Recruiting and retaining employees is a nasty battle zone in the competitive semiconductor industry. Therefore, the company offers a unique and creative compensation package that includes bonuses as well as non-cash recognition ranging from personalized plaques to country ranch parties, movie tickets to golf lessons, team shirts and jackets to footballs and train kits. The number of TI employee recognitions between 1996 and 1997 jumped 400 percent from 21,907 to 84,260. We're part of an aggressive industry. Our people work hard and long hours.
Rewards make a difference in their attitudes and performance.
Hey, everyone has a need to be recognized, and not just once a year when there's a formal review process. And when recognition is tied to effort, you end up getting more bang for your buck. It's wildly unrealistic to assume that all incentive programs work, or that by taking away individual rewards, productivity per person will triple. Even though TI's Charlton emphatically defends her company's incentive programs, she has never been able to definitively link motivation and productivity to non-cash rewards. And although Marshall Industries' CEO Rodin loves to trumpet his company's new nonincentive system, some naysayers claim that, for example, salespeople will never perform without commissions.