Bonuses didn't work, 'spite' did: Bengaluru-based CEO on employees working nights, Sundays
A Bengaluru-based startup CEO says bonuses, deadlines and equity failed to motivate his team as effectively as a bitter rivalry. His post about employees voluntarily working nights and Sundays to outdo a competing product has sparked debate online.
A Bengaluru-based CEO, Vikram Pai, sparked an online discussion after revealing that his employees voluntarily worked late nights and weekends to take on a former customer who had treated them badly. The CEO, co-founder of ReferRush, shared the unique motivation on X, referencing a screenshot of an employee stating he would not take Sundays off for the next three weeks, except in an emergency.
Pai had previously tried various methods to boost productivity, including bonuses, incentives, deadlines, and equity, but nothing seemed to work as effectively as the "spite" he witnessed from his team. He concluded that "turns out spite might be the greatest employee incentive of all time," drawing attention to the unusual source of motivation behind the employees' extra efforts.
The post garnered over 23,500 views and prompted discussions on the nature of workplace motivation and the logic behind the employees' response to the former customer's actions.
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