Find Out What People Find Rewarding

Job satisfaction is critical to employee retention and productivity but companies often misunderstand what people find satisfying. There isn't a simple answer because people are different so it is very important to understand your people.

One thing for sure is that while money can be a factor in retention, it is not a very good source of job satisfaction. In a frustrating environment, you might hear a common cliche, "Oh well. Another day, another dollar." If you hear that, you are in trouble. Money may be some consolation when you have had a crummy day but it is a meager consolation.

There is a dramatic variance in productivity. People can be many times more productive when they are motivated and satisfied than otherwise. It can really pay to understand what gives people satisfaction.

Junior and senior people have different needs. The needs may be similar but the scope will vary. Senior engineers need to see how their work contributes in the big picture and see that their recommendations and designs have visibility. Junior people need to see how their work fits into the part of the system they are working on and that their feature/piece is appreciated.

There are some common factors in job satisfaction and dissatisfaction:

• challenge, coolness
• visibility, appreciation.
• appropriate forms of support
• quality
• pain level

There are some common scenarios that can be satisfying or dissatisfying depending on how they are handled. Almost everything management does has some effect on individual people's job satisfaction and motivation. Be aware of the effect of your management decisions and style.

Challenge

Most software involves a certain degree of tedium. People who have significant responsibility for maintenance work, backwards compatibility, etc. may have a high degree of tedium. Don't forget to share out some of the cool work to all people. At least give them a chance to be involved when there is new/cool work. Don't get caught in the trap of thinking that a person is too busy and that you can't afford to have them work on something cool. 

Avoid a hero culture when a select few get all of the cool work and visible appreciation. Instead, create a culture where everyone contributes and gets visible appreciation.

Avoid a "give it to the Co-op" culture where work that would be interesting to a senior person is given to an overly junior person, especially when you will later expect the more senior people to live with and possibly maintain the thing. Instead, give the Co-op to the senior person to direct and mentor. 

One of the best experiences for junior people is to work with more senior people. You can easily spoil them by giving them a taste for glory too early.

Appreciate

Show appreciation at the level where the work is done. Regularly. As immediately as possible. If the only visible appreciation given is the open e-mail from the CEO congratulating engineering on a project that just achieved a General Availability release milestone, don't be surprised if this fails to make people feel appreciated. It's too little, too late. It could be months to many months after the work was done.

Appreciation should be based on tangible evidence that the work is complete. A unit test, integration test or demonstration. Don't be arbitrarily appreciative or you will encourage poor work.

Recognize initiative. If someone shows initiative in a valuable area, give them visible appreciation, give them a role moving forward. A financial bonus for initiative can be a very much appreciated and a better use of money than a raise.

Don't bypass people. If they've had a role in the past, involve them in the future.

Support

Listen to what your best people need. Be careful not to intrusively, forcefully help them, like taking a part they've done good work on and give it to someone else because you think they are too busy. Talk to them first. Find out what they want. 

If people ask for help, listen.

Quality

Have a quality agenda if possible. Allow people to feel proud of the product and their contribution to it.

Pain Points

Develop a good development culture. Recognize competency and allow your best people to work with your best people.

Some development activities are painful. Don't try to hide necessary evils but do try to minimize any unnecessary pain points. Avoid ADHD behavior, militant project management, finger pointing, etc.