Incentive programs for inventors (Dial Corp.)

Dial Corp. has a multifaceted incentive program for its inventors. Inventors get “monetary awards” where there are “different pay grades at different stages of development,” according to Kate Huffman, intellectual property and patent counsel at Dial, in an article of InsideCounsel, Oct. 2006 at 30. This tantalizing but opaque statement means, perhaps, that inventors get different cash awards according to the level of the inventor and how far along the invention is toward commercialization.

Complementing the cash, Dial also gives inventors plaques, which are distributed at monthly meetings, and the top R&D executives personally recognize the contributors (See my post of Jan 27, 2006 about other forms of encouragement to inventors.).

Do Dial’s patent lawyers get “monetary awards,” wall eye-candy, and a handshake from on high when they cope with all the inventions these incentives encourage?