The CEO of Widgets-R-Us is a progressive kind of fellow. No matter that his after work cross-dressing has become an obsession.

In the daytime he thinks hard about the business of selling widgets and is always looking for ways to make improvements. One day as he sipped orange juice in the front of a morning flight to the capital, an article in a magazine caught his eye. It was on the merits of unexpected pay rises and he read it twice.

Fortified by the prospect of a motivated workforce the CEO called his chairman before the seat belt sign was off and easily persuaded him of the merits of pay rises all around. A few weeks later he proudly announced a board sanctioned raise of 5% for everyone in the company.

Not only that but if the company performance improved more pay rises were to come. He proudly told the now eager employees that this made him feel humble to be able to help everyone out.

Sure enough widgets cascaded off the production lines and on to consumers with unprecedented efficiency. The company became hugely successful kicked along by a newly efficient and pay rise motivated workforce.

In the blink of a corporate eye the base pay of everyone in the company had doubled and the CEO smiled all the way to his favourite car dealer.

And the riddle is?