Three No-Cost Ways to Improve Employee Morale

Hint: Just Pay People More… [Morning Reckoning] March 28, 2024 [WEBSITE]( | [UNSUBSCRIBE]( Three No-Cost Ways to Improve Employee Morale Asti, Northern Italy March 28, 2024 [Sean Ring] SEAN RING Good morning Reader, I gave you ten steps to build your [Free State of Me]( a few years ago. (Feel free to read or reread that article, as it’s been a while.) One piece of advice is to start an online business, but many people don’t know how to do that. With that in mind, I thought I’d briefly shift our focus to microeconomics. Microeconomics deals with the behavior of individuals and firms in making decisions about allocating scarce resources and the interactions among these individuals and firms. It’s critical to understand many microeconomic concepts to run a successful business, but perhaps none more so than how to keep your employees or freelancers motivated. Daniel Pink authored a book called Drive, published in 2009. It’s not about cars but what drives us to do the things we do. There’s an [excellent YouTube video]( that summarizes his findings. I encourage you to watch it after you read this. In this Morning Reckoning, I’ll relay to you his excellent points. [James Altucher: “Don’t Settle for 500%”]( Crypto millionaire James Altucher predicts Bitcoin could rally 500% in the next couple of years alone. And yet, if you want your chance at the biggest gains… He says Bitcoin is the last investment you should own. To see why, [go here now](. [LEARN MORE]( Just Pay People More! Not so fast! This works. Just not universally. Only in the right jobs with the right people. This is the most shocking finding among economists. For decades, the mantra was, “If you want higher performance, pay people more.” And this works for people doing mechanical jobs. That is, digging ditches or smashing rocks. However, this incentive no longer works once a job requires even basic cognitive skills. (As a former banker, I found this hard to believe. But bankers are a weird lot. Study after study replicates this finding.) Once the work task goes above rudimentary cognitive skills and into something like creativity, the motivation game changes. Innovative employees need something else: things that don’t involve money. Of course, you still have to pay people. But with intelligent employees, Pink says the trick is to pay them enough “to take money off the table.” Pay them enough so they don’t have to worry about cash. Once you’ve paid them well enough not to worry about their bills, what else do these employees need? The Three Things Smart Employees Need Autonomy, mastery, and purpose keep good employees motivated. I’ll explain each in turn. Autonomy According to Pink, autonomy is the ability to direct one’s work. Autonomy allows employees to feel empowered in their positions rather than like their success is out of their hands. Autonomous employees manage their time and decide how to do their work rather than having someone else dictate it. This sense of control gives them the freedom to be productive and engage in their job tasks. Anecdotally, one of the things I love most about my job here at the Reckoning and the Rude is that my publisher, Matt Insley, never tells me what to write about day-to-day. (Though he does give great advice, particularly about my headlines!) Mastery Pink discusses the second element of employee motivation as mastery. Mastery is the desire to get better at what you do. When employees are allowed to improve themselves and hone their skills, it creates a sense of satisfaction that leads to increased motivation and productivity. Why do people play musical instruments on the weekends for free? Because they want to master something (and enjoy their melodious tunes, too, I’m sure). When we focus on mastering a skill or task instead of just completing it, we often reach new levels of engagement and creativity that are essential for any organization’s success. Purpose Finally, Pink proposes that purpose is a crucial factor in motivating employees. When one feels connected with the purpose behind their job tasks and understands how their work contributes towards something larger than themselves, it gives them a sense of meaning. That can help drive them forward even when things seem challenging or boring. It helps them stay focused on long-term goals (rather than getting caught up in short-term frustrations) and keeps them motivated throughout the journey toward achieving those goals. Of course, purpose gets confused with wokeness sometimes. I’ve heard horror stories about developers getting hired at tech firms and immediately concerning themselves with hiring policies rather than writing code. That’s no good. Businesses must profit to stay in business. First, they must create revenue. Then, they must collect that revenue and convert it into cash. If you don’t have profits, you won’t have a business. But you don't have a business if you don’t have cash. So, the purpose and the business must intertwine to work well. Wrap Up Motivating competent employees requires more than just cash. Strange as it may sound, they need autonomy, mastery, and purpose to flourish. And this isn’t some kumbaya stuff. It’s core to a business's success and has been proven repeatedly. Motivation is an inherent part of any organization’s internal success strategy. To maximize your company’s potential, you’ll need motivated employees. I wish you a very Happy Easter! All the best, [Sean Ring] Sean Ring Contributing Editor, The Morning Reckoning feedback@dailyreckoning.com X (formerly Twitter): [@seaniechaos]( [WARNING: The Following Content May Be Disturbing]( [Click here to learn more]( Former CIA Advisor explains the post-election threat facing our nation… One that could drain your bank account and leave the U.S. dollar completely worthless. This may be disturbing – but you need to see it in order to prepare. [Watch now.]( [LEARN MORE]( In Case You Missed It… Gold $2,600 Greg Guenthner, Editor [Greg Guenthner] GREG GUENTHNER Good Morning Reader, The Senate quietly passed a $1.2 trillion funding package on Saturday morning to avert a partial government shutdown. Just days earlier, Jerome Powell and the Fed soothed jittery investors, declaring that the Fed still intends to cut rates before the end of the year. Meanwhile, you might have noticed gold and Bitcoin consolidating near their respective all-time highs. Coincidence? Probably not. While you might consider the sharp moves higher in both assets to be no-brainers considering recent events, gold’s resilience in the face of numerous rally-busting pressures is where I want to focus our attention. Crypto and its mind bending rallies might have hogged a majority of the attention recently. But there’s something special brewing in precious metals right now, even though most investors aren’t paying close attention to the sector. Today, I want you to briefly forget about the stocks-only-go-up rally, the artificial intelligence boom, and the roaring crypto market. Sure, these are all important market themes. But I want to take a break from the endless noise to dig into what’s happening with gold and other metals right now – and how you should position your portfolio to profit from the next major leg higher. Let’s begin with the post-Fed reaction and where it might lead us from here… Fed Chair Jerome Powell is doing his best to keep his options open last week, explaining that while the path forward is still uncertain, the Fed still intends to cut rates before the end of the year. When, exactly? Well, even he’s not sure. All the so-called experts agree we’re getting cuts in 2024. But maybe not in June. As of early this week, July seems to be the most likely date for the first cut. Unless something unexpected happens, of course. I suspect inflation data release days will remain relatively volatile as everyone searches for clues as to which way the Fed might be leaning. It’s the watch and wait method in action – another layer of uncertainty to navigate as the first quarter draws to a close. How did gold react to the continuation of the unofficial data-dependent Fed policy? While stocks enjoyed a nice bump, gold spiked above $2,200 that evening for the first time ever. And it wasn’t the only metal streaking higher. Silver promptly topped $25 for the first time this year. Dr. Copper also stretched its gains and continues to hold above $4 as it consolidates just below 52-week highs. These moves bring the possibility of an extended metals rally back into focus following months of choppy action, which have been fraught with the occasional failed breakouts that tend to drive traders crazy. Yet gold has persevered through it all. In fact, gold continues to overcome multiple obstacles as it marches into uncharted territory: A Rising Dollar Fails to Cap the Gold Rally Gold has exploded off its February lows despite a resurgent dollar. That’s an impressive feat considering a strong dollar rally has stomped gold not once but twice over extended time frames since early 2022. The first was the dollar's epic surge during the 2022 bear market. The next was the dollar index’s summer bounce in 2023, which was partly to blame for gold’s ugly slide into the low $1,800s in early October. The dollar index has been working off its lows since late December. Yet gold has still managed to maintain higher prices. That’s worth noting, especially since gold hasn’t exactly been the recipient of the bulk of the anti-dollar attention lately… Crypto is Stealing the Narrative I’ve seen several arguments lately that all go something like this: Gold is not the preferred anti-inflation, anti-dollar investment vehicle anymore. It’s a dinosaur. The younger investors who would have been “all in” on the gold narrative are now involved in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. This line of thinking makes sense – and I don’t think it’s completely ridiculous to assume that crypto has stolen some of gold’s shine over the past several years. But again, gold is steadily consolidating near its highs, even as Bitcoin retakes $70,000 and meme coins capture the imagination of the next generation of speculators. Sure, Bitcoin moves faster than gold. But momentum works both ways. While Bitcoin’s recent consolidation has featured some wild swings in both directions, gold’s consolidation has been relatively stable. No, it probably won’t generate the massive short-term gains folks have come to expect from crypto. But it’s certainly a more stable dollar hedge, if that’s what you’re looking for… Gold’s Speculative Sidekicks Can’t Get Ahead As if a disinterested speculator class wasn’t enough, gold’s more speculative sidekicks – silver and mining stocks – have yet to kick into high gear. In ideal gold bull market environments, silver should be outperforming. That’s simply not the case right now. In fact, silver is still below its December highs – and well below all-time highs. Meanwhile, gold just posted new all-time highs earlier this month. Gold miners are beginning to firm up. But they have yet to post a significant change in trend. If precious metals speculators were out in force, we would have seen much more constructive action in these stocks as soon as gold made its initial push toward $2,000 in Q4. Conditions for this latest gold run are far from perfect. But that hasn’t put the brakes on the rally. That alone tells us that despite some of the recent setbacks, a strong bid under the gold market should help it (eventually) extend higher. If we assume this consolidation area is a halfway point of gold’s rally off its latest retest of $2,000, I think $2,400 is a reasonable short-term upside target. From there, $2,600 is well within reach over the next several months, which would match my longer-term prediction from mid-December. Don’t sleep on gold here… Best, [Greg Guenthner] Greg Guenthner Contributing Editor, Morning Reckoning feedback@dailyreckoning.com Thank you for reading The Morning Reckoning! We greatly value your questions and comments. Please send all feedback to [feedback@dailyreckoning.com.](mailto:dr@dailyreckoning.com) [Sean Ring] [Sean Ring, CAIA, FRM and CMT]( is a former banker and financial educator and is the editor of the Rude Awakening. Sean has trained interns and graduates from Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Citi, Bank of America, Standard Chartered Bank, DBS (Singapore), the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), Bank Indonesia (the central bank), HSBC, Barclays, RBS, and BlackRock. He knows the global economy is being corrupted by forces that most people can't understand and has used his unique and worldly experiences to help people navigate the markets. [Paradigm]( ☰ ⊗ [ARCHIVE]( [ABOUT]( [Contact Us]( © 2024 Paradigm Press, LLC. 1001 Cathedral Street, Baltimore, MD 21201. By submitting your email address, you consent to Paradigm Press, LLC. delivering daily email issues and advertisements. To end your The Daily Reckoning e-mail subscription and associated external offers sent from The Daily Reckoning, feel free to [click here.]( Please note: the mailbox associated with this email address is not monitored, so do not reply to this message. We welcome comments or suggestions at feedback@dailyreckoning.com. 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