Rewards and Recognition in

Knowledge Management

APQC Members-Only Teleconference

KM Virtual Community
www.ksn.apqc.org
June 20, 2002

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Discussion Agenda

Est. Time Content

1:00 Purpose of APQC’s KSN, KM Community, and
Teleconference Series
1:10 Psychology of Rewards and Recognition

1:20 Implications of R&R for KM Change

Management
1:35 Best Practice Examples

1:45 Discussion

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Goals of the Knowledge Sharing Network™ (KSN)

• Connect people to content
– Selecting a primary area of interest at registration
enables the KSN to deliver targeted information to our
users
• Connect people to people
– Member-only benefit: members are able to search for
other members based on areas of interest, company,
geography, and role
• Connect people to expertise
– Led by APQC experts, communities within the KSN
provide members with a forum to communicate and
work together
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Purpose of Teleconferences
• Convene community to discuss relevant topics
• Share APQC expertise
• Provide forum for members to share expertise
• Provide actionable information based on best practices

The Community should drive the selection of discussion

topics. Please let us know what topics you would like
to cover in the future.

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Call Guidelines and Etiquette

To maintain a high quality phone conversation with this number of
people, please observe the following:
• Please do not call in on a speaker phone --or mute your phone while
you listen so we don’t pick up background noise.
• Please only have one person on the line when you call in.
• Please do not call in on a cell phone.
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same phone number).
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• If you have questions, and we will encourage you to ask them at
designated Q & A intervals, please state your name and organization
so that we can identify who is speaking.

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Definitions
Recognition:
• Visible, public reinforcement to individuals and teams for
contributions and role modeling of behavior.
• May be at the individual, community, group, department,
business or enterprise level.
• Sometimes recognition is accompanied by rewards.
Tangible rewards:
• May include money, promotions, and substantial gifts.
• May or may not be public.
• Usually reflects exemplary contribution or performance, but
at a small $ level can recognize desired behaviors

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Wait! What is the Real Problem or Issue?

Is it really “rewards and recognition?” Or are R&R a
potential response to some other issue or need?
• Behavior
• Motivation
• Appreciation
• Social cohesion and allegiance
• Engagement and commitment
• Attitudes and feelings

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Start by Addressing the Right Issues

The limits to knowledge sharing
• Compelling reason
• Time
• Access
• Context (situation, consequences)
• Relative payoff
• Absorptive capacity

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Knowledge Management
• Systematic approaches to help information and knowledge
flow to the right people at the right time so they can act
more efficiently and effectively.
• Find, understand, share, and use knowledge to create
value.

The focus for today:

How to address the motivation issues to enable this
system to work in the complex things we call
“organizations,” with the even more complex beings
we call “employees?”

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Incentive and Motivation Theory:

What Applies Here?
• What works in rats and dogs does not always
apply to people in organizations.
– Classical Conditioning (Pavlov)
– Operant Conditioning (Behaviorism -Skinner)
• Cognitive and social psychology
– More relevant to motivation and R&R in organizations
– Humans have needs for achievement, status, affiliation
– Humans interpret their own motivations and the
motivations of others
– People do respond to both intrinsic and extrinsic
rewards

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What Drives Knowledge Workers?

Pride, Commitment,
Ownership

Intrinsic Motivators Extrinsic Motivators

Autonomy Salary
Time for Own Projects Stock Options
Opportunities for Learning Recognition, Awards

Group/Organizational
Goals

Dorothy Leonard, Wellsprings of Knowledge

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Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

• Intrinsic Motivation
– Originates internally, inherent in a person
– Demonstrated where the task itself is experienced as appealing –
the task is rewarding
• Extrinsic Motivation
– Originates from the outside
– Demonstrated when a task is seen as a means to a rewarding end
Interdependence and Implications
• As extrinsic motivation, or the perception by the person that
they are acting because of extrinsic motivation, goes up,
intrinsic motivation can decline.
• If intrinsic motivation declines, it take more and more
extrinsic rewards to maintain the behavior.

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The Dark Side of Extrinsic Rewards

• Issues arise when you:
– attribute more importance to money than it actually has,
– make money more prominent than it needs to be, and
– confuse compensation with reward.
• Rewards may increase the probability that individuals do
something but may impact the way they do it.
• Competition for rewards may negatively impact teamwork.
• When supervisors hold control of rewards, employees are
more likely to conceal problems.
• Rewards may ignore the underlying issues behind
behaviors.
Alfie Kohn, “Challenging Behaviorist Dogma: Myths About Money and Motivation” and
“Dangling the Carrot: Examining the ‘Downside’ of Rewards” 13
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Four Rules of Thumb:

Participation and Contribution
1. Always acknowledge the contributor; Keep names
associated with tips and other contributions
• Examples: Best Buy and Xerox Eureka Communities;
Siemens AG ShareNet
• Determine who should provide the recognition:
- Senior management needs to recognize design
teams and champions (people who create and
support the system)
- Peers should nominate and recognize team
mates for their contributions to the overall effort
(aka the “Sally Fields Effect”)
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Four Rules of Thumb, cont’d

2. Volunteers deserve special recognition
• If people take their personal time and energy to
contribute or lead a KM effort or community, they
deserve special recognition by the community and by
senior managers
- Special annual award (by nomination)
- Newsletter mentions
• A great reward is to legitimize the time they spend and
make room for it by building it into their job
descriptions (if they choose!)

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Four Rules of Thumb, cont’d

3. Subject Matter Experts
• Rely on intrinsic motivation
• Increase the usefulness of the interactions they have;
ensure they gain value from interacting with their
peers
- Special SME roundtables
- Grants to work on something (3M)
- Time and money to attend a conference and bring
back what they learn (Woods Publishing)
- Other professional development opportunities
• Reduce the barriers to spending time and sharing
what they know

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Four Rules of Thumb, cont’d

4. Create Safe Places for People to Share
• Set expectations and requirements low to get people
using a system and then slowly raise the bar
- Context Integration
- Boeing Rocketdyne SLICE team
• Make it fun
- Buckman Laboratories has lots of chat rooms on
pets and garage sales, encourages people to use
the system for work and play

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100% of APQC best practice partners provide recognition to

employees for contributing to the knowledge system
Best Practice Partner R&R Approaches

Bonus 25%

Informal
100%
Recognition

Evaluations 38%

Rewards 38%

0% 25% 50% 75% 100%

APQC's 2000 Benchmarking Consortium Study
"Successfully Implementing Knowledge Management"

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Lessons Learned and Examples from APQC’s

Nine Knowledge Management Studies

1. Make using the system self-rewarding. Build

it into daily work. One stop shop for
information people need to do their job.
Supply “magnet” content.
Hewlett Packard
Consultants are better able to address client concerns
and are thus more successful and perceived as experts.
Best Buy
Associates can find the answers to customer questions
– they feel smarter and do a better job.
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Lessons Learned and Examples

2. Recognition may lie in being perceived as an
expert by peers and management. Quality
does matter.
Siemens AG
Top ShareNet contributors are rewarded and invited to a global
knowledge sharing conference of their peers. Users receive
ShareNet shares based on the quality and reusability of the
contribution as assessed by peers
Schlumberger
“Frequent contributor points” that can be redeemed for rewards
Best Buy
Associates get a rating on their tips by the company expert as well
as peers.

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Lessons Learned and Examples

3. “Link and Leverage” existing reward systems
American Management Systems:
Knowledge Center contributions and reuse are recognized through
annual awards and daily activity
World Bank
• Part of Performance Appraisal for promotions, assignments, and
pay.
• High-level organizational awards include knowledge sharing as
a criterion. President’s Award is given annually to teams that
excelled at knowledge sharing
• It took time for the cultural to shift to understanding that rewards
for knowledge work were equal to or greater than rewards for
other work

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Lessons Learned and Examples

4. Celebrate success stories and propagate tales
of savings and contributions.
World Bank
As a mission-driven organization, stories about how sharing helped
solve country problems are compelling
Hewlett Packard
Through its reward process HP developed a critical mass of
success stories to share and help estimate savings as a result of
KM.
Schlumberger
Collected and advertised quantifiable success stories

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Lessons Learned and Examples

5. Recognize both parties or units involved,
including both those who share knowledge and
those who receive knowledge. If both ends do
not feel rewarded, they won’t provide the results
desired.
Texas Instruments
NIHBIDIA* Award: both units recognized with major Chairman’s
award (*Not Invented Here, But I Did it Anyway)

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When Should You Begin Thinking about R&R?

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Conclusion: Reward and Recognition in KM

• Ideally, the benefits of knowledge
sharing are intrinsic.

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• However, the work and change

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involved require organizations to
create appropriate, structured

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systems to encourage employees

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to change behavior or reduce

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barriers.

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• Regardless of what “incentives”

Or
an organization chooses to
reward and recognize knowledge
sharing, it is important to align
these incentives with
organizational culture.
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Where to Go for More

Recommended Reading
• Search KSN in KM area for Rewards and Recognition
- White Papers
- Case Studies
- Chapters from APQC Best Practice KM Reports
• Books and Articles (short list)
- KM Review
- Alfie Kohn: Punished By Rewards, 1999
- Wellsprings of Knowledge, Dorothy Leonard, 1995

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Continue Discussion in KSN

Post Ideas
for New
Topics Here

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 Discussion
Your ideas for Future
Discussion Topics?

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