Employee Bonus'

[dnbob]

Do any of you contractors out there pay out job bonus' based on the jobs performance? I worked for a company for 8 years, and my yearly income increased by approx. 25%, depending on how well a job did or didn't do. The employer I work for now, has no interest in a monitary compensation for a job well done, just wondering if he is more of the "norm"?

I am not a greedy person, in 12 years in the trade, I have never asked for a raise or bonus or anything. The jobs I do turn out quite well and I am proud of them, yet I am paid the same as the guy that screws up most of the things he touches.
Perhaps my work is just expected just as some have less expected of them for the same pay?

[ January 23, 2005, 07:43 PM: Message edited by: dnbob ]

 

[bphgravity]

Re: Employee Bonus'

I am currently experimenting with an hourly plus bonus wage for a few of my new construction employees. It is sort-of a piece rate mixed with a standard hourly rate.

 

[roger]

Re: Employee Bonus'

The problem is in fairness.

Think about it, some of the best superintendents get the worst jobs or have to take over bad jobs
because we in management know they will save us in a bad situation.

The easy jobs go to the not so accomplished who will show a good profit to base their bonus on.

One may have a good GC while the other is fought through the whole project.

To date, I have not been able to come up with a fair way of doing it although I'm definitely for it.

Roger

 

[George Stolz]

Re: Employee Bonus'

One method I've heard of is paying a bonus based on an increase in productivity based on minutes per hole before the inception of the program, versus minutes per hole after.

I think this penalizes those who already move at their max rate, efficiently.

I think to best way (for houses) is to base a small bonus on the breakeven point of a job. Anything over the breakeven would make a percentage of the profit. That seems fairly fair.

The employee under a bad GC would be penalized, but perhaps the breakeven for that job should be higher?

Do EC's tend to bid higher when they know the GC kinda stinks?

 

[active1]

Re: Employee Bonus'

I can't speak for all the states but an emploiee does not have the same rights to a bonus compaired to your standard pay.

If a worker is late, breaks something, lost something, gets hurt, etc. the bonus may be lost. It can be a step backwards in emploiee rights. It really depends on the company. If they want to take care of the guys thats great. I have worked for other places where it was not so good. Some companies will pay a lower than normal wadge with the intention of the bonus making up the differance. But the bonus is like a carret in front of you that you don't get as much as you should.

It's great if a company is fair with it. I seen a story on TV about a restraunt that set up some kind of bonus for the wait staff. It was based on number of tables per minuits. The clocked in hours droped for everyone once the bonus started. They didn't want to hurt the bonus amount by waisting time. They would be ready and clock in and clock out the minuite they were done. Before they would change close, make phone calls, talk about sceduling, etc..

If the workers are doing the same work all the time I could see some kind of production bonus. But how would you administer a program with all different types of jobs? I don't think it's so good to base it on job amount. Sharing the numbers with the workers might make them feel like they should get a bigger piece of the $$ when they don't realize the costs of a business.

Tom

 

[charlie b]

Re: Employee Bonus'

Originally posted by roger: The problem is in fairness.

Please allow me to suggest one small alteration to this statement: The problem is not in fairness itself, but rather in the perception of fairness.

How does anyone created a program in which all participants perceive the bonuses to be fair? I don?t think you will find many employees who would be willing to say, ?Yes, that person deserves more of a bonus than I do, because that is a fair reward for the work that person did, as compared to the work I did.?

That?s the problem. I don?t have a solution. That is because I have never worked for a company that had a bonus program that was considered fair by the employees.

 

[goldstar]

Re: Employee Bonus'

I think Charlie is right on the $$$. It's the perception of "fairness" that is the critical issue. What might seem fair to an employer may be quite different to an employee. When I first started out in the trade my employer would give "Xmas presents" at years end. Anyone who was employed up to one year got $25.00; everyone else, right up to the vice president, got $50.00. I've also left the trade for a while and worked for a furniture sales company. There were some 5 key employees who equally shared bonuses at years end. I guess, in terms of fairness, this was the most fair except that we relied on the honesty of our employer to inform us as to how much the bonuses would be based on what he considered to be profit. However, none of the profitability information was made known to us. There were years when we all received $0.00, years when we received $1500.00, and one year we received $6000.00. But I think that was the last year we received anything at all. Greed somehow set in and our employer realized that he was taking all the risks and we were taking none so we all went back to our regular salaries. In a way, I guess he was right but if you look at a guy like Bill Gates, although he is a billionaire in his own right, he didn't get to where he is on his own. He was surrounded by some 12 other individuals (and founders) who are also millionaires today.

In my opinion, you'll never satisify all the people all the time. This is the main reason why I went into business for myself. I knew the amount and quality of work I put forth and there was no employer that could compensate me adequately for my efforts.

 

[petersonra]

Re: Employee Bonus'

It seems to me that an inherent part of any effective bonus program is that those covred by the bonus plan understand the criteria for awarding bonuses.

I used to work for a place that had a bonus plan that was so convoluted that it was totally ununderstandable.

It was supposed to have the same criteria for management versus nonmanagaement personel (and this was one of its advertsied features) yet management personel alwys seemed to do real well under the plan while guys in the trneches got next to nothing (I think I got something like $60 one year where I averaged working something like 65 hours/week).

I am not all that sure what the bonus plan was supposed to accomplish since basically only management people benefited by it and mostly it brought about a lot of bad feelings because of that.

 

[lanyb88]

Re: Employee Bonus'

dnbob,

My company gives its field employees a bonus based on the performance of a particular job. Lets say the job is supposed to take 10,000 hours to complete. Five percent of those hours are set aside in a bonus account which would be 500 hours. If the job is completed with 9500 hours the employees who worked on that job will get a bonus based on how long they worked on that project and what position that they held. So lets say if the labor rate per hour was 40$ that means that the account would be worth $20,000. The foreman might receive 40%, journeyman 35%, and apprentices 25%. The journeyman and apprentice bonus will vary depending how much time they spent on the project.

 

[indcom]

Re: Employee Bonus'

I agree with lanyb88, but, would make it more feasible by setting a specific goal. Let's say the same 500 hours on a 10,000 hr job (wow).

Using the 500 hours as a goal to reach as a completion base line and using the mentioned percentage of lanyb88 is all well and good. But, let's make a more incentive for all. Let's say for every hour over and above the 500 hour goal saved that the Foreman gets an additional 2-3% of and distributes across the board amongst himseld and his subordinates. Now the guys are thinking, "Okay, I'm already shooting for my percentage but if I work a little harder and better and more efficiently, I'll get a little more of the pie."

I've used similar plans on large jobs before and had a great crew who did their absolute best to achieve the goal and surpass it---and suceeded!

More money for everyone all around!

[ January 26, 2005, 08:49 PM: Message edited by: indcom ]