Pfeffer J
Stanford Graduate School of Business, CA, USA.
Harv Bus Rev. 1998 May-Jun;76(3):109-19.
Every day, executives make decisions about pay, and they do so in a landscape that's shifting. As more and more companies base less of their compensation on straight salary and look to other financial options, managers are bombarded with advice about the best approaches to take. Unfortunately, much of that advice is wrong. Indeed, much of the conventional wisdom and public discussion about pay today is misleading, incorrect, or both. The result is that business people are adopting wrongheaded notions about how to pay people and why. In particular, they are subscribing to six dangerous myths about pay. Myth #1: labor rates are the same as labor costs. Myth #2: cutting labor rates will lower labor costs. Myth #3: labor costs represent a large portion of a company's total costs. Myth #4: keeping labor costs low creates a potent and sustainable competitive edge. Myth #5: individual incentive pay improves performance. Myth #6: people work primarily for the money. The author explains why these myths are so pervasive, shows where they go wrong, and suggests how leaders might think more productively about compensation. With increasing frequency, the author says, he sees managers harming their organizations by buying into--and acting on--these myths. Those that do, he warns, are probably doomed to endless tinkering with pay that at the end of the day will accomplish little but cost a lot.
每天，企业高管都会做出有关薪酬的决策，而且他们是在不断变化的环境中做这些决策的。随着越来越多的公司减少直接薪资在薪酬体系中的占比，转而寻求其他财务选项，经理们被各种关于最佳做法的建议所淹没。不幸的是，其中许多建议都是错误的。事实上，如今许多关于薪酬的传统观念和公开讨论都具有误导性、不正确，或者两者兼而有之。结果是，商界人士在如何支付薪酬以及为何支付薪酬方面秉持着错误的观念。尤其是，他们轻信了六个关于薪酬的危险谬见。谬见一：劳动费率等同于劳动力成本。谬见二：降低劳动费率会降低劳动力成本。谬见三：劳动力成本占公司总成本的很大一部分。谬见四：保持低劳动力成本能创造强大且可持续的竞争优势。谬见五：个人激励薪酬能提高绩效。谬见六：人们工作主要是为了钱。作者解释了这些谬见为何如此普遍，指出它们错在哪里，并建议领导者如何更有效地思考薪酬问题。作者说，他越来越频繁地看到经理们因相信并践行这些谬见而损害自己的组织。他警告说，那些这样做的人可能注定要没完没了地调整薪酬，到头来除了花费高昂却收效甚微之外一无所获。
