I remember there was this story about a business. I think it was a brokerage. But anyways, they gave out large bonuses at Christmas, thinking that this would encourage employees to work harder.

But instead, it had the exact opposite effect. The stock brokers worked most of the year, but when it came to December, they basically stopped working because of the bonuses. They knew by around November generally how well they did compared to the other stock brokers, and so they knew what kind of bonus to expect in December.

The problem was that even if they worked really hard in December, they were unlikely to earn a much bigger bonus, but there was a higher possibility that they’d screw up, which could reduce their bonus by a lot. So, if they worked hard in December, it could only make their bonus go down. So, they didn’t work hard.

Reminds me of the classic how to talk Australians episode

January 2nd: ah shit, here we go again

Thanksgiving and Christmas/NY are pretty much change freeze and no-touch seasons, meaning nothing should change in production to avoid downtime during the busiest shopping days of the year, so pretty much “nah” if someone wants to do something that could potentially cause an issue.