The Lumen and Absorb Teams

An Information Week survey of tens of thousands of IT workers confirms that theory: On-the-job challenge ranks well above salary and other financial incentives as the key source of motivation. This is no surprise -- since the pioneering work of Frederick Herzberg, managers have known that learning and being challenged motivate workers more than money or fear of disciplinarian bosses. What's different about SAS is that it goes to uncommon lengths to find the right intrinsic motivator for each group of employees.

Artists are inspired by the desire to create beauty. Salespeople respond to the thrill of the hunt and the challenge of making their quotas. Whatever the particular incentives, companies can take steps to help employees realize their goals. To ensure that its salespeople could make their quotas, for example, SAS developed a product-knowledge management system and created the position of sales engineer. That person's job is to answer staff questions and solve technical problems, so the sales reps can spend more time chasing down leads and less time digging up product specs.

Since developers thrive on intellectual stimulation, SAS sends them to industry- and technology-specific conferences, where they can hone their programming skills and build relationships within the larger software community. SAS stages its own R&D expos, where SAS developers share their work with the nontechnical staff. The company also encourages employees