Business leaders know that employees need their efforts and achievements recognized to continue performing well and contributing to company success. Unfortunately, knowing the importance of recognition and executing recognition effectively are not the same.
It is not enough to fire off a “thank you” email after a few completed projects or to hand out gift cards during the holiday season; business leaders need to develop a structured recognition program to keep their staff happy, engaged and productive. However, even a recognition program can have flaws that impact the effectiveness of appreciation. Here are some mistakes business leaders must avoid if they want their workers to feel truly valued:
Table of Contents
Ignoring Some Employees
Too often, employee recognition programs involve the customer-facing sections of a business — and no one else. There are plenty of members of an organization that are critical to business operations but do not directly contribute to company profits, and it is imperative that business leaders include these workers in their recognition programs. Choosing to leave people out of a recognition program will breed resentment and result in low morale that makes a business less functional overall.
Focusing on Performance
Performance is undeniably important, but it should not be the only reason an employee receives recognition. Typically, performance-based recognition only provides praise and rewards to workers who have achieved goals and completed projects, but these events might not happen with the frequency that a workforce needs to be appreciated. Organizations need to build recognition programs that take into account effort, values, milestones and other causes of celebration that can boost worker motivation and morale.
Awarding Annually
Annual awards ceremonies — and annual performance reviews — can give business leaders time to evaluate performance and develop strategies for encouraging high performance. However, once per year is not nearly enough to keep up employee engagement. A recognition program should provide a structure for rewards that are available to workers on a more frequent basis, like weekly, biweekly, monthly and quarterly.
Standardizing Rewards
It is tempting for organizations to offer the exact same reward to every employee who earns the same achievement, but standardizing recognition in this way is not ideal. Different workers maintain different motivations; while one worker might be driven by the opportunity to earn a gift card to a local restaurant, another worker might not be and thus might never strive to perform to the same level. Business leaders need to consider how to personalize rewards to individual employees to make the most positive impact — which might be as easy as asking recipients what they want.
Offering Only Money
Bonuses, raises and other monetary rewards can be effective motivators, but they tend to be incredibly expensive for businesses to maintain. What’s more, not every worker will gain the same benefits from recognition in the form of cash; in fact, extrinsic rewards like money can actually weaken a workforce’s self-motivation over time. It is best to reserve monetary rewards for the most significant achievements and find other forms of recognition and gratitude to satisfy individual workers’ needs.
Hiding Recognition Processes
Business leaders are in charge of maintaining an employee recognition program, but leaders should not be the only members of an organization involved in a recognition program’s creation. Feedback from employees on recognition processes will ensure that the structured recognition has a lasting positive effect on worker performance and morale. Additionally, the program should remain transparent, so workers understand expectations from leadership and are able to earn the rewards available to them.
Neglecting Goal-setting
Every business program should be guided by organizational goals, to include employee recognition. Business leaders need to consider what they hope to achieve from the recognition process. It might be useful to receive employee input as well; workers who set and accomplish their own professional goals might be worthy of additional rewards.
Forgetting or Abandoning the Program
Perhaps the worst recognition-related mistake of all is abandoning the recognition program entirely. Though maintaining a recognition program can be a heavy responsibility for business leaders, the workforce absolutely relies on recognition from their superiors to continue high levels of work. If a program is too burdensome on leadership time and energy, it might be necessary to modify the program or hire staff dedicated to keeping the recognition program alive.
Employee recognition should not be a perk of a progressive employer; functional recognition programs should be in place within every organization. By identifying and avoiding the above mistakes, every business can benefit from effective employee recognition.
