Let’s talk about your job for a moment.
What you do doesn’t matter. You could be a construction worker, an accountant, or a stand-up comedian. Either way, this conversation is the same.
What does a construction worker get paid to do? Erect buildings and infrastructure. An accountant keeps track of the books. A stand-up comedian is supposed to make you laugh. Those are the goals–the requirements–of these jobs. This is how you get paid. Would you pay a stand-up comedian for reciting Macbeth instead of telling jokes? Would you give a bonus to an accountant if he spent his time writing a novel and not keeping track of finances? If construction workers fail to make any progress on building a new road, are they still getting checks?
The answer is no. Everyone has specific targets they have to meet to make their money. But then why is it nearly every CEO of a diabetes non-profit (with the exception of the JDRF), gets paid extra based on goals and objectives that have nothing to do with finding a cure?
We just finished our latest report ” Are Non-Profit Executives Financially Incentivized to Deliver a Cure”, and our findings are pretty upsetting. Most of the CEO’s are rewarded on the performance of completely different criteria, such as advocacy, or how much fundraising they pull in. Finding a cure is a large part of every organization’s mission, so why is progress towards one not incentivized at all? If they’re going to get bonuses anyway, shouldn’t the bonuses be for work that helps cure diabetics, and not for how much fundraising they gain?
We believe there are many paths to a cure, but if an organization is not operating in a manner where reaching one is a top priority, the road to one gets even longer. What if these CEOS were given a meaningnful financial incentive for meeting specific research goals related to a cure? Or take the JDRF’s Jeffrey Brewer, who actually gets no money for running the organization. Surely, altruism is something to be proud of, but think of the flipside: When someone is not being paid for work, they’re held to much less accountability than others who are collecting a check. Would people give closer scrutiny to his performance if he were getting paid?
We believe that if these CEO’s are already getting bonuses, giving them based on cure research milestones makes the most sense. If the very heads of these organizations are given all the reason in the world to fight for a cure, one will come much sooner.
–Nick
