Impact Of Organizational Reward System On Corporate Performance

Focus of the Research

Corporate performance is a parameter through which the states of matter of a business organization including marketing, sales, stakeholder and employee performance and others are measured. It is a general perceived thought that the corporate performance can be enhanced if various organizational reward systems are applied for rewarding the employees and stakeholders based on their performances. As a result, many business organizations reward their employees based on their performances in the hope of gaining even better performances from the employees. On the other hand, some organizations do not have such schemes and focus on other factors that directly affect the corporate performance. Hence, it is important to determine whether these rewards have positive impact on the corporate performance and whether the organizations are right to reward the employees in the expectation of further enhancing the performances of the employees.

The main focus of this research is on the organizational reward system and how it impacts the corporate performance of the business organizations. It will also be determined in this research regarding whether the reward system directly affects the corporate performance of the organizations or there are other factors and means that the companies continue to ignore or have less focus on.

Enhancement of corporate performance is the subject of study of all business organizations. Any business organization focuses on taking any initiative that will enhance its corporate performance. One such initiative is the employee reward system, in which, the organization rewards the employee for overachieving their performance targets. Hence, it is important to know whether these reward systems actually provide any corporate performance benefit or not.

Organizational rewards are integral schemes of internal operations of a business organization that looks to reward the employees based on their performances. These companies have the philosophy that in order to improve the corporate performance, the employee performances need to be enhanced and for that purpose, they roll out various reward schemes for the employees. However, it is still a matter of argument whether the rewards actually impact the corporate performance of the organization in the long run. Hence, the impact of the organizational reward system on the productivity and corporate performance of the companies need to be determined.

The aim of the research is to explore various business organizations and determine whether their employee reward schemes have had any positive impacts on their corporate performances.

The objectives of the research are as follows.

• To explore employee reward schemes of various business organizations
• To identify the changes in the corporate performance of the organization since the introduction of the reward schemes
• To identify whether these rewards have made any impact on the corporate performance of the organizations   

The main identified problem is that many of the business organizations do not have any clear idea regarding the purpose of the employee reward schemes and hence they continue to spend funds on the rewards but at the same time, their corporate performances do not increase as per the expectations. Hence, it is not sure whether these organizational rewards have any impact on the corporate performances of the organizations.

This particular research paper has six distinct chapters. These are described as follows.

Chapter 1: Introduction – This chapter introduces the reader to the selected problem and the background of this particular research study.

Rationale

Chapter 2: Literature Review – In this chapter, works of several reputed researchers have been collected and analyzed for the purpose of further research.

Chapter 3: Research Methodology – This chapter focuses on the research methodology that will be followed through the course of the research.

Chapter 4: Data Analysis and Findings – In this chapter, the findings from the research process (qualitative data in this case) will be noted down, explored and discussed for the purpose of the research.

Chapter 5: Discussions – This chapter mainly focuses on the discussion of the data collected that will finally publish the results of the research.

Chapter 6: Conclusion – This is the final chapter that summarizes the entire research and only includes possible future scope of research.

Different organizations have different philosophies regarding rewarding their employees and enhancement of their corporate performances. Thus it is important to know whether the companies have been successful in enhancing their corporate performances by giving out rewards to the employees. A literature review has been conducted whether this particular topic has been explored and various data are noted down for research.

According to the researchers Eccles, Ioannou and Serafeim (2014), corporate performance of a business or commercial organization is driven by the efforts and work outputs of the employees working in the organization. While the management board emphasizes on monitoring of the internal and external operations, the employees are responsible for executing all the operational and marketing works for the organization. Hence, it is important to motivate the employees from time to time such that they enhance their performances and in turn help to enhance the corporate performance of the organization.

According to Epstein (2018), the primary target of business organizations is to enhance corporate performance on a constant basis. Most of the business organizations have identified that corporate performance is enhanced based on two main factors – technology and employee productivity.

Lee and Steers (2017) said that in addition to the upgradation of technology, it is important to keep the employees happy and motivated in order to maintain or enhance their productivity. The authors have found that one of the major steps taken by most of the business organization to ensure the employees are motivated to work is incentive or reward i.e. the employees are rewarded with bonus or other rewards in addition to their regular salary. Most organizations think this is an effective method to keep the employees happy and motivated and they also get more competitive to earn more rewards based on their performance.

On the other hand, Valmohammadi and Ahmadi (2015) said that organizational reward may not always be effective to motivate the employees to increase their productivity. This is because, some employees may have the mindset to perform only a fixed amount of work per day and earn their fixed salaries only as well as they do not feel the need to earn any additional rewards. Again, there are some employees who get overconfident after received one or two rewards and they slowly start to reduce their productivity. In these cases, the corporate performance of the organization does not increase at the expected rate and the reward system fails.

Impact

Paillé et al. (2014) argued that while motivating the employees of the organization is important, it does not necessarily mean the company needs to pay rewards to the employees with vision to enhance the overall corporate performance. The authors said that employee motivation can also be done through regular friendly interactions, allowing scope for interactive sessions, indoor games, fun activities, breaks during holidays and others. These occasional activities allow the employees to be more refreshed and motivated to work. Thus, the authors want to make a point that the companies need to pay rewards financially to motivate the employees and enhance the corporate performances.

Story and Neves (2015) on the other hand expressed a different opinion regarding organizational rewards. According to the authors, while occasional recreational activities do freshen up the employees before they go back to their regular duties, it is important to reward them financially in order to motivate them to enhance their capabilities of providing work output. This is mainly because the employees are working for the organization for financial gain only and additional financial rewards will motivate them to work harder and earn more rewards from the company. The authors also said that the companies should have specific strategies for designing and rolling out rewards and incentives for the employees that will not impact the companies financially but at the same time will allow the employees to be rewarded and motivated to enhance their performances.

Wang and Hou (2015) made a detailed research on the performances of the employees in an organization and how the performances are affected by various inputs from the organization itself.  

The author described that behaviour and performance are two interrelated attributes for both employee and the organization that ultimately affect the overall organizational performance. Hence, it is important that these attributes are coordinated with each other in order to ensure a suitable and optimum performance is reached. For that purpose, the organization needs to identify the performance capabilities of the employees in order to understand whether their actual performances can be enhanced further or not. If the company finds that the capabilities of the employees are much higher than the actual performances of the employees, they should take appropriate steps to enhance the performances. Again, in order to enhance the performances, the employee behaviour in the organization must also be favorable towards the organization. For achievement both performance and behavior enhancement, the company can introduce reward schemes that will mainly target to reward the employees who show considerable improvements in their performances and behaviors.

Epstein (2018) explored the concept of human capital and have stated that employee capability can act as the platform for human capital as well as intellectual capital. According to the authors, this concept of employee capability helps the organization to determine the potential value of the individual for them and accordingly, the organization will look to enhance the employee capability that will in turn increase the value of the employee for the organization. In order to enhance the capability of an employee, it is also important to enhance the employee satisfaction and commitment that helps to drive the employees towards self motivation. In order to achieve these goals, many organizations provide numerous benefits to the employees in the form of incentives and rewards. These incentives can include monetary bonus, travel expenses for a trip, in-house promotion and others. As per the authors, these benefits can help the employees to remain satisfied and committed to the organization and the organization can receive the benefits of the capabilities of the employees.

Research Aim

Authors Newman, Nielsen and Miao (2015) argued that organizational rewards may have positive impacts on the performances of the employees but they do not ensure enhancement of corporate performances of the organization through the employees. According to the authors, the corporate performance is defined by the collective efforts of various levels of employees – from clerical and other lower ladder workers to the top ranked stakeholders in the organization. Without this collective effort, coupled with some other external factors, it is not possible to enhance the corporate performance of the organization. Hence, offering rewards to individual employees who have enhanced their performances have considerable motivational impact on the employees but in the larger scale, the corporate performance does not get benefitted by much.

According to Selden and Sowa (2015), although many organizations keep in mind in improving the satisfaction and happiness of their employees, they do not any specific reward schemes for their employees. They provide sufficient compensation in salary at the end of each month and promote team work but no added incentives as rewards. The organizations follow a particular philosophy and believe added rewards are not necessary for enhancing the corporate performances. Rather, they concentrate more on other factors like customer demands, market performances and technology in order to enhance the corporate performances.

According to Aguenza and Som (2018), employee performance may not always be the sole reason behind the organization rewards. Some organizations also give away rewards for employee retention. They provided a test case in which a business organization is performing well in terms of corporate output but there is another competitor growing rapidly and is threatening to take over a major share of business from the organization. The rival organization is also attracting the employees of this organization with high salaries and other benefits. Now, in order to retain these employees, the organization develops and rolls out a reward scheme from which, the employees will be able to earn huge rewards based on their performances. Thus they will not leave and they will provide enhanced performance output for the organization. In this case, the organization is successfully able to retain its core group of employees who have been instrumental on the enhancement of the corporate performance of the company. 

Authors Shields et al. (2015) talked about corporate sustainability of business organizations and how employee performance enhances the same. According to the authors, corporate performance of a business organization depends largely on various internal and external factors like business strategy, market condition, customer demands and others. However, employee performance still has a very major impact on the corporate performance and should be considered by the business organizations on top priority. It is important for the business organizations to ensure the employee performance is always enhanced as much as possible and this is only achievable if the employees are happy, content and motivated to work for the organization. Now, these organizations may have different approaches to motivate their employees and rewarding them is only one such approach.

Research Objectives

Bolino and Grant (2016) countered this argument by stating that the reward system may spoil the employees instead of motivating them. The authors also said that even if the rewards do not spoil the employees, they only motivate the employees for a short period of time before they again lose interest. In this case, the authors argued that while implementing these rewards, the organizations often set unrealistic targets and in order to overachieve them, the employees have to work extra hours in addition to their shift times and hence, they often get dissatisfied. As a result, their performances drop and in turn, the corporate performance of the organization also drops significantly.

As per the opinion of the authors, it can be summarized that different organizations have different approaches towards their operations and follow different strategic implementations for enhancing their corporate performances. While some organizations strongly believe on rewarding the employees, others feel it is rather unnecessary and the companies should not spend resources for rewarding employees if there is no sufficient scope for corporate performance improvement.

There are generally two types of research methods: qualitative and quantitative. Qualitative method involves collection and analysis of qualitative data i.e. the data that is not statistical in nature. This type of data is mainly collected from literature, interviews and others. On the other hand, quantitative method involves collection and analysis of statistical data that are gathered from questionnaire surveys, business reports published by the business organizations.

For the purpose of this research, qualitative method has been adopted in which, only qualitative data will be collected and used for analysis. For the collection of qualitative data, six managers from six different organizations will be interviewed on the same set of questions in order to collect the data from their opinions.

Managers from six different organizations are recommended in order to broaden the scope of the research and try to find different organizational policies regarding the reward system and corporate performances.

In this research, interviews were conducted with six organizational managers for the collection of qualitative data. The interview questions used are listed as follows.

• How long have you been associated with this organization?
• You have been the Chief Executive in this organization since?
• During your time as Chief Executive, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
• Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
• Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
• So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
• Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
• Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
• Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
• Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?

The work schedule (research timeline) for this particular research is estimated and developed as follows.

Task Name	Duration	Start	Finish
Research Timeline	90 days	Mon 2/4/19	Fri 6/7/19
Research Initiation Phase	7 days	Mon 2/4/19	Tue 2/12/19
Analysis of Research Requirements	3 days	Mon 2/4/19	Wed 2/6/19
Determine Feasibility of Research Topic	2 days	Thu 2/7/19	Fri 2/8/19
Develop Research Project Charter	2 days	Mon 2/11/19	Tue 2/12/19
Research Planning Phase	9 days	Wed 2/13/19	Mon 2/25/19
Development of Research Plan	4 days	Wed 2/13/19	Mon 2/18/19
Develop Appropriate Schedule for Research	1 day	Tue 2/19/19	Tue 2/19/19
Determine Resource Requirements	2 days	Wed 2/20/19	Thu 2/21/19
Develop Research Team	1 day	Fri 2/22/19	Fri 2/22/19
Allocate Duties Among Team Members	1 day	Mon 2/25/19	Mon 2/25/19
Execution phase	54 days	Tue 2/26/19	Fri 5/10/19
Initial Development and Literature Review Phase	26 days	Tue 2/26/19	Tue 4/2/19
Conduct Literature Review on the Research Topic	10 days	Tue 2/26/19	Mon 3/11/19
Determine Data Analysis Method for the Research	2 days	Tue 3/12/19	Wed 3/13/19
Collect Initial Data from the Literature	5 days	Thu 3/14/19	Wed 3/20/19
Develop a Conceptual Framework of the Corporate Performance of an Organization	5 days	Thu 3/21/19	Wed 3/27/19
Develop Framework for Organizational Reward Analysis	2 days	Thu 3/28/19	Fri 3/29/19
Arrange Meetings with Six Managers for Interview	2 days	Mon 4/1/19	Tue 4/2/19
Qualitative Data Collection and Analysis	28 days	Wed 4/3/19	Fri 5/10/19
Prepare Interview Questions	5 days	Wed 4/3/19	Tue 4/9/19
Conduct the Interview	6 days	Wed 4/10/19	Wed 4/17/19
Document the Interview Transcripts	6 days	Wed 4/10/19	Wed 4/17/19
Gather Data from the Interview Transcripts	2 days	Thu 4/18/19	Fri 4/19/19
Final Analysis of Data	10 days	Mon 4/22/19	Fri 5/3/19
Publish the Research Results	5 days	Mon 5/6/19	Fri 5/10/19
Closing Phase	20 days	Mon 5/13/19	Fri 6/7/19
Prepare Research Report	15 days	Mon 5/13/19	Fri 5/31/19
Validate the Report	4 days	Mon 6/3/19	Thu 6/6/19
Closing of the Research	1 day	Fri 6/7/19	Fri 6/7/19

In this research, qualitative method is implemented in which, qualitative data has been collected from the interviews of six managerial persons posted in six separate business organizations. Based on the interview answers, separate interview transcripts have also been provided that will help in the analysis of the data accordingly.

The findings from the qualitative data collection in which six managers have been interviewed are provided in the following part in the form of interview transcripts.

Manager 1: Keith Wong, Aged 47, Founder and Chief Executive, Charles & Keith

Interviewer	Hello Sir, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	Yes, I have gone through it and I agree with your terms. Please go ahead.
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	Well, right from the start! (Laughs) I and my brother Charles founded this company in 1996.
Interviewer	You have been the Chief Executive in this organization since?
Manager	So, after we set up this company, we just had the roles of the founders and continued to develop the management team in parallel with the employee teams. After a proper management board was set up, Charles just stayed as the company founder and major stakeholder while I took the role of Chief Executive. That was in early 1997.
Interviewer	During your time as Chief Executive, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Well to be honest, the organization has grown a lot since foundation. We always had steady and healthy growth in our corporate performance over the years that continue till now.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Look, we always set our targets very high. I personally ensured we deliver the highest quality products to our customers and in order to do that, I emphasized on employing highly skilled employees. We also have significant compensation for all the employees who are working hard to keep up our standards.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Yes of course! Where would we be now without all their effort? (Smiles)
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	Why not? Everyone needs a source of motivation and reward for their hard work. Even I do! (Laughs)
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	I do.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	Yes there are some quarterly rewards for the employees that are given out based on their performances. In addition, whenever our company exceeds our annual sales target, we share a good percentage of the additional profit with our employees.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	Just a month after the first reward scheme was announced, our monthly productivity increased by 55%. Now you decide! (Smiles)
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	I have not noticed any negative impacts yet.
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	Yes, it was nice talking to you. Good day to you too!

Manager 2: Goh Choon Phong, Aged 55, CEO, Singapore Airlines Cargo

Interviewer	Hello Sir, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	Yes yes, I do go through them. It’s ok, you can go ahead.
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	28 years.
Interviewer	You have been the CEO of this organization since?
Manager	3rd September, 2010.
Interviewer	During your time as CEO, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	A lot. When I became the CEO, the company was going through some rough phases due to some false allegations and all that. But within two years, we turned around and had a significant growth in our corporate performance till date.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	For our company, individual effort is not enough. I brought in a number of international brands like Rolls-Royce, SIA and others for partnership in our business operations. Also, I strongly recommended the HRM to recruit only highly skilled employees who would be able to work and achieve great heights within our company.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Yes they do. They are our main areas of strength.
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	Although I won’t say it is “necessary” but at the same time, I think we should reward our employees often so that they are eager to enhance their productivity and also help to increase our overall corporate productivity.
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	Most of the time they do. Although in some cases, I have seen that even these rewards are not enough for some employees to work harder. They just complete their daily work duties and go home.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	Yes there are some monthly monetary incentives that are completely based on overachievement of the monthly work targets.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	There has been a lot of improvement, yes. More than 75% of our employees regularly overshoot their targets, thus helping in our overall corporate performance.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	Yes, for a few employees, I have seen they are so eager to earn the rewards that they compromise the quality of their work with quantity. I never want to compromise on quality of work.
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	Thank you and good day! (Smiles)

Manager 3: Chua Sock Koong, Aged 62, GCEO, SingTel

Interviewer	Hello Madam, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	Oh yes I did. Now let’s do this interview fast as I have a meeting to attend later! (Laughs)
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	I first joined Singtel in 1989, so it has been 29 years!
Interviewer	You have the GCEO in this organization since?
Manager	I was promoted to GCEO in 2007.
Interviewer	During your time as GCEO, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Since I became GCEO, we, as a company, achieved a lot. We made so many successful investments in telecom companies of various countries like India, Thailand, Indonesia, Australia, etc. I have been very active about the company’s growth the international market.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	We care a lot about our employees as well as our external operations. We ensure our employees are fully aware about our operations, the expectations from them and what are their roles in the corporate structure of our company. We only have sets of very enthusiastic employees are always active in enhancing their performances every day.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Yes, employees have very important roles to play in the corporate performance along with some other internal and external factors.
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	I do not know about other organizations but we do have some rewards for the employees. However, we believe in team effort and team achievement and hence, we reward an entire team for good performance instead of a single individual.
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	Sometimes they do, sometime they don’t. It all about the approach to work by the employees themselves.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	We provide rewards to the teams every month if their monthly targets and achievements are exceeded. There is no fixed reward, sometimes it is money, sometimes an extra day off for team picnic, sometimes it’s a free dinner plan for everyone in the team. It depends.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	Our employees are always enthusiastic about their work. But these rewards have provided them an extra bit of motivation and also, they work as a unit within a team. This helps a lot in our overall corporate performance.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	Nope.
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	Pleasure is mine. Good day!

Manager 4: Kuok Khoon Hong, Aged 69, Chairman, Wilmar International

Interviewer	Hello Sir, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	Yes, I am good with it. Let’s start with this!
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	I am the co-founder of this organization, which was set up in 1991. So, I am here for 27 years.
Interviewer	You have the Chairman in this organization since?
Manager	1991. Right from the start.
Interviewer	During your time as Chairman, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Since I have been here from the start, I have seen all the ups and downs of the company. The end result is visible to all; we have now gained control over a fair share of the international market thanks to our continuous improvement in the corporate performance.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	We treat our employees as the most important resources of our business. We always keep track of the performances of the employees and provide them with rewards if they exceed our expectations.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Well yes, of course! We would not have reached this great height without our employees.
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	I am not sure whether rewards are absolutely necessary to motivate the employees as we already provide sufficient compensation. However, we also know how to reward the employees if they exceed our expectations. I would rather say these are rewards that acknowledge the hard work of the employees.
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	I think self motivation is enough for driving the employees forward. If they are not interested enough, no reward can motivate them. Rewards are meant for acknowledgement of hard work, not a “bribe” to provide more input in work.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	There are no specific schemes. But we do have rewards for extra achievement in individual performances that exceeds our expectations.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	We go through a process of continuous improvement and development of self motivation and we reward the best performers of our organization.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	Our employees are always highly enthusiastic about their work and how we operate here. We also ensure employees are happy while working unless they want to leave the organization. So, not many negative impacts here, no.
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	Good day!

Manager 5: Anil Mathews, Aged 42, CEO, Near

Interviewer	Hello Sir, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	Yes I have read the document you sent. I am ok with it.
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	Since 2012.
Interviewer	You have been the CEO in this organization since?
Manager	From the start.
Interviewer	During your time as CEO, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	I started the company from Bangalore, India but I had always wanted to operate on global scale. After shifting the headquarters to Singapore, the company started growing rapidly and now we have access to markets all around the world.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	The first initiative I took was to utilize the latest technology in every field of our operations including services as well as internal operations. I also ensured we have only a limited workforce but maximum and efficient output.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Yes obviously. We strongly depend on the work output of our employees to provide the best quality outcomes.
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	I would not say rewards; I would rather the coin the term as benefits. You see the employees are not customers, we already provide them with sufficient amount of wages in exchange for their work in our organization. However, in order to ensure our employees always happy and content, we provide them with several benefits like once in a year full funding of a one long tour (up to 15 days), special allowances for funding their children’s education and others. Mind you, these are not rewards, these are benefits provided by us as tokens of thanks for their hard work.
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	As I said earlier, I do not believe in the concept of rewards for the employees. But for the benefits, I believe they do have positive impacts on employee performances but only to a certain extent.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	In order to ensure our employees always happy and content, we provide them with several benefits like once in a year full funding of a one long tour (up to 15 days), special allowances for funding their children’s education, casual leaves and others.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	These benefits have always been there from the start and till now, our corporate performance has been good.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	No negative impacts.
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	Yes! Good evening!

Manager 6: Wee Eo Cheong, Aged 66, Deputy Chairman and CEO, United Overseas Bank

Interviewer	Hello Sir, I hope you have gone through the terms and ethical policies regarding the interview?
Manager	W: Yes.
Interviewer	Ok. Let us proceed with this interview. How long have you been associated with this organization?
Manager	Almost 40 years. I joined UOB in 1979.
Interviewer	You have the CEO in this organization since?
Manager	April 2007.
Interviewer	During your time as CEO, what are the changes you have seen regarding the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	Our organization has always been growing significantly throughout South East Asia. Since I came here as CEO, our organization, instead of focusing on further expansion, focused on increasing on the stronghold on the areas we already got. Since 2000, UOB targeted to get hold of business in China and I focused on providing customer services that would help us to reach out target. After several years till now, I would say we have been pretty successful in terms of our corporate performance target.
Interviewer	Regarding corporate performance, what are the initiatives that you have taken to increase the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	I took initiates to completely move our focus to serve our customers needs and requirements. I also ensured that we removed our focus from expansion only and focused more on serving the existing customers so that we can grow significantly.
Interviewer	Do you think the employees have a significant role to play in enhancing the corporate performance of the organization?
Manager	There are a number of factors working behind the corporate performance. The employees are one of the factors.
Interviewer	So, do you think it is necessary to reward the employees from time to time to motivate them?
Manager	No I do not really believe in rewards.
Interviewer	Do you actually think that the rewards actually motivate the employees to enhance their performance?
Manager	No definitely not. If the employees are enthusiastic about their work, they will automatically work well. If they are not interested, no rewards can motivate them.
Interviewer	Does your organization have any reward schemes for your employees? If yes, please explain a bit.
Manager	No, no reward schemes. However, they do get some benefits for working in our company. But these benefits are applicable to all once they reach a certain level of the corporate ladder.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any significant enhancement in the corporate performance after the implementation of the reward scheme?
Manager	No reward schemes. For corporate performance as overall, the business strategy making is much more vital and the employees play important roles in implementing the new business strategies.
Interviewer	Have you noticed any negative impact of the reward system on the performances of the employees?
Manager	No rewards, no negative impacts! (Laughs)
Interviewer	Well, thank you very much for your valuable time and feedback and we will end the interview right here. Hope you have a great day!
Manager	I hope you noted all the answers (laughs). Have a good day.

Problem Statement

From the data collected from the interview, it has been found that the different organizations have completely different approaches to handling the employees and enhancing the corporate performance. While one manager thinks organizational rewards are very important for motivating the employees and enhance their performances while another manager thinks the wages are sufficient and the employees do not need any additional rewards for motivation and performance enhancement. Again, another manager stated that the monthly productivity increased by 55% once the reward scheme was introduced while another manager stated that the corporate performance was mainly enhanced due to the implementation of proper business strategy and investment in technical upgrades.

From the overall analysis of the problem, it can be said that rewards and other factors depend on the organization management i.e. it is up to their own discretion regarding whether there should be any additional rewards for the employees or not. Different business organizations follow different approaches towards the employees depending on their nature of work and the expectations from the performances of the employees. For instance, a business organization that is mainly based on field work (construction, mining, etc.) and depends on the field workers / labors for business productivity are less likely to give out rewards and the employees also have minimal expectations of any rewards. On the other hand, a corporate accounting firm that has a large number of employees working with specific daily targets is more likely to give away rewards to the employees on the condition of overachieving daily and monthly performance targets. Again, the reward schemes may or may not have any direct impact on the corporate performance of the organization and it depends upon various internal and external factors related to the employment, business strategies and others. Hence, it is very difficult to reach a proper conclusion regarding whether the organizational rewards have direct influence and impact on the corporate performance of the organization or not.

Conclusion

Corporate performance of a business or commercial organization is driven by the efforts and work outputs of the employees working in the organization. The primary target of business organizations is to enhance corporate performance on a constant basis. Most of the business organizations have identified that corporate performance is enhanced based on two main factors – technology and employee productivity. In addition to the upgradation of technology, it is important to keep the employees happy and motivated in order to maintain or enhance their productivity. While the management board emphasizes on monitoring of the internal and external operations, the employees are responsible for executing all the operational and marketing works for the organization. Hence, it is important to motivate the employees from time to time such that they enhance their performances and in turn help to enhance the corporate performance of the organization. It has been found that one of the major steps taken by most of the business organization to ensure the employees are motivated to work is incentive or reward i.e. the employees are rewarded with bonus or other rewards in addition to their regular salary. Most organizations think this is an effective method to keep the employees happy and motivated and they also get more competitive to earn more rewards based on their performance.

Structure of the Study

Based on the results of analysis discussed previously, some recommendations have been made for the business organizations as follows.

• The organizations must not roll out valuable rewards just in order to target the enhancement of employee performances. Rather, they should also focus on employee satisfaction, employee retention and other major factors.
• If a reward scheme is rolled out, it must be ensured that the performance targets of the employees are realistic and the employees have clear idea regarding how they can earn the rewards after providing sufficient work output.

There are a lot of limitations of the research that are discussed as follows.

• This research follows qualitative data analysis only and does not provide any statistical proof for the research results presented.
• The collection of data has been limited to six Singaporean companies only and does not reflect the data on global scale.
• This research study is focused on only one factor and does not explore much about more and related factors.

There is a lot of scope for this research study. This research study can act as the basis for the future studies that deal with the research regarding other related factors like employee engagement, role of stakeholders and other external factors that have impact on the corporate performances of the business organizations. Future studies can also emphasize on quantitative data analysis on this same topic as it has been generally ignored in this particular research paper. 

References

Aguenza, B.B. and Som, A.P.M., 2018. Motivational factors of employee retention and engagement in organizations. IJAME.

Amabile, T.M. and Pratt, M.G., 2016. The dynamic componential model of creativity and innovation in organizations: Making progress, making meaning. Research in Organizational Behavior, 36, pp.157-183.

Anitha, J., 2014. Determinants of employee engagement and their impact on employee performance. International journal of productivity and performance management, 63(3), p.308.

Barrick, M.R., Thurgood, G.R., Smith, T.A. and Courtright, S.H., 2015. Collective organizational engagement: Linking motivational antecedents, strategic implementation, and firm performance. Academy of Management journal, 58(1), pp.111-135.

Bolino, M.C. and Grant, A.M., 2016. The bright side of being prosocial at work, and the dark side, too: A review and agenda for research on other-oriented motives, behavior, and impact in organizations. The Academy of Management Annals, 10(1), pp.599-670.

Brammer, S., He, H. and Mellahi, K., 2015. Corporate social responsibility, employee organizational identification, and creative effort: The moderating impact of corporate ability. Group & Organization Management, 40(3), pp.323-352.

Bullock, J.B., Stritch, J.M. and Rainey, H.G., 2015. International comparison of public and private employees’ work motives, attitudes, and perceived rewards. Public Administration Review, 75(3), pp.479-489.

Chow, C.W., Lai, J.Y. and Loi, R., 2015. Motivation of travel agents’ customer service behavior and organizational citizenship behavior: The role of leader-member exchange and internal marketing orientation. Tourism Management, 48, pp.362-369.

Cummings, T.G. and Worley, C.G., 2014. Organization development and change. Cengage learning.

Eccles, R.G., Ioannou, I. and Serafeim, G., 2014. The impact of corporate sustainability on organizational processes and performance. Management Science, 60(11), pp.2835-2857.

Eisenberger, R., Malone, G.P. and Presson, W.D., 2016. Optimizing perceived organizational support to enhance employee engagement. Society for Human Resource Management and Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, pp.2-22.

Epstein, M.J., 2018. Making sustainability work: Best practices in managing and measuring corporate social, environmental and economic impacts. Routledge.

Gomez-Mejia, L.R., Berrone, P. and Franco-Santos, M., 2014. Compensation and organizational performance: Theory, research, and practice. Routledge.

Guerci, M., Radaelli, G., Siletti, E., Cirella, S. and Shani, A.R., 2015. The impact of human resource management practices and corporate sustainability on organizational ethical climates: An employee perspective. Journal of Business Ethics, 126(2), pp.325-342.

Gupta, N. and Shaw, J.D., 2014. Employee compensation: The neglected area of HRM research. Human Resource Management Review, 24(1), pp.1-4.

Hameed, A., Ramzan, M. and Zubair, H.M.K., 2014. Impact of compensation on employee performance (empirical evidence from banking sector of Pakistan). International Journal of Business and Social Science, 5(2).

Hartnell, C.A., Kinicki, A.J., Lambert, L.S., Fugate, M. and Doyle Corner, P., 2016. Do similarities or differences between CEO leadership and organizational culture have a more positive effect on firm performance? A test of competing predictions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 101(6), p.846.

Literature Review

Katzenbach, J.R. and Smith, D.K., 2015. The wisdom of teams: Creating the high-performance organization. Harvard Business Review Press.

Kim, J.S., Song, H.J. and Lee, C.K., 2016. Effects of corporate social responsibility and internal marketing on organizational commitment and turnover intentions. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 55, pp.25-32.

Lee, T.W. and Steers, R.M., 2017. Facilitating effective performance appraisals: The role of employee commitment and organizational climate. In Performance measurement and theory (pp. 75-93). Routledge.

Malik, M.A.R., Butt, A.N. and Choi, J.N., 2015. Rewards and employee creative performance: Moderating effects of creative self?efficacy, reward importance, and locus of control. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 36(1), pp.59-74.

Mone, E.M. and London, M., 2018. Employee engagement through effective performance management: A practical guide for managers. Routledge.

Nazir, S., Shafi, A., Qun, W., Nazir, N. and Tran, Q.D., 2016. Influence of organizational rewards on organizational commitment and turnover intentions. Employee Relations, 38(4), pp.596-619.

Newman, A., Nielsen, I. and Miao, Q., 2015. The impact of employee perceptions of organizational corporate social responsibility practices on job performance and organizational citizenship behavior: Evidence from the Chinese private sector. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 26(9), pp.1226-1242.

Noe, R.A., Wilk, S.L., Mullen, E.J. and Wanek, J.E., 2014. Employee Development: Issues in Construct Definition and Investigation ofAntecedents. Improving Training Effectiveness in WorkOrganizations, ed. JK Ford, SWJ Kozlowski, K. Kraiger, E. Salas, and MS Teachout (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1997), pp.153-189.

Osabiya, B.J., 2015. The effect of employees motivation on organizational performance. Journal of public administration and policy research, 7(4), pp.62-75.

Paillé, P., Chen, Y., Boiral, O. and Jin, J., 2014. The impact of human resource management on environmental performance: An employee-level study. Journal of Business Ethics, 121(3), pp.451-466.

Pinder, C.C., 2014. Work motivation in organizational behavior. Psychology Press.

Posey, C., Roberts, T.L. and Lowry, P.B., 2015. The impact of organizational commitment on insiders’ motivation to protect organizational information assets. Journal of Management Information Systems, 32(4), pp.179-214.

Ramdhani, A., Ramdhani, M.A. and Ainissyifa, H., 2017. Conceptual Framework of Corporate Culture Influenced on Employees Commitment to Organization. International Business Management, 11(3), pp.826-830.

Ramdhani, A., Ramdhani, M.A. and Ainissyifa, H., 2017. Conceptual Framework of Corporate Culture Influenced on Employees Commitment to Organization. International Business Management, 11(3), pp.826-830.

Reverte, C., Gómez-Melero, E. and Cegarra-Navarro, J.G., 2016. The influence of corporate social responsibility practices on organizational performance: evidence from Eco-Responsible Spanish firms. Journal of Cleaner Production, 112, pp.2870-2884.

Selden, S.C. and Sowa, J.E., 2015. Voluntary turnover in nonprofit human service organizations: The impact of high performance work practices. Human Service Organizations: Management, Leadership & Governance, 39(3), pp.182-207.

Shields, J., Brown, M., Kaine, S., Dolle-Samuel, C., North-Samardzic, A., McLean, P., Johns, R., O’Leary, P., Robinson, J. and Plimmer, G., 2015. Managing employee performance & reward: Concepts, practices, strategies. Cambridge University Press.

Singhapakdi, A., Lee, D.J., Sirgy, M.J. and Senasu, K., 2015. The impact of incongruity between an organization’s CSR orientation and its employees’ CSR orientation on employees’ quality of work life. Journal of Business Research, 68(1), pp.60-66.

Story, J. and Neves, P., 2015. When corporate social responsibility (CSR) increases performance: exploring the role of intrinsic and extrinsic CSR attribution. Business Ethics: A European Review, 24(2), pp.111-124.

Valmohammadi, C. and Ahmadi, M., 2015. The impact of knowledge management practices on organizational performance: A balanced scorecard approach. Journal of Enterprise Information Management, 28(1), pp.131-159.

Wang, S., Noe, R.A. and Wang, Z.M., 2014. Motivating knowledge sharing in knowledge management systems: A quasi–field experiment. Journal of Management, 40(4), pp.978-1009.

Wang, W.T. and Hou, Y.P., 2015. Motivations of employees’ knowledge sharing behaviors: A self-determination perspective. Information and Organization, 25(1), pp.1-26.

Zhang, Y., Long, L., Wu, T.Y. and Huang, X., 2015. When is pay for performance related to employee creativity in the Chinese context? The role of guanxi HRM practice, trust in management, and intrinsic motivation. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 36(5), pp.698-719.