Passion and Incentives

In terms of describing employee passion, it typically means that the employee so strongly believes in something that it almost consumes them. Employers want their employees to be passionate towards their cause, and at times they can achieve this. Passion is contagious.

If you are passionate towards using data to change human behavior, then you are way more likely to find partners in the business who share your passion.

However, as time passes, the flame will likely start to burn out on whatever data-driven initiative you kick off. The managers and employees may see an early positive result, and as a result be very passionate about continuing. But over time, this passion will dwindle.

One common way to deal with this loss of interest is to incentivize data-driven initiatives in some way, be it monetary or by some other type of reward. This is a very reasonable approach, but it leads to another important principle:

When you see the passion draining...