Remuneration and productivity at the Minas Gerais Hospital Foundation: the perception of employees and managers

Abstract

This paper analyzes how employees and managers of the Minas Gerais Hospital Foundation have perceived and modified the proposal of remuneration conditioned to the attainment of results introduced in 1993. The punctual study of the actors¿ perception was carried through by half-structuralized interviews with the management and with multi-professional and functional focal groups of employees. This perception was collated with the data obtained in a previous study that identified changes of the main production indicators of services between 1992 and 1995. The speech both of directors and of employees is permeated by three key questions, being two of them also central in the theory principal-agent: aversion to risk, asymmetry or incomplete information, and participation. These questions seem to be basic for a lasting success in the adoption of a flexible remuneration. Underestimating the importance of those factors, especially the participation in decision making, could transform a proposal of remuneration conditioned to the attainment of results, as it occurred in this specific case study, into mere wage complementation.