Incentive Drift

When people optimize what is rewarded, not what is intended—metrics become targets and targets replace purpose.

Why it matters: Incentives are the engine of drift; they silently reshape behavior at scale.

Quick Diagnostic

Teams hit metrics while outcomes worsen.
“Gaming” becomes normal and celebrated.
Safety/quality loses to speed.
Cost of delay: you institutionalize the wrong behavior.

Problem

Success signals drive behavior more powerfully than mission statements. When metrics become targets, the system optimizes for the scoreboard, not reality.

Mechanism

Metric chosen → reward attached → optimization begins → gaming emerges → truth decays → trust collapses

Early Indicators

Performance improves while real outcomes degrade.
“Workarounds” become standard practice.
People fear missing numbers more than harming mission.
Reviews focus on outputs, not mechanisms.
“We can’t change the metric” becomes governance.
Bad news is reframed to protect numbers.

Examples

Civilizational: engagement economics amplifies outrage.
Institutional: enforcement agencies optimize appearances over outcomes.
Organizational: quarterly targets distort long-term investment.

Control Opportunity

Design

Metric audits (how it’s gamed, what it displaces).
Balanced scorecards (short/long term; quantity/quality).
Reward truth-telling and risk surfacing.
Guardrail metrics (safety, trust, reversibility) that can veto.
Independent review of metric changes.

Measurement

Gap between reported vs audited outcomes.
Incident rate correlated with target pressure.
Exception growth during end-of-period pushes.
“Near miss” reporting rate (truth culture).

Failure mode if missing
The system becomes a machine for rewarding distortion.

Core Question

What behavior does success reward?

Maps to Patterns

Incentives Outrunning Safeguards • Exception Drift • Verification Gap • Crisis as Audit

Routing

Hub • Drift • Controls (Social) • Daily Brief • Field Notes

A Think Tank for Human Flourishing