Week 1 Blog Post

Prompt: Think of a situation where you (or someone you know) engaged in a set of behaviors and compensation was a motivating factor. Some examples – accepted or declined a job offer, left a job, or decreased effort. Why do you think compensation motivated that behavior? What was it about the compensation that led you (or the other person) to behave that way?

This past summer after COVID caused my internship to fall through I had to pick up a part time job for the summer. I had to decide between going back to work at Kohl’s or taking a new opportunity to work at Walgreens. I had worked at Kohl’s for three years before I moved to Corvallis for school and because of this I had established great relationships with my coworkers and knew how to perform all the tasks required of me. However, because Kohl’s was not an essential business, they were unsure when they would be able to reopen and they would be paying me less than what was offered by Walgreens, which is why I choose to work at Walgreens.

I think compensation motivated this decision as I had a small amount of time during the summer to make money and wanted to make as much as I could by working the most amount of hours with a higher pay and I knew Walgreens would be better able to provide this. Although I knew I wouldn’t enjoy working at Walgreens as much because I didn’t know the employees and I had to learn several new skills, the compensation and stability of the position were a highly motivating factor in my decision. The compensation led me to behave this way as it was higher than the one that I was to be offered at Kohl’s and thus drove me to choose Walgreens over Kohl’s.