About the Book
Preface: Why should you read this book?
Have you ever thought, “This company has never paid me what I’m really worth”? If you answered yes to the above, this book is for you.
If you are a boss or an employee, have you ever thought, “It would be really great if everybody in the company pulled together and made a real difference”? If you answer yes to the above, this book is for you.
If you are a boss, have you ever thought, “My employees didn’t really add value to the company this year and yet they still want more money”? If you answer yes to the above, this book is for you.
This book is about understanding how each person’s actions increase the value of a business, and how to reward each person for creating that value.
After reading this book, you will be able to show:
- How much more money you deserve as an employee
- How much money all employees deserve
Most importantly, you will know how to structure pay and other incentives to drive your company’s value to the highest level. The nice thing about making a company rich this way is that you and other employees can also get quite wealthy along the way.
Chapters 1-7 explain the idea in just 40 pages. Chapters 1-7 are for both employees and bosses who want better pay and a better system.
Chapters 8, 9, and 10 are for bosses who want a better system.
Chapter 11 (the finish) is about how you can get a bigger piece of the action for yourself, and should be of interest to all.
TABLE OF CONTENTS + Chapter Overviews
Chapter 1 - A Problem in Most Companies Today
Life used to be simple. The hunters went out at dawn, and the best came home with a kill.
Life used to be simple and fair. The hunters went out, the best came home with food, and those with food lived. Those that did not hunt well or did not hunt hard starved. Food, health, status, and large families came to those worked hard and worked smart. The hunters “ate what they killed”.Read More
Chapter 2 - How It Works: Five Guys
We have a lot of tension in my family when the topic of “Which burger chain is best?” comes up. My daughters like “In N’ Out”, but I like burgers from “Five Guys”. Things get tense when we are in the car and looking for the best place to eat.
However, “Five Guys” is the biggest commercial success in burgers of the last decade. Five Guys have exploded their number of locations while charging a lot more per burger than their competitors. Since starting franchising in 2002, they have expanded to over 1,000 locations in 2014. In N’ Out was founded in the 1940s, and has only 290 locations today.Read More
Chapter 3 - Why Your Pay Package Doesn’t Work For You or Other Employees
You are not alone. Very few people are properly and fairly rewarded for what they do.
If you have a year when you deliver 50% more product or profits than the year before, does your pay go up 50%? The odds are overwhelming that your pay does not match this value increase.Read More
Chapter 4 - The Big Pay Problem for Companies
Employment costs are the biggest cost for almost every company. Studies have shown that most companies have 70% of their costs in labor costs. Moreover, as mentioned above, most people feel that this huge business cost is spent under a failing system.Read More
Chapter 5 - Why Does Performance-Based Pay Work?
Why don’t more firms use performance-based compensation? The main reason is a lack of common sense. Many managers take a wrong, static view of a dynamic process. By static, we mean that bosses tend to look at possibilities as fixed and future profit growth as not changeable.Read More
Chapter 6 - Why Involve Low-Level Employees?
Why are companies spreading incentives to lower levels in the organization?
From 1900 through to the financial crash of 2008 was the century of making senior management rich through dramatic incentive plans (IPOs, LBOs, stock options, etc.). Now (the decade of the 2010s) is the decade of spreading incentives throughout the organization.Read More
Chapter 7 - Example: Implementing a Successful Eat-What-You-Kill System
We now tell the story of how my firm, L.E.K. Consulting, faced a business challenge, implemented an Eat-What-You-Kill pay system, and realized outstanding success.Read More
Chapter 8 - Pay Plans that Work
For good or ill, pay systems are very powerful. This power can work either for or against success. You should not change pay systems on a whim. Changing pay to the wrong type of system can have huge unanticipated negative consequences for your company or your paycheck.Read More
Chapter 9 - Tips, Tricks, and Traps for Managers
Don’t ignore non-cash rewards
Over the past two decades there has been a fierce war over whether people were more motivated by cash or non-cash rewards such as recognition, affiliation, and status.Read More
Chapter 10 - How You Can Implement A Successful Eat-What-You-Kill Plan
There is a simple 7-step approach:
- Start with small business units or groups that are receptive to the idea.
- Make sure the bosses give their needs and input up front.Read More
Chapter 11 - Getting Your Piece of the Action
Finally, we will now focus on just you.An Eat-What-You-Kill pay system gives you the opportunity make much more money.How do you go about getting a plan for yourself?Read More