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The Pharma Career Ladder · The first-line manager · Step 5: Motivating and building the team · Lesson 3

Money is not the whole answer

What an incentive can do, and where it stops

By Ahmed El Menshawy · 20 years in pharma, from medical rep to country manager in the UAE. Founder of RepPharma. LinkedIn
Published

When a team goes flat, the first idea in the room is usually a bigger incentive.

I understand why. It is quick, it is visible, and it feels generous. In my experience the effect rarely outlasts the quarter.

Two ideas shape how I think about it.

Herzberg put pay among the things that prevent dissatisfaction, not the things that create drive. And Daniel Pink's Drive makes a simple point: pay people fairly, then take money off the table so they can focus on the work.

So I ask three questions, in this order.

  • Is the plan clear, fair and paid on time?
  • If pay feels unfair, nothing else I say will land.
  • What exactly does it count?
  • Effort goes to what is counted. A plan paid only on sell-in, for example, can quietly reward month-end stock pushing instead of real demand.
  • What does the rep get that money cannot buy?
  • A skill they are proud of. A doctor they won over. Recognition that is specific. More say in how they run their territory.

Money gets attention. The work itself keeps the effort going.

“An incentive can buy effort for a month. It cannot buy pride in the work.”
Money is not the whole answer: What an incentive can do, and where it stops

Lesson 3 of 19 in Step 5: Motivating and building the team, with the full guide and a checklist for this week.

More lessons in step 5: Motivating and building the team

Lesson 1The 70% managerWhy the first-line manager decides whether a sales team is engagedLesson 2What actually motivates a repFixing frustrations is not the same as building driveLesson 4Autonomy, mastery, purposeThree drivers, applied to a field teamLesson 5The one-to-one that is worth the hourAgenda, ownership and follow-throughLesson 6Knowing what is going on at homeCare as a management skillLesson 7Trust is built in small promisesThe manager who does what they saidLesson 8Recognition on a zero budgetFive things that cost nothingLesson 9Recognising effort when results lagProtecting motivation in a bad quarterLesson 10Emotional intelligence for managersKnow yourself, manage yourself, read your teamLesson 11Six leadership stylesChoosing the style the moment needsLesson 12The team meeting nobody dreadsStructure, timing and everyone talkingLesson 13Psychological safety in a sales teamWhy reps hide bad newsLesson 14Stages of a new teamForming, storming, norming, performingLesson 15When two reps do not get alongMediating without taking sidesLesson 16The difficult conversationPreparing, opening and staying in itLesson 17Radical candour in a field teamCare personally, challenge directlyLesson 18Managing a rep older than youAuthority without seniorityLesson 19The rep who wants your jobDeveloping a successor, not a rival

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