When you ask employees what they'd rather have, cash or a gift, many times they will say, "Oh, just give me the money." However, this is not always the case. A survey of 1000 adults working for Fortune 500 organizations revealed that salary and bonuses are not the key factors to job satisfaction. The people who conducted this survey found that these 1000 individuals placed greater value on benefits that impact their overall quality of life. (Turner, 2000). Why the discrepancy between these two viewpoints? I think it was very well put by Nigel Cover when he said "The heaven of each is but what each desires." There will always be differences of opinion in whether non-cash or cash incentives are the most desirable and even the most motivating. There are four major types of compensation. These are pay, benefits, learning and development opportunities and work environment. The former two are cash based incentives. In this report I will be focusing on non-cash incentives!
             . I will be talking mainly about rewards and recognition, employee empowerment, and workplace amenities. These types of incentives are relational in nature. They enhance the value of cash incentives.
             Before getting into a discussion on the three aforementioned, non-cash incentives, I would like to discuss several reasons why cash incentives may be considered less motivating than non-cash. There are two major reasons. The first is that cash awards are taxable. A $50 check might sound nice, but if the employee has learned from past experiences that the actual value after taxes is only $25, they might not work as hard to get the award. The second reason is that monetary rewards are easily forgotten. The money most likely goes in with the rest of your money to pay bills and buy the things you normally would have bought. During a survey, employees were asked if they remembered what they had bought with the $200 bonus they had...