Tag: incentive

Incentive is not Outcome

Post author By jrlsage
Post date December 14, 2016

Wealth doesn’t necessarily mean paycheck

It means “wealth.”

Don’t confuse the outcome for the incentive.

Like the exercise I pointed to earlier, it is easy to mistake the first thing as the thing.

I previously discussed how the first thing done rarely matters; at its best, it is an opportunity to understand better what you are thinking.

Our brains struggle to find nuance until it is obvious.

It is easy to see outcomes as being the same as your incentives.

Example: if your incentive is gaining wealth, you could mistake the outcome of earning a paycheck and its later money as having reached your incentive. Remember that incentives are stimuli, encouraging factors, and motivations. They are not items.

Tags incentive, models, outcome, think

Blog Post

The Primary Incentive Guides Us

Post author By jrlsage
Post date December 13, 2016

We live from default based on our incentive

The last two days, we’ve defined incentive and had an exercise to list them.

Today, we are focusing on the primary incentive.

Human beings are creatures of habit and live on our defaults.

We live by default because our brains are structured to maintain energy. Using intent is energy expensive.

How do you figure out your major incentive?

Your major incentive could well be on your exercise’s list. Try to think back to a pressure filled situation and think about which one of those things you tended to.

Why is this all important?

As a result of this, our primary incentive creates the foundation for how we approach our work.

A quick example: If someone says wealth is the primary incentive – then when push comes to shove, they will focus most on the wealth. When the pressure is on, that person is going to decide based on his wealth, for better (focusing on bringing in clients) or for worse(fudging numbers to make it better).

If you are self-aware, then you can lead yourself (and by extent, the team around you) to better decisions by creating systems that protect against the “worse.”

Tomorrow, we are going to end this mini-series with a mistake people make about incentives.

Tags default, guide, Habit, incentive, primary

Blog Post

What is an Incentive? Why is it Important?

Post author By jrlsage
Post date December 11, 2016

We move on the incentive

Over the next four days, this blog is going to focus on incentives.

What is an incentive?

Definition of incentive

: something that incites or has a tendency to incite to determination or action

Merriam Webster Dictionary

Incentives drive our work and behavior.
Why focus on incentives?

The leader’s incentives and subsequent actions are the foundations of the business’s culture.

Intellectually, the concept of incentive is easy to grasp. And when one is not aware of the necessary actions to bring about that incentive, execution will be all over the place.

This lack of focus can have disastrous consequences because they often start small, and like a virus, effect a ton of things.

So what are we looking at tomorrow?

Tomorrow – We are looking at the incentives in your life.

Tags defintion, dictionary, incentive, what

Wealth doesn’t necessarily mean paycheck

We live from default based on our incentive

We move on the incentive

Definition of incentive