Reward Ramping

Imagine this scenario: Your job gets 25% harder. That’s it, that’s the whole scenario. In whatever way you want to imagine, your job becomes 25% more onerous and difficult to do.

Now ask yourself – what would your reward have to look like in order for you to be as happy with that harder job as you currently are with your real job?

And I’m not just talking about pay, although certainly that’s part of it. Would a 25% pay increase do the trick by itself? I’m guessing it wouldn’t! That doesn’t scale linearly – if your job became 200% more difficult, a 200% pay raise might be nice for a little while, but you’d burn out fast.

Here’s the thing – your job is going to be 25% harder at some point. Either because your job duties grow in complexity over time, or because you get a harder job as you advance in your career. In fact, if your job 5 years from now wasn’t 25% more difficult than the one you have now, chances are good that your career is stagnating. The question isn’t whether you’ll face increasing difficulty in your life. It’s whether or not your reward will ramp up alongside it.

If your reward, in terms of recognition, mastery, autonomy, or whatever else you want, grows with the difficulty of your job, then you’ll stay satisfied. But that’s not automatic! You have to advocate for your side of the bargain, and that starts with knowing what you even want your side to be.

So don’t skip over this question. Really take the time to think about it. What reward would make you satisfied with the increased difficulty? You’ll get the difficulty either way, so you should know!