One compensation and its role in designing leadership and management systems:

When Will We Ever Learn? | The Corner Office | BNET

I agree with the three points made:

1. Nobody cares about the past, as long as it does not involve them.
   When managing idea portfolio, I have see them same old stuff resurface, even though everybody has access to the “library”. When talking about corporate learning, nobody wants to “raise old ghosts” and talk about past failures (they might be associated with a “Teflon Man” that has dodged that bullet and rose to power). Historic data is routinely getting ignored or discounted, unless you talk about sales projections. Then, only the past counts. WEIRD.
2. Compensation is not a tool to control behavior at a granular level.
   Once the general management system is in place, compensation is really not a great lever. Usually, variable pay needs to be hooked to simple metrics like “Unit Sales” that can be games safely and easily.
3. Everybody believes they are “above the average”. Interesting. Who forms the "bottom”?