There was someone I once knew, lets call him Jake. He had been working at a location for about 6 months, and was running his division. Mind you this was an easy position for a high school student, but that didn’t change that he did his best work.

Jake worked hard to the point where he was the go to person to train new employees. He was also often scheduled to work alone on nights when he should have had at least one other coworker. After these months, he had his scheduled performance review and raise. There was a tiny increase of 3 cents, despite putting forth his best effort. Another coworker got a raise after 3 months for 25 cents. This coworker, lets call her Jane, was trained by Jake and didn’t do much when she was actually on shift.

After this situation occurred, Jake realized that it didn’t matter how much effort he put in to the job. He could do the bare minimum instead of always going above and beyond, and still get paid the same. His work wouldn’t be valued anyways so why bother right?

The result was exactly as you would expect. Jake enjoyed work a lot more, slacked off and still got paid the same. There was no need to put forth his best efforts anymore, and the company saw the areas it struggled because of this. There was no real ending to it, it just changed his work behavior towards that company forever until he left.

Compensation received from the job greatly impacted his work behavior. Seeing his coworker receive more when he believed that he should be at least be getting the same compensation completely changed the way he worked. In speaking with him, I came to learn that it changed his mindset for the worse.