Cheryl Cran: CEO, Evolutionary Business Solutions
Effective rewards programs needs to factor in the individuality of the team members. Recognition goes along with reward, and it needs to correlate with generational values. For example, a baby boomer may want to have a Friday or Monday off to extend his or her weekend and be given personal recognition for taking the lead on a project. A gen-Xer may want a family reward such as tickets to the PNE for his or her entire family or any other type of family outing and he or she would want recognition for team contributions. A gen-Yer might want a day off spontaneously to go skiing and would want recognition with a video or group text being sent to the entire company to announce the work he or she did on a successful project or with a client.
When a reward is tied to personal values, it makes a more meaningful impact and produces longer-lasting feelings of engagement for the recipient.
A great example is Sodexo. It varies its rewards based on a range of values that appeal to all generations. The meal pass ensures a varied and quality diet. The mobility pass helps with the costs for commuting to work. The eco pass promotes the purchase of environmentally friendly products.
Bottom line: match rewards to the generational values of your team.
Merv Gilbert:Principal partner, Psych Health + Safety
One important manifestation of a psychologically healthy workplace is the creation of an environment where there is appropriate, timely and fair acknowledgement and appreciation of employees' accomplishments. This includes appropriate financial compensation but goes beyond a regular paycheque to include employee or team celebrations, recognition of years served and/or milestones reached. Recognizing and rewarding employees motivates, fuels the desire to excel, builds engagement, encourages employees to exceed expectations and enhances team success.
In order to effectively recognize and reward employees:
- Ask staff what would be meaningful for them. Individuals differ: for some, acknowledgement in a company newsletter means a lot; for others, a more personal and private "perk" such as a sports or theater ticket will be preferred.
- Be real. Recognition that is not based on meaningful accomplishments above and beyond routine job expectations can seem empty and meaningless. Pins for years of service can easily be experienced as reflecting only that an employee has been with the company for a long time … and is still alive.
- Make it personal. Recognition means a lot more if it comes from a colleague or immediate supervisor who knows what happens "on the shop floor."
- Acknowledge effort as well as outcome. If an individual or team sincerely worked hard to meet a goal or deal with a problem, this needs to be commended, even if they weren't completely successful.
- Be transparent. Rewards and recognition should be causes for shared and public celebration, not a backroom deal.
Sandra Reder: President and founder, Vertical Bridge Corporate Consulting
Studies show that companies that recognize and reward their employees have a higher level of engagement and retention. But how you recognize and reward your staff is not a "one size fits all" undertaking.
Recognition is personal; there are those who are not comfortable with public acknowledgement and others who thrive on it. A pat on the shoulder and a simple "job well done" from a manager may be all it takes for one person. There will be others who are motivated by public acknowledgment from a supervisor or manager. Whether you have a formal program in place or not, managers should be encouraged to watch for ongoing opportunities to say "thanks for a job well done" this alone can change the level of engagement in a workplace.
There are some fundamental steps to developing an employee recognition program that is meaningful to employees and valuable to an organization. They include establishing goals and objectives, obtaining leadership support and securing budget approval, creating the program design using a committee, communicating and implementing the program, rewarding and recognizing employees and evaluating the program's effectiveness.
There are numerous creative ways to recognize and reward employees. They range from the more traditional long service awards, which include plaques, certificates and things like a gold watch, to creative online points systems where the employee can earn rewards points that can be applied to the purchase of everything from electronics to trips.
A good recognition and rewards program will not only help to create an engaging workplace, statistics show that it also helps to improve an organization's profitability.
