Creating a Total Rewards Strategy: A Toolkit for Designing Business-Based Plans

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Summary: A textbook on employee rewards
Review: If you enjoy working with university textbooks, you'll appreciate this book. It feels like a college text. It looks like a college text. It's filled with graphs and charts like a college text. It's seasoned with case studies in call out boxes. There are endnotes, as well as a bibliography. The index is so full of references, a smaller type was used-perhaps to save space.

The authors' message is that the secret to developing a creative and effective rewards strategy is based on a combination of Money, Mix, and Message. The Money aspect addresses the value of the reward(s) to the employee. The design of the plan, constructed to meet employer and employee needs, is the Mix. The Message deals with what the employer wants to communicate to its employees about appropriate values and the company's expectations. The authors describe their approach as "M3," emphasizing the need for a good balance between the three factors.

Readers will explore more than a hundred practical tools for building what they call the M3 Reward System. Financial rewards are integrated with non-financial rewards. Application of the step-by-step strategy promoted by the authors is a CD-ROM that is loaded with tools, exercises, and techniques to equip readers to tailor their own strategies to be consistent with company needs.

The authors are consultants with considerable experience in serving dozens of Fortune 500 companies. The orientation of the book, understandably, is toward larger companies. Smaller firms will still get a lot out of this text, but may have to invest some serious study time to get the full benefit of the package. The stories relating the authors' experiences are illuminating and add value for the reader who wants to gain the deeper understanding of how customized corporate reward programs are put together and managed.

Hefty price, but fully loaded.

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Summary: A great tool and and resource!
Review: Manas and colleague do a wonderful job giving an overview of the totality and power of the total rewards equation, and provide the reader with a tremendous wealth of knowledge, practical insight, and design- and implementation primers for successful total rewards systems.
From the basic to the more complex, this book has it all and it really is a valuable tool for today's (and tomorrow's!) business visionary.

Rating:
Summary: A great tool and and resource!
Review: This book is an absolute must-purchase!...
Compensation and HR professionals in general can derive great insight and value from this work. I recommend it strongly as a cornerstone of every business person's professional library.

Rating:
Summary: Great Resource!
Review: This book is an excellent resource for HR professionals, compensation specialists, and line managers alike.
Well written, with great models and thought processes, yet pragmatic in its approach, this book provides a great fresh look at how to motivate employees to achieve business results.