Congratulations to Business Goa for
completing a milestone 5th year. Every year adds to the
wealth of experience and strengthens the magazine for another year
ahead. All the very best to Team BG. Even as this is written
“SHAKTI” enters its 20th year.
A cookie jar is more western in usage.
It usually denotes an easily accessible jar in the kitchen which
anyone can put their hands in and get a cookie (reward). In our
companies we usually make policies and systems which unknowingly
create cookie jars. Related or unrelated stake holders, find them and
help themselves. When it is discovered, it leaves a bad taste as it
implies the Company was short changed.
When sitting late into the night in
Shanghai and catching up with a junior from the Asian Institute of
Management, he told me a story. He was a senior expat manager at an
FMCG company. They had faced a peculiar problem, sales to a nearby
district (X) were almost zero. While sales to another district (Y) a
few 100 kms away were flourishing. Yet, when the marketing team
visited the district X, the market was flooded with the product.
Surprised and perplexed, they did a quick survey and found out that
they were being supplied by the Company distributor itself. The catch
was in the freight factor. Freight to the X was far less than freight
to Y. So the salesmen decided to book all orders on District Y, claim
higher freight, but ship to product to X. The difference was split
between the transporter, distributor and salesmen.
Closer home, we noticed that it was
difficult to get our workers to agree to an hour of OT, however if we
asked for 4 hours there was less resistance. This was becoming
cumbersome. After a little study the reasons became apparent. We used
to offer an incentive with 4 hrs, a food allowance and somewhere
along the line an additional transport allowance got added. This was
in addition to the statutory double salary for OT. All this was not
available for 1-3 hours. So our workers adapted to the situation and
either did 4 hrs OT or nothing. We had made the rules, the employees
were only tweaking them to their advantage. It took us some effort to
correct the situation.
Another common use of this cookie jar
phenomena is leave, not much can be done to stop employees from
clubbing sick or casual leave with a long stretch of public holidays
and making it even longer for themselves at the cost of productivity
and customer service.
The above clearly demonstrates that
management policy defines and guides behaviour. This can be positive
or negative from the Companies point of view. Another word which
describes the cookie jar syndrome is “loop holes”. People are
always looking for loop holes to exploit and get a better deal for
themselves Not wrong in itself but when the other persons perspective
is taken, it is wrong. Take any situation mentioned above or look at
some of your own and you will notice it is not fair to all.
One way of avoiding such situations to
to think thru your decision making process to include checking if
COOKIE JAR situations are possible. This is easier said than done as
decisions are taken on the run. The other way is networking, where
you meet other owners & managers and discuss situations and avoid
the same in your organisation. If, despite all your precautions, you
do end up with a cookie jar situation, be sure to take immediate
corrective action. All the best.
