Weird things happen when we decide by law who should have jobs and who should not and we order how people and businesses should spend money. I am not referring to the legality of telling people who receive money from the government how to live their lives and run their businesses. I am referring to the wisdom of it. And by "weird" I really mean "bad."
On Friday a press release came across my desk, issued by seven travel-meeting-event industry trade associations. Their basic message was that the public beating up of companies over the meetings they hold and the incentive programs that they have for employees is killing the travel, tourism, and meeting industry and the people who work in it. They estimate that 200,000 jobs were lost in that industry in 2008, and a larger number of job losses are predicted for 2009.
Even the old communist governments figured out that workers respond to incentives. Under the power of incentives people work harder, smarter, and more creatively. They may even enjoy their work more. Sometimes incentives that take the employee out of the normal routine can be very powerful. If left to their own devices, businesses will experiment with different packages of incentives to guide their employees into the most efficient ways to accomplish company goals and objectives. Will they get it right? Often they will not. When they get it wrong, they try something else.
What is the best set of incentives, and should the incentives include travel and recreation programs? I do not know, and neither do you. No one has enough information, smarts, or involvement to know. You may know what works for you, but are you willing to say that others should be offered the same rewards or that you should be given the same incentive program designed by someone somewhere else or in some other line of work? Everyone meeting company goals gets a set of golf clubs. That may work fine for Harry, but how about for you?
While it may be lots of fun to rant about businesses sending employees to Florida for a weekend, do we have any idea how that might figure into the incentive programs in those businesses? If you take that option away, what other option will work as well or as efficiently? Again, I do not know, and neither do you.
Up until recently, I did not have to know or pretend to know. We left it for businesses and their employees to figure out. In view of the efficiency of our businesses--which efficiency continued to improve and lead the world even in 2008--American businesses have been getting the incentives much more right than wrong. When we decide to make those decisions for other people, especially when we try do so through government force, we can be pretty sure we will get it wrong. Who wants to explain to the 200,000 travel and tourism industry people who are in danger of losing their jobs why businesses should not be holding meetings in Williamsburg or San Antonio or Nashville? Step up now; a frozen turkey if you get it right.
4 comments:
Hey Dad, as one of your most avid readers and biggest fans, I have to admit I got pretty confused reading your second paragraph. I think I understand your basic message of this article- incentives are good, don't mess with them. However, I've reread the second sentence of your second paragraph again and again, and I'm still lost after "their basic message was". It also doesn't help that I'm not 100% positive what a travel-meeting-event industry trade association is. I thought I knew what the travel-meeting-event industry was, companies that organize events and meetings in exotic places for companies, such as Orlando, etc. However when you add "trade association" to the end, you lose me. I'm not criticizing your writing, just admitting I don't understand it.
The trade associations that signed the letter include the American Hotel and Lodging Association, the Destination Marketing Association International, the Meeting Professionals Association, the National Business Travel Association, the Professional Convention Management Association, and the Society of Incentive Travel Executives. These are all members of the U.S. Travel Association.
The point of the second paragraph is that all of the recent efforts to get government to prohibit or otherwise limit businesses from rewarding employees with participation in a conference or a family trip, or otherwise involve travel as part of their program of incentives, all of these efforts to use the coercive power of government to stop these incentives are harming the travel and meeting and lodging industries. Fewer employees taking trips mean less work for the employees of the businesses that provide those trips and related travel services. That is to say while some might be having fun playing the politics of envy (maybe because they are still waiting for their first convention or work trip) such restrictions have real, serious consequences for the lives of the people who work to provide those travel services.
The rest of the article asks what logic is there behind such restrictions? Who is to say that these are appropriate incentives or not? Shouldn't that be left up to the employer and employees?
Why is the government restricting this? Are they saying the bailout money can't be used for that, or are they flat out saying companies shouldn't be able to reward their employees with fancy trips? How on earth do these trips hurt anyone? What, are the planes running over the poor? Because that would have a lot more to do with the FAA . . .
It is a bit of all of the above, but mostly the source of the objections come from people who do not grow weary of telling others how to live their lives while showing inadequate ability to control their own. Such people will use one excuse or another to exert their will over others, and the logic, wisdom, or legitimacy of the mandate are seldom consulted.
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