Hot Seat

The peak incentive that actually works is the simplest one you can write. Administering it is what will consume your GM's November. In July I wrote about incentive plans built on engineered standards — why the measurement banks most of the gain before a dollar of incentive is paid, and why the plan usually dies before it ever launches. That piece was about paying people to perform. Peak is the opposite problem. You are not paying people to perform. You are paying them to stay

The best-run distribution centers freeze SOPs and technology by Labor Day. Miss the line and it waits until January — because a change forced in during peak fails on the floor, with a half-new workforce, at the worst possible time.

Peak is the largest change most distribution centers absorb all year, and almost nobody manages it as one change. The pieces don't fail. The absorption fails.