When giving sharp objects to your employees is a good thing

I often get unsolicited emails that are completely ridiculous. While this particular email did not interest me personally, I was still intrigued by the idea.

There is a popular line of thinking that states that employees are not all that motivated by money, but are more motivated by other forms of motivation. In that vein, this email sender, PremStar Incentives, wants employers to give knives to their high performers.

But not just any knives.

Ginsu Knives.

I guess these are still popular in certain age brackets, and they certainly have the name recognition.

Another story about the real soon now end of Sears

This one is from a former Sears employee who left before the merger with K-mart. A brief excerpt:

More broadly--and most stupefyingly--Lampert continues to claim turnaround efforts are on track. This from a company that has had precisely one-quarter of positive sales growth in seven years, operating losses that continue to worsen, an acceleration in store closings and rampant departures of key executives. Moreover, the moves detailed in the most recent press release are all about financial restructuring and say nothing about actions to improve customer relevance. If Sears does not quickly and dramatically improve its performance with its customers nothing else matters. Period.

Read the rest.