The carrot and stick policy is as old as the ages. It is perhaps the oldest management policy that has stood the test of time. While there are hundreds of different theories of motivation in management books that are designed for the most civilized and modern societies, none can match this age-old policy.
Every organization tries to induce its employees by giving them rewards for desirable acts (carrot) and punishing them for undesirable acts (stick). This is the theme of every religion that tempts heaven and paradise for good work while threatening to send evildoers to hell. In modern times, almost every society and nation has a criminal justice system that wields the stick by punishing the wrongdoer with severe punishment. Although there is hardly a reward for doing a good job by the justice system, but for participation there is a reward, as a law-abiding citizen enjoys full freedom while a wrongdoer is put behind the prison that severely restricts his freedom and forces him to lead a life of discomfort and isolation.
Every commercial organization knows the importance of rewarding its best professionals who are paid exorbitant salaries so that they work to the maximum in the interest of the organization. Less competent people receive low wages and slow promotions. If they are found to be too bad or inefficient, they are kicked out of the organization.
Therefore, it is hard to believe that an organization like the Indian governments can function without this carrot and stick policy. Here, promotions are limited in time or based on seniority and the increments are uniform. There is no difference between a person who performs well and those who do not work at all. It would be interesting to understand what drives people to do a good job in a system that gives no carrots to the best employees and punishes the worst.
The carrot and stick politics of terror
The fundamental assumption in the carrot-and-stick policy is that employees are not interested in doing the job they have been assigned. They work only for money. Therefore, the more money you pay, the better services you will get. Therefore, the politics of the carrot is the recognition that human beings are driven solely by greed.
In the same way, the other assumption is that some people work only under fear. These people are not greedy as they are satisfied with their low wages and slower promotions. Therefore, the carrot does not work with them. These people must be threatened and coerced to do the work. That is why the policy of the stick is applied to them.
However, it is extremely logical to have a carrot and stick policy in an organization, but in reality this policy takes all the joy and human values out of an employee’s life as it fails to recognize the divinity of human nature and failure. reward goodness in human beings. A person who provides the maximum benefits for the organization (mainly in the short term) is the one who reaps the greatest dividend while the one who tries to look beyond measurable parameters and tries to pour values and humanity into the organization is left behind.
the fun of playing
Many of us play different games to stay fit and healthy. However, for some people these games are their profession and they make a living from them and make millions of dollars from them. It’s important to understand that most of us don’t play because we want to win or even improve our health or become champions. We play because we love to play these games. Most of us play these games without any kind of monetary or other reward. Therefore, even when we lose, our opponent does not become our enemy. In all probability, we become better friends and the spirit of teamwork is strengthened. We thank our friends for playing with us (even when they beat us) as we enjoy those moments outside of the aftermath of the match. In any case, we have enjoyed the time together and gained health thanks to our actions.
Now imagine that each game becomes a tournament. So if you lose, you’re out of the game. If you win, you get financial rewards and go to the next level. We can easily see that in such cases, we play to win and hate to lose. The person who makes us lose the game becomes our enemy. However, we try to do our best, but unfortunately, there can only be one winner and others have to lose. Therefore, it is obvious that our chances of winning depend as much on our own efforts as on the efforts of others. If others work harder, we are bound to lose, even if we have done our best. We become jealous of others, if we cannot beat them.
Therefore, in a competitive game, although we have become better players, we have also become worse human beings, since we want to win by hook or by crook.
Therefore, it is important to know that if people love work and add value to society and their organization by doing work, they will do so regardless of the temptation of rewards or threats of punishment. People’s recognition and customer satisfaction is a reward in itself that may not be monetary but fills the soul and brings happiness and joy to the person.
