Video Title: Compensation (Focus Pointe)

In this video, two HR staff members, Cheryl and Gina, must determine if an employee, Angelo, is worthy of a pay raise. The company, Focus Pointe, provides market research services. One of these services involves recruiting consumer, medical, and other respondents for the market research industry. It’s important to get good, qualified respondents. To distinguish itself from its competitors, Focus Pointe uses a special “triple screening” process to ensure that the respondents it recruits meet its clients’ specifications. In this case, Angelo seems to be recruiting inadequate respondents. The two HR staff members are trying to determine if giving Angelo a raise would solve the problem. As Angelo says in the video, he’d like to be better compensated. Cheryl and Gina point out to him that his pay is falling because his recruits often don’t qualify. They ask him what he would like—an increase in salary or an increase in the amount per recruit that he is paid. He responds that he’d like both. They tell them they will go along with his request but that they must see higher levels of recruit qualifications within 3 months. As the panel’s human resource managers (including Paul, from BMG) point out in assessing this video, they don’t necessarily agree with giving someone who is underperforming a raise. As Paul says, “They should have just told him to improve first.”

Discussion Questions

1. Do you think Angelo is underperforming as a result of motivation or something else, such as the need for improved training? How would you find out?

2. Is it a good idea to give someone who is underperforming a raise? Does it send the wrong signal, insofar as it seems to suggest that poor performance leads to rewards?

3. Do you think the idea of paying recruiters like Angelo per recruit might actually backfire, and if so how?