从理论上讲，企业可以建立一个薪酬体系来管理员工绩效。其中，可以用奖金和其他短期激励措施来奖励和鼓励拔尖的员工，也可以给表现平庸（或者更差的）员工少涨薪，甚至不涨薪，把这部分钱留给顶尖员工，这样就不必增加总体的工资预算。这听起来很容易做到。

然而，在实际操作中，情况完全不同。

150家大中型公司的高级经理反映，其薪酬激励计划根本没有起到作用。只有不到三分之一（32%）的受访高管认为他们的计划“能够有效地根据个人的不同表现给予不同的薪酬。”Willis Towers Watson公司最新公开了这一研究。

该研究显示，只有一半人表示年度奖励，比如给优秀员工发放的奖金，会根据员工的工作表现加以区分。最没有效果的是绩效加薪，评判标准在于员工的绩效表现是否优异。只有五分之一（20%）的受访高管认为，在他们的公司，绩效加薪“有助于提升个人表现”。

如果绩效薪酬的方案没有这么流行，这也不会是个大问题。在2014年创造历史最高纪录之后，依靠激励性工资来获得出色业绩的公司还在越来越多。Willis Towers Watson 公司全球薪酬主管劳拉•赛伊恩发现：“公司每年要花费几亿美元来实施这些令人失望的计划。如果这是任何其他业务流程，我们现在早就去着手改善投资回报率了。”

问题出在哪里？激励薪酬往往不能产生效果的最大原因似乎是，管理者并不会坚持这个计划。

在绩效加薪上尤其如此。赛伊恩表示：“美国公司每年加薪的传统已经根深蒂固。30岁以上的员工就是在这种耳濡目染下成长起来的，他们期待着涨薪。现在公司说：‘好，从现在开始，不是所有人都能每年加薪了。’他们相信管理者会把一部分薪水定得比较低，从而在关键的目标领域提供更大幅度的涨薪和更多奖金。”

然而，这些管理者难以同那些没有获得加薪的下属展开对话。所以，更通常的情况是，老板仍然会增加每年的“绩效奖金”，而不考虑这个员工的表现如何。不仅如此，还有26%的受访公司甚至会给“未能达到目标的员工”发放奖金。

如果有更多流动的资金，也就是说，如果公司在他们规划的奖金池中投入了足够的资金，这可能会有用。但研究指出，自2005年以来，这种情况只出现了两次，并补充道：“2015年的奖金池只有计划值的87%。”

研究表示，考虑到奖金的不足，经理不愿意与表现普通或糟糕的团队成员发生冲突，就意味着“即便是表现最优秀的员工，获得的奖金也比计划中应得的要少。”在目前的人才市场，一份微薄的奖金远远不如竞争对手的签约奖金那么有吸引力。（财富中文网）

译者：严匡正

审校：任文科

In theory, it sounds like a no-brainer: Come up with a compensation system that rewards and encourages topnotch employees with bonuses and other short-term incentives. Fund it, without blowing up the overall pay budget, by giving mediocre (or worse) performers tiny raises, or none at all.

In practice, though, it’s a different story.

Senior managers at 150 large and midsized companies in a new Willis Towers Watson studyadmit their incentive pay plans don’t actually work. Barely one-third (32%) of the executives polled think their programs are “effective at differentiating pay based on individual performance.”

Only half say annual incentives, like bonuses for top employees, make any difference in how well people do their jobs. Least effective of all: Merit raises, which managers are supposed to give (or not) to employees based on, well, merit. Just one in five (20%) of the executives surveyed thinks merit pay “drives higher levels of individual performance” in their companies.

This wouldn’t matter quite so much if pay for performance plans weren’t so popular. But, since reaching a record high in 2014, the number of companies counting on incentive pay to produce stellar results has kept on rising. “Companies are spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year on these disappointing programs,” observes Laura Sejen, global chief of rewards at Willis Towers Watson. “If this were any other business process, certainly we’d all have moved to improve the ROI by now.”

So what’s the hold-up here? The biggest reason incentive pay so often doesn’t deliver results, it seems, is that individual managers don’t stick with the program.

That’s especially true when it comes to merit raises. “The traditional annual raise has become so ingrained in U.S. companies that every employee over age 30 has ‘grown up’ with it and expects it,” observes Sejen. “Now companies are saying, ‘OK, from now on, not everyone gets a raise every year.’ They’re relying on managers to keep some salaries flat so they can pay larger salary raises and bonuses in critical, targeted areas.”

Those managers, however, are the ones who face difficult conversations with unhappy subordinates who don’t get pay hikes. So most often, bosses are still handing out annual “merit” increases, regardless of how individual employees perform. Not only that, but 26% of companies in the study have paid bonuses even to “employees who fail to meet expectations.”

It would probably help if there were more cash to go around—that is, if companies fully funded their projected bonus pools. The study notes that has happened only twice since 2005, adding that “average projected bonus pool funding levels for 2015 were only 87% of target.”

When combined with that shortfall, managers’ tendency to chicken out on conflict with mediocre or underperforming team members means that “even top performers receive a lower bonus than called for in the plan design,” says the study. In the current market for talent, a skimpy payout may look pretty unappealing next to the signing bonus a competitor is offering.