What a thought provoking concept...motivating employees through feeding them, as per this article by John Baldoni. It has been a long accepted theory that winning anyone over can be as simple as feeding them, and admittedly, while I have always worked in companies that have provide copious amounts of starchy, processed carbs, I never gave much thought to why we were doing it. I do remember several years ago there was almost an uprising when the management team suggested taking the Dad's oatmeal cookies and replacing them with cheaper no name brand cookies. There was a meeting about this Very Pivotal Management Decision and it occurred to me that maybe, just possibly, there are some management teams out there with too much time on their hands.
I had always assumed there might be a nefarious reason for ensuring the kitchen was always well stocked. It meant that employees would not need to leave the premises for snacks, drinks or even lunches in some cases. And once you start providing food, do NOT even think about taking that perk away. In my time I have done an exit interview or two, and here is another good article to read, this one is about exit interviews. I keep my interviews fairly simple but I like to think I have some hard hitting questions such as "Did you make your decision to start looking for another job before or after the Dad oatmeal cookies were replaced with a lower quality substitute?"
I had always assumed there might be a nefarious reason for ensuring the kitchen was always well stocked. It meant that employees would not need to leave the premises for snacks, drinks or even lunches in some cases. And once you start providing food, do NOT even think about taking that perk away. In my time I have done an exit interview or two, and here is another good article to read, this one is about exit interviews. I keep my interviews fairly simple but I like to think I have some hard hitting questions such as "Did you make your decision to start looking for another job before or after the Dad oatmeal cookies were replaced with a lower quality substitute?"
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