Improving the Performance of Government Employees

CHAPTER 9The Rewards and Recognition and Renewal Systems

The rewards system is the pay and benefits structure but also includes incentives, celebrations, and informal rewards and recognitions. Given the fact that the government’s pay and benefits structures are usually set by law, I am going to focus almost exclusively on the incentives, celebrations, and informal rewards and recognition components. First and foremost, you need to think about rewards and recognition as a system that reinforces excellent performance and behavior. It should not be used to reward people for merely doing their job and meeting the minimum standards of performance. Unfortunately, I’ve seen this happen far too often in government, when virtually every employee both ...