BetaCodex10 - Making Performance Management Work

Make it real!

Making Performance Management Work.
From fixed to relative performance contracts,
and towards simple, ethical and empowering ways of
dealing with performance
(Why your performance management systems have to
change. And how you should approach this)

BetaCodex Network Associates
Gebhard Borck - Niels Pflaeging – Andreas Zeuch
Gebhard Borck - Niels Pflaeging – Andreas Zeuch
White paper
White paper
January 2009
January 2009

Traditional management processes keep teams from strategic
thinking, and motivate counterproductive or unethical behavior

Financial problems
• Process takes too long
Vision • Plans become obsolete quickly
• Plans are of little or no use
Targets and
strategic guidelines Strategic problems
Profitability in petrochemical industry in Europe
600
500
• Target negotiation 400

Fixed • Definition of incentives 300

Fixed • Activity planning 200
performance
performance • Resource allocation 100

contacts and
contacts and • Coordination of plans 0
0
1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000
Source: Chem Systems
“keep on track”
“keep on track” • Approval
Behavioral problems
Budget

Performance control
(plan-actual)

Bonus (vs. targets)

Source: BBRT ...
White paper – Making Performance Management Work 2 © BBTN – All rights reserved

Management processes in command and control
organizations are “straight jackets”

Strategy “Fixed” performance contract

Strategic • Period [Fixed]
learning cycle • Targets [Fixed]
• Compensation [Fixed]
Annual plan
Fixed • Plan [Fixed]
Performance
Contract • Resources [Fixed]
Budget • Coordination [Fixed]
• Control [Fixed]
Management • Agreed through [Negotiation]
control cycle
• Signed by: [Manager/Director]

Control

Tayloristic management works like this: As centralistic-burocratic hierarchies,
held together through a regime of fixed performance contracts!
Source: BBRT
3

Current practices are misaligned with the
Critical Success Factors of today's competitive market places

Six “Critical Success Factors” Six examples of misalignment

• Fast response Annual planning process retards it
• Innovation Centralized bureaucracy stifles it
• Operational excellence ‘Spend it or lose it’ mentality fights it
• Customer intimacy Short term targets prevent it
• Best team Extrinsic ‘motivators’ undermine it
• Ethical behaviour Dysfunctional, even unethical behaviour
conflicts with it

• Value creation • Inferior financial results

When pressure is
applied, misalignment
gets worse!

Can you read the future, from the bottom
of a cup of coffee? Or do you have a crystal ball
that lets you to look into the future? Can you
read the cards and see what will happen next
year? Well, if none of this actually works,
and if we accept that it´s impossible to predict
the future, then why do we still spend massive
energy and time on formal techniques that try
to achieve just that for businesses?


Organizations need a different, trust-based form of
“future-directed thinking”, not command and control!

The secret of success is not to foresee the future.
But to build an organization that is able to prosper in any
of the unforeseeable futures.
Michael Hammer


Applying the BetaCodex means:
From fixed to adaptive management processes.

Traditional model New model
(fixed performance contracts, (relative performance contracts,
negotiated in advance) assessed with hindsight)

Relative
strategy performance
contracts
Changing
Fixed
performance processes
Dynamic
contracts
coordination

control

• Fixed, annual processes • Dynamic, continuous processes
• Fixed targets and incentives • Relative targets/compensation
• Centralized and • Self-control, transparency and
bureaucratic control peer pressure


But there is a further challenge. Which is why most theories about
leadership, as well as most advice from consultants, are flawed...

One cannot talk sensibly about leadership, or people
management, nor design decent management processes,
unless we clarify beforehand our beliefs with regards to what
people in organizations are like.
We have to arrive at a shared understanding of human
nature and of the consequences of that for our organizations.
Niels Pflaeging, Leading with Flexible Targets


vs.
Douglas McGregor

White paper – Making Performance Management Work 9
9 © BBTN – All rights reserved

The industrial age management model not only fails because
markets have changed. It is also misaligned with human nature.

Theory X (0%) Theory Y (100%)
Attitude
People dislike work, find it boring, People need to work and want to take an inte-
and will avoid it if they can. rest in it. Under right conditions, they can enjoy it.
Direction
People must be forced or bribed People will direct themselves towards
to make the right effort. a target that they accept.
Responsibility
People would rather be directed than People will seek and accept responsibility,
accept responsibility, which they avoid. under the right conditions.
Motivation
People are motivated mainly by money Under the right conditions, people are moti-
and fears about their job security. vated by the desire to realize their own potential.
Creativity
Most people have little creativity - except Creativity and ingenuity are widely distributed
when it comes to getting round rules. and grossly underused.

Based on Douglas McGregor, ‘The Human Side of Enterprise’, 1960


Question:
How often do the systems,
especially the HR systems,
get in the way of change, transformation,
vision and strategic thinking?

Answer:
Far too often.
History often leaves HR people in highly bureaucratic
personnel functions that discourage leadership and make
altering human resource practices a big challenge.
WhiteSource:–based upon John Kotter, Leading Change, p, 110-111
paper Making Performance Management Work 11 © BBTN – All rights reserved

Do you BELIEVE in Theory Y?
Firmly?

Good. Because we are sure then you would never,
ever practice (or support, or tolerate) HR processes
and tools that treat people like children, or animals, or
worse. Right? Such as performance appraisals,
individual target setting, incentive compensation,
meritocracy, or control of work-hours…

Do your HR systems make it in people's best interest to
implement your new vision?

What is meant by HR systems?
Performance appraisal
Compensation
Hiring and Promotions
Succession planning
...

Most often, examination of a firm's human resource systems reveal:
Performance evaluation processes have virtually nothing to do with customers
or strategy – yet that is typically at the core of a new vision or management
model
Compensation decisions are based much more on not making mistakes than
on creating the right and useful change
Promotion decisions are made in a highly subjective way and seem to have at
best a limited relationship to the change effort
Recruiting and hiring systems are a decade old and only marginally support
the transformation

Source: J. Kotter, Leading Change, HBSP, p, 110-111


Let's start with compensation then.
First of all, let's be clear. Carrots don't work.
They might beat the intellect of donkeys. But they certainly
don't trick human beings, who all have “Theory Y”
wiring inside them. Incentives simply don't
have a positive influence on organizational
performance. Full stop.

So why do so many of us still apply
in the carrot-and-stick method with people?


Background stories we wouldn´t tell our clients:
Real-life examples from companies

The case of Marie Taylor

This is what happened:
Marie Taylor, a sales person from our organization, has generated
income that goes against our company´s principle
“Always act to the benefit of our customers“.

The decision: Marie Taylor is being transferred to the internal sales
support department. All her bonuses rights have been immediately
cancelled.

The background story:
It is true – all sales people are obligued to act in the interest of customers.
But it is also true that 40% of Marie Taylor´s salary depend on the amount of
net sales she generates.


Background stories we wouldn´t tell our clients:
Real-life examples from companies

The case of Frank Miller

This is what happened:
Frank Miller, a consultant, has overcharged during his work with
clients, which means he has systematically inflated the amount
of worked hours charged to his customers.

The decision: Frank Miller was fired and is leaving the company
immediately.

The background story:
It is true: Frank Miller has acted against the law, by charging for more than
he has actually worked for his clients.
But it is also true that 25% of Frank Miller´s income depend on the hours
charged to clients…


An example: “motivation”, or “threat”?
What compensation systems really do...

System with no System with variable compensation
variable compensation (bonus, incentive, etc.)

30%
Variable
compensation

100%
Base salary 100%: Total 70%
compensation Base salary Is this an “energizing
expected by promise”, or is it
employee. just a pitiful threat?

“We have a conservative pay “We have an aggressive pay
philosophy. philosophy: 30% of your total
Your base salary equals your total compensation will be paid in form of
compensation, which is USD a bonus. The total is USD
100.000,00.“ 100.000,00, by the way.“


Social scientist Alfie Kohn says:

I am arguing against…..
(1) attributing more importance to money than it actually has,
(2) pushing money into people's faces and making it more
salient than it needs to be, and
(3) confusing compensation with reward
(the latter being unnecessary and counterproductive).
The problem isn't with the dollars themselves,
but with using dollars to get people to jump through hoops.


And:

Pay-for-performance is an outgrowth of behaviorism, which is
focused on individual organisms, not systems - and, true to its name,
looks only at behaviors, not at reasons and motives and the people who
have them.
I tell Fortune 500 executives (or at least those foolish enough to ask me)
that the best formula for compensation is this: Pay people well, pay them
fairly, and then do everything possible to help them forget about money.
How should we reward our staff? Not at all! They are not our pets.
Pay them well, respect and trust them, free them from disturbance,
provide them with all available information and support to perform
on the highest possible level.

1. Pay people well
2. Pay people fairly
3. And then do everything possible to take money off peoples minds!
All pay-for-performance plans violate that last precept!

1 very simple principle:
Never use bonuses and incentives.
Apply profit sharing and/or shareholding concepts
for community.


True, it is tempting to believe that we can
“control”, or “steer” organizations. Looking at
the reports, and indicators, and accounting
statements, it appears that an intelligent
executive might be able to remote-
control a company, right?
Now, the problem is:
That's just a
beautiful illusion.


Let´s leave compensation myths behind!

We found no systemic pattern linking
executive compensation to the process of
going from Good to Great
Jim Collins, From Good to Great, 2001

Individual incentive pay, in reality, undermines
performance – of both the individual and the
organization. Jeffrey Pfeffer,
Six Dangerous Myths about Pay, HBR 1998

Spending time and energy trying to
“motivate” people is a waste of effort...
The key is not to de-motivate them.
Jim Collins, From Good to Great, 2001


Always disconnect compensation from targets.
Always.


The problem with “incentives”: How traditional management
systematically forces people to cheat
Bonus Variable Bonus
Common practice: hurdle area limit “Ceiling”
„Pay for performance“
compensation Salary/ Reduction Maximization Reduction incentive:
profile with fixed bonus incentive: Lower incentive: Anticipate postpone results to
performance contract: result even more results next period
Creates maniuplation
incentive in any situation! Base salary
80% 100%: 120% Performance as %
of target target of target of target realization

Linear compensation curve without breaks:
A better model: Result variable compensation becomes
oriented compensation decoupled from targets
profile with relative
Salary/ Free from
performance
bonus incentive to manipulate
contracts:
No incentive to
manipulation.

Actual Actual Actual Performance in
Source: Michael Jensen
result #1 result #2 result #3 relative evaluation

Pay the person. Not the position.
Always.


Variable compensation: Unbundling fixed “Pay for
Performance” contracts, in favor of “Relative Improvement”

• Beyond Budgeting principles advocate basing evaluation and rewards on
relative improvement contracts with hindsight,
rather than fixed performance contracts agreed upon in advance.
• In formulating a rewards policy,
the Beyond Budgeting model leads to eight key recommendations:
1. Base rewards on relative measures, not fixed targets.
2. Align rewards with strategic measures, not budgets.
3. Reward the performance of teams, not individuals.
4. Align rewards with independent groups, not parochial interests.
5. Use clear and transparent measures, not unfathomable numbers.
6. Use the language and thinking of gain sharing, not incentives.
7. Make rewards fair and inclusive, not unfair and divisive.
8. Recognize and reward company values, not just the numbers.
Organizations can free themselves from
All employees should earn a conventional forms of
share of the financial success. “pay for performance”,
Restrain from the idea of
Source: BBRT through simple and more transparent
White paper – “motivating Management Work
Making Performance them“! 26
compensation systems.rights reserved
© BBTN – All

Resources. What most organizations do with them is basically this:
Once a year, they define the size of the pie. Then, they invite managers to
fight for a piece of the action… Organizational research has shown over and
over that this is the fundamental mechanism organizations use… and that it
inevitably leads to sub-optimization, to say the least.
Happily, there is a far better way to steer resources. Just imagine for a
moment that you simply wouldn't define the size of the pie for a fixed period
any more. And that you would take important resource decisions together in
a team, and always as late as possible! (Yes, you read that right!)


Employing resources dynamically: A typical way of doing it,
as practiced by Sydney Water, Australia

Resources
Income as
“total (expected) available resources over time“ -
forecasted as “limiting factor“

Yet uncommited resources –
work actively on available
Already approved investments - “options for a better future“
actively handled as “dynamic portfolio“

Operational resources –
controlled by Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) –
activities are focused on continuous improvement!

Projected
period (e.g. 5 quarters)
Source: Sydney Water

Morpheus to Neo:

"You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your
bed and believe whatever you want to believe....
You take the red pill and you stay in Wonderland and I show
you how deep the rabbit-hole goes."


The world of command and control management and planning-based steering has a lot
to do with the fictitious, machine-generated world in the movie trilogy "The Matrix".
Actually, like in that crucial scene in the first movie of the series, traditional management is
much like the blue pill the movie's hero Neo is offered, and Beyond Budgeting is the red pill.

Organizations have the choice to either stick with
the illusion of control that their “management by
numbers” delivers, or to acknowledge that there is a
whole world of performance management “beyond
planning and control”. One that doesn't deny uncertainty
and paradoxes. And that makes far better use of people´s
talent and potential.

Why traditional management with “fixed performance contracts“
regularily fools us: We have lost control a long time ago…

The blue pill: Fixed, negotiated targets The red pill: Relative, self-adjusting targets
Target: absolute ROCE in % (here: 15%) Target: relative ROCE in % (to market)
Plan Actual Target Actual

Comparison:
Comparison: Market-Actual
Plan-Actual Most Target: „ROCE Most
important in % better important
Market competitor than market Market competitor
(25%) (28%) average” (25%) (28%)
Actual Actual
Plan (21%) (21%)
(15%) [independent
[expected from expected
market Ø: 13%] market Ø]

• Interpretation within the plan-actual- • Interpretation within actual-actual compa-
comparison: Plan was outperformed by 6 rison: Performance was 4 percentage points
percentage points > positive interpretation below competition! > negative interpretation
• Better ROCE of the market average and the • Absolute assumptions at the moment of
most important competitor remain unnoticed! planning don´t matter.
• Targets always remain updated and relevant!
White paperNiels Pfläging
Source: – Making Performance Management Work 31 © BBTN – All rights reserved

Relative target definition through “league tables“ (rankings) –
instead of planned, fixed targets and internal negotiation
Strategic „cascade”
Bank to bank
Bank to bank
Return on Equity (RoE)
Return on Equity (RoE) Region to region
Principles Region to region
Return on Assets(RoA)etc.
1. Bank D 31% Return on Assets(RoA)etc.
1. Bank D 31% Branch to branch
2. Bank JJ 24%1.
2. Bank Branch to branch
24%1. Region A 38% Cost/income ratio etc.
Region A 38% Cost/income ratio etc.
3. Bank I I 20%2.
3. Bank 20%2. Region CC 27%
Relative targets and Region 27%
relative compensation 4. Bank BB 18%3.
4. Bank 18%3. Region H 20%1.
Region H 20%1. Branch JJ 28%
Branch 28%
5. Bank EE 15%4.
5. Bank 15%4. Region B 17%2.
Region B 17%2. Branch D 32%
Branch D 32%
Continuous 6. Bank FF 13%5.
6. Bank 13%5. Region FF 15% 3.
Region 15%3. Branch EE 37%
Branch 37%
7. Bank CC 12%6. 4.
Region EE 12% 4. Branch A 39%
Branch A 39%
planning/control 7. Bank 12%6. Region 12%
8. Bank H 10%7. Region JJ 10%5.
10%5. Branch I I 41%
Branch 41%
8. Bank H 10%7. Region
9. Bank GG 8% 8. Region I I 7% 6.
7% 6. Branch FF 45%
Branch 45%
“On demand“ flow of 9. Bank 8% 8. Region
7. Branch CC 54%
10. Bank AA (2%)9.
10. Bank
Region G 6% 7.
(2%)9. Region D (5%)8.
Region G 6% Branch 54%
resources/ 10. Region D (5%)8. Branch G 65%
10. Branch G 65%
dynamic coordination 9.
9. Branch H 72%
Branch H 72%
10. Branch B 87%
10. Branch B 87%
Result & value contribution

Leads to lowest operational cost!

Does your organization use “traffic light” reporting?
Those red, orange and green dots indicating what to pay attention to?
Most of these reports are made for managers and executives,
because, so the the story goes, those people have short attention
spans and “need” the color coding.
Now, isn't it fascinating that organizations have such a low opinion of
their supposedly “top” people?


To evaluate performance in an adaptive and dynamic way,
the basis of Performance Measurement must shift
Against plan Against time
• Prior periods
• Progress towards achievement of
medium-term (2-3 years) targets
Internal focus External focus
• Internal peers
• Competitors
• Benchmarks/Stretch
Annual focus Trends and “as needed”

Financial measures Few key indicators

Closed systems Open information systems for all

Pure measurement Mixed approach meajuring/judging
“Indicators only indicate“, there is no “truth“
in the numbers – living systems cannot be
evaluated by measuring alone!

Simple and relevant: creating reports without actual-plan-
variances, fixed targets, or plans!

Company KPI Regions KPI Compe- last Same Same Ø Ø
month month month last 12
Competitor A 31% Region G 7% titor A last prev.. 12 prev.
Our year year mnths mnths
Competitor E 24% Region E 7% unit A
Competitor C 20% Region B 6% KPI 2
Us 18% Region F 4% Compe-
Competitor B 13% Region A 3% Us titor B Indicators
Competitor D 12% Region D 3% Our or
Competitor G 10% Region C 1% unit B Groups of accounts
Competitor F 8% Region H 0%
KPI 1
Ranking (League table) ext./intern. Snapshot (static) with benchmarks Accouts/KPIs vs. Previous periods

(A) Maximum
Tolerance levels
Us
(B) Gliding average

KPI KPI KPI

Us
Competitor A Curve with variance

Time (Actuals) Time (Actuals) Time (Actuals)
Trend with tolerance Trend with benchmark Trend with references

By applying the 12 Beyond Budgeting principles, you will revolutionize
performance management. And more. You will set your people free to think
and to act like entrepreneurs. You will make far better use of their talents, and
finally stop de-motivating them.
You will stop fighting against
the reality of your
marketplace.

Read the BBTN´s white papers and presentation slides
for further information about Beyond Budgeting
and about how to approach transformation.
Vortrag: Niels Pfläging
36

Make it real!

www.betacodex.org

Gebhard Borck Niels Pflaeging Valérya Carvalho
gebhard@bbtn.org niels@bbtn.org valeria@bbtn.org
gberatung.de nielspflaeging.com Betaleadership.com
Pforzheim, Germany Sao Paulo, Brazil Sao Paulo, Brazil

Get in touch with us for
more information about
leading transformation with
the BetaCodex and the
Double Helix Framework, or Andreas Zeuch Silke Hermann Markus Schellhammer
ask us for a workshop az@a-zeuch.de silke.hermann@ markus.schellhammer@
proposal. a-zeuch.de insights-group.de my-online.de
Winden, Germany Wiesbaden, Germany Zurich, Switzerland

BetaCodex10 - Making Performance Management Work

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