Google's Reward System and Performance

This assignment analyzes Google's reward system and its influence on employee performance. It explores the relationship between rewards and productivity, examines the effectiveness of Google's monetary and non-monetary incentives, and identifies potential challenges within their system. The analysis concludes by emphasizing the positive impact of Google's reward system while recommending adjustments to address emerging issues.

HRM Rewarding Management
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
The key reward choices...............................................................................................................3
Message conveyed by the reward system of the selected organization.......................................4
Extent to which extent does the reward strategy in the organization drive individual
performance.................................................................................................................................4
Ways to improve the reward system............................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
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INTRODUCTION
Reward strategy plays the most significant role in the organization as it is associated with
providing benefits to the staff members so that they can efficiently carry out business operations
in best possible manner. Further, reward strategy varies from one company other another and in
turn it is necessary for every business to design reward strategy keeping in view actual
expectations of its workforce (Hendry 2012). It has been found that through reward system
company tries to convey some message to its employees like the value of its workforce or any
other specific message. The present study carried out is based on Google Inc. Which is an
American multinational technology firm that specializes in internet related products and services
(Inc 2017). The company employs more than 57,100 employees and carries out operations
worldwide. The present research focuses on analyzing the reward strategy of Google Inc in order
to know its effectiveness.
MAIN BODY
The key reward choices
Different type of reward strategies has been undertaken by Google Inc where the main
purpose behind the same is to retain its workforce and motivating them in best possible manner.
Further, the company has adopted the mixture of both monetary and nonmonetary benefits that
are provided to the employees. In the form of different reward, benefits are provided to the
employees that involve healthcare such as medical insurance, HMO healthcare premiums are
100% paid for the staff, dental insurance, and vision insurance. In terms of holidays 10 paid
holidays, sick days (Google 2004). Income protection plan involves short-term disability
insurance, voluntary life insurance, group life insurance. Apart from this other form of general
benefits are also delivered to the employees such as gym where Google reimburse $20 per month
for any gym membership that its employees hold.
Maternity leave where 12 weeks off is given at 75% pay, employee referral program
where Google awards $2000 bonus if referral accepts the offer of the company (Google 2004).
Moreover, some other additional benefits are provided to the workforce such as tuition
reimbursement where company reimburses college expense in case if any employee is pursuing
higher course or degree. So, this provides the detailed description of the reward choices that are
given by Google Inc to its valuable employees. It is directly representing that company provides
full assistance to its workforce through which their motivation level is enhanced in best possible
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manner. Reward practices of Google Inc focus on different areas such as health and safety where
proper insurance facilities are delivered to employees, education benefit in the form of tuition
reimbursement. So, with the help of this, it can be clearly stated that the reward choice provided
by the company are highly effective and this, in turn, provides the competitive edge to the
business in every possible manner (Wei, Frankwick & Nguyen 2012). This is the main reason
due to which Google is easily able to retain its employees for the longer period of time.
Message conveyed by the reward system of the selected organization
By designing different type of effective reward strategies, the main message that
company communicates to its employee is linked to the value of workforce where Google
highlights that its workforce is highly valuable for the company. Further, the organization
believes in retaining the present talent instead of hiring the new employees and in turn they are
the real asset of the business (Walker 2012). Another message that business conveys with this
type of reward program is employee motivation where the company believes in motivating its
workforce so that they can efficiently carry out operations of the firm in the proper manner.
All these messages positively influence the performance of Google Inc. in the market has
acted as the development tool for the company. No doubt Google Inc carries out all its operations
on the wider basis, and due to this reason, it is necessary for the business to design effective
reward strategy so that it may enhance its future performance. The key business that company
wants to communicate with this reward system is that no other company is able to design such
type of reward practices in the industry (Ulrich 2013). Google is associated with the practices of
innovation and in order to involve each and every employee in such type of innovative activities
company has design reward system through which monetary benefits are delivered to its valuable
workforce. So, this directly allows managing workforce in the appropriate manner and in turn
acts as the development tool for the company in every possible manner.
Extent to which extent does the reward strategy in the organization drive individual performance
In the modern era, the overall productivity and performance of staff members are directly
affected by the kind of reward system adopted by the organization. Thus, the management of
companies is responsible for ensuring that a transparent, effective and satisfactory system of
reward is encouraged within the enterprise (Snelgar, Renard & Venter 2013). In the context of
Google, it can be asserted that positive reinforcement is one of the fundamental techniques which
the organization is using to strengthen the performance of people working in the organization.
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The reward strategy of Google emphasizes on offering both monetary and non-monetary
rewards to employees against the performance delivered by them. The key benefit of this
strategy is that it creates a sense of satisfaction among workers and at the same time, it
encourages workers to give their best towards the success of Google. Nowadays, every employee
seeks for the opportunity to become the integrated part of the organization (Mowday, Porter &
Steers 2013). The reward system implemented by Google provides workers with the most
potential platform to deliver satisfactory performance and become an integral part of the brand.
On the other side of this, the workers of Google are highly motivated and can deliver
more effective performance because the organization is also taking care of their health and well
being. The statement can be justified by the example of free meals and breakfast provided by
Google. The company emphasizes more on offering organic and healthy food to employees. The
strategy acts as a motivational force and results in enhancing the overall performance and
productivity of all the staff members. In addition to this, Google also offers additional benefits
and services to employees at regular intervals (Jiang et al. 2012). It includes facilities such as
free health checkups, haircuts, free dry cleaning, swimming pool facilities, videos games, etc.
These services and facilities are the clear examples of the effectiveness of Google’s
reward strategy. Furthermore, employees always look forward to delivering efficient and
satisfactory performance with an objective to achieve different monetary and non-monetary
rewards and facilities offered by the brand (Bratton & Gold 2012). On the other hand, it can be
critically argued that there are specific issues with the existing reward system adapted by Google
and the impact of this can be directly seen on the performance of the employee. The critical issue
with Google’s reward system is that the management does not offer attractive monetary rewards
and remuneration during the promotion of staff members (Hendry 2012).
Most of the time, it develops high degree of dissatisfaction among workers and restricts
them to deliver effective and satisfactory performance towards the accomplishment of
organization’s aim and objectives.
Ways to improve the reward system
Over the past few decades, Google has been emerged one of the best companies to work
with, and its system of reward has contributed a lot in the same. However, it can be stated that
there are specific issues in existing reward system and the company is required to take corrective
measures to overcome these problems. It can be recommended that Google should offer
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attractive incentives and increase in pay even during the promotion of an employee (Cummings
& Worley 2014). The benefit of this is that it will help in developing a high degree of satisfaction
among workers and give best of their performance toward the success of Google.
It is also suggested that Google should emphasize on reducing the leniency provided to
all staff members. The reason behind this is that at present the company is providing complete
freedom and flexibility to all its workers without any differentiating between the senior and
junior level of employees. Now, some of the employees have started making wrong use of the
freedom offered to them as they are using various facilities provided by Google without
delivering required and satisfactory efforts (Chen, Williamson & Zhou 2012). Such kind of
situation can create obstacles in long-term growth and success of the selected business enterprise.
The management is required to become a little bit strict regarding offering facilities, freedom,
and flexibility to employees.
CONCLUSION
From the above-conducted study, it can be concluded that the reward system and
employee performance have a direct relationship with each other. Furthermore, Google has been
able to enhance the overall performance and productivity of employees by offering them
satisfactory monetary and non-monetary rearwards. It can be also inferred that the selected
business enterprise is operating with one of the best reward systems in the industry and it has
supported in enhancing the overall degree of employee satisfaction and motivation. However, the
company is required to take corrective measures to overcome some issues in its existing reward
system.
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REFERENCES
Bratton, J & Gold, J 2012, Human resource management: theory and practice, Palgrave
Macmillan, United Kingdom.
Chen, CX, Williamson, MG & Zhou, FH 2012, 'Reward system design and group creativity: An
experimental investigation', The Accounting Review, vol 87, no. 6, pp. 1885-1911.
Cummings, T & Worley, C 2014, Organization development and change, Cengage learning,
Massachusetts.
Google 2004, Google Non-California Benefits, viewed 16 October 2017,
<http://mooglemb.com/threads/googlecache/64.233.187.104/jobs/nonca_benefits.html>.
Hendry, C 2012, Human resource management, Routledge, Abingdon.
Inc, G 2017, Our company, viewed 16 October 2017, <https://www.google.com/intl/en/about/>.
Jiang, K, Lepak, DP, Hu, J & Baer, JC 2012, 'How does human resource management influence
organizational outcomes? A meta-analytic investigation of mediating mechanisms', Academy of
management Journal, vol 55, no. 6, pp. 1264-1294.
Mowday, RT, Porter, LW & Steers, RM 2013, Employee—organization linkages: The
psychology of commitment, absenteeism, and turnover., Academic Press, Massachussets.
Snelgar, RJ, Renard, M & Venter, D 2013, 'An empirical study of the reward preferences of
South African employees', SA Journal of Human Resource Management, vol 11, no. 1, p. 14.
Ulrich, D 2013, Human resource champions: The next agenda for adding value and delivering
results, Harvard Business Press, Massachusetts.
Walker, S 2012, Employee engagement and communication research, London: Kogan Page,
London.
Wei, YS, Frankwick, G, & Nguyen, BH 2012, 'Should firms consider employee input in reward
system design? The effect of participation on market orientation and new product performance',
Journal of Product Innovation Management, vol 29, no. 4, pp. 546-558.
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