I was speaking with someone recently about what happened when they tried to increase completion of their employee survey. They offered employees a muffin and a coffee to sit down and complete the survey one morning on their way into work.

People sat at laptops in a building lobby, completing the questions as they drank their drink and ate. They’d supplied ~1200 muffins over a week for ~1000 employees. They got fewer than 600 completions.

I get why; people will have used the time to pause, chat and avoid the manufactured and artificial framework attempting to seize approval.

Or, to put it another way, gimmicks don’t work.