to this Fortune article, it’s because they don’t know what’s expected of them. “A big reason is that a huge percentage of new employees, including new managers, are not clearly told what they were hired to do or what their goals should be for the first six months and the first year.”

Makes good sense.

Apparently, nearly 50% of employees fail in the first 18 months of their jobs. And we’re not just talking about individual contributors, either. Actually, the higher up you are, the more likely you are to fail.

But it seems to me that blaming lack of direction for failure doesn’t address the whole problem. It’s a company’s fault for not providing enough direction – but it’s an employee’s fault for not seeking one out. Beyond that, bad managers, personality mismatches and lack of appropriate competencies are all good reasons for why new employees fail.

It’s always been a belief of mine that taking a job (or hiring someone) is like the beginning of a new relationship. There are all kinds of reasons why personal relationships fail. I’m sure we’re all familiar with many of them. Sometimes, even knowing our goals for the relationships is not enough to keep it alive when other parts are missing.

Check the article out, there’s even a cool quiz to take to find out if you’ll succeed in your new job.

About an American company. As told by Jason Corsello.

It’s an entertaining tale, you should read it even if just for a laugh. But it make you take note of the fact that Performance management ain’t a cure for stupidity, – that’s for sure.

It often occurs to me that some of the highly educated people that comprise the management ranks at our nation’s most highly regarded companies are so capable of strategizing that they never actually DO anything. They just think.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that by itself.

But, in that world, the people that are actually doing the work are just that – doers. Well what if the doers thought and the thinkers did? What a wonderful, productive world it would be. In some ways, I think that’s part of the promise of goal alignment in particular and performance management in general.

Just a thought.