Employee Engagement, Recognition and Reward Commentary | Globoforce Blog

I'VE MOVED -- www.recognizethisblog.com

2011-05-03T09:15:00.001-04:00

To all my readers, I'm pleased to announce I've relaunched my blog as Recognize This! and relocated it to www.recognizethisblog.com.

I'm still blogging on everything employee recognition, rewards, incentives and engagement, but also broadening my focus to the power of strategic employee recognition to positively impact the entire talent management spectrum - from recruiting and onboarding, through performance management, succession planning and even exiting. You can continue to follow my posts at Recognize This! by subscribing here.

I hope you'll continue to follow my blog and share your thoughts and insights. I learn so much from my readers. To continue to follow the Globoforce Blog, which is now a multi-author blog, you'll need to subscribe to the Wordpress feed at http://globoforce.com/globoblog/

Proactive Management of Company Culture Is the Cure for What Ails the Workplace

2011-04-29T02:33:00.004-04:00

Recognize This! – “Facestabbing” in the workplace is a symptom, not the disease.

What’s your opinion of managing “Facestabbing” incidents in the workplace? When it comes to your attention that an employee has posted a negative comment of some kind about your company, superiors or colleagues, how does your company respond? How do you think it should respond?

Is there a formal policy? What is it? If not, do you think there should be a formal policy or procedure for addressing such comments progressively up to and including termination? Do you believe in a more informal approach?

Or do you see it more like my friend Bob Selden, author of the Management-Issues issues blog, who sees such Facebook commenting as “the old ‘water cooler gossiping’ or ‘heard it at the pub’ that have been part and parcel of work life forever?”

I tend to fall in the camp of how medical professionals might address Facestabbing – treat the disease, not the symptoms.

For some companies, treating the disease may be a bit like treating cancer at first, requiring excising of cancerous growths in the form of backstabbing, unproductive, and incompatible people that simply don't fit with a culture of appreciation focused on teamwork, success and a commitment to living out the company values in the daily work. As Josh Bersin pointed out:

“Companies which understand their core culture can far outperform their peers by building a set of staffing and management programs to reinforce this culture. And what this research clearly shows is that employee engagement (or employee satisfaction) is directly related to leadership and culture: the company must understand the culture it wants to create, hire for that culture, and manage around that culture.”

Once you have that culture built, the symptoms simply melt away.

Don’t forget on Monday next week I’ll be writing on my new blog – Recognize This! Content will be what you’ve come to expect here on the Globoforce blog, but with an expanded focus across the entire Talent Management spectrum. Current subscribers will move with me. If you want to subscribe to the corporate Globoforce Blog for new multi-author content on Globoforce news, events, customers and products, please subscribe here.

This Month on Compensation Café * Merit Increases Are Dead & 2 More

2011-04-28T14:33:00.003-04:00

Today on Compensation Café I wrote about the possible death of merit increases as a feasible means of managing (and hopefully improving) employee performance. This year’s average merit increase is 3% -- barely a cost of living increase and not enough of a differentiation between employees who at the top of performance will receive a 4% salary increase as compared to those who meet expectations receiving 2.5% increases.

Where’s the differentiation in that? As inflation rises will those merit increases even be noticed? And even those increases for top performers are reliant on a largely failed annual performance review process. How many of you have dealt with the manager who says:

So what’s an alternative? I propose year-round rewards commiserate with year-round recognition of employee efforts. Those who perform at a higher level are naturally more frequently recognized and rewarded for those efforts.

Also this month in the café I wrote about Communicating Compensation, Total Rewards & Meaning in which I ask how well we communicate total rewards and the value of benefits packages to employees. More importantly, do we fully understand what it is about their total rewards package that most matters to employees?

In my third post of the month, I also spoke to the importance of communicating “dinner” vs. “dessert” to employees – ensuring the base compensation is fair and accurate before laying on recognition and rewards.

Pop over to Compensation Café and join the conversation or share your thoughts on this concept here. I’m really interested in what you think communicating total rewards and undifferentiated differentiation reward practices.

Also, don’t forget I’m moving to my own Recognize This! blog on Monday, May 2. Subscribers will move with me. If you want to subscribe to the corporate Globoforce Blog for new multi-author content on Globoforce news, events, customers and products, please subscribe here.

What’s a Leader Supposed to Do?

2011-04-27T10:09:00.000-04:00

Recognize This! – A leader’s sole responsibility is to focus employee energy on achieving target objectives.

Leaders in an organization – especially people with the responsibility for managing others – are often overwhelmed with the many responsibilities, objectives and tasks on their own plates, much less those on their employees’. That’s why I enjoyed Chris Edmonds’ piece that focused expectations of leaders to one clear thing:

Source: www.drivingresultsthroughculture.com

Isn’t that the essence of what we expect our leaders/managers to do? Set their employees on the path to delivering strategic objectives and doing so in a positive, helpful way that reflects the company’s core values?

That’s precisely what strategic employee recognition is designed to help leaders accomplish:

1) Clearly communicate expectations through frequent, in-the-moment praise and recognition of employee efforts that help meet company goals

2) But not offer that praise unless such employee efforts are in line with company values and a culture of positive appreciation and recognition.

As we learned in Monday’s post of highlights from an HBR podcast:

"If managers just increased their praise and recognition of one employee once a day for 21 business days in a row, six months later, those teams as opposed to control group, had a 31% higher level of productivity."

Do you agree? Is this list of 1 sufficient for what we need leaders to do? What would you add?

I’m launching my own blog – Recognize This! – on Monday, May 2. Content will be what you’ve come to expect here on the Globoforce blog, but with an expanded focus across the entire Talent Management spectrum. Current subscribers will move with me. If you want to subscribe to the corporate Globoforce Blog for new multi-author content on Globoforce news, events, customers and products, please subscribe here.

3 Steps to Help Employees Find the Meaning in Their Work

2011-04-26T03:24:00.004-04:00

Recognize This! – It really is as simple as Listen, Tell, Praise.

Psychometrics Canada came out last month with a study on employee engagement. One of the findings buried in the report was more interesting to me, though:

“Those working in government (80.3%) and business (74.4%) sectors are more likely to identify engagement as a problem than are people in education (64.2%) and not-for-profit (54.2%) organizations.”

Why is this? I tend to think it’s because those who choose to work in education and non-profit organizations are naturally much more connected with the “meaningfulness” of their work. I’ve written before about employees ranking “doing something meaningful” as more important to them even than recognition and cash rewards.

The challenge becomes, then, how do you help those in government and business “find the meaning.” Psychometrics own research lends some insight:

“When asked what leaders could do more of to improve engagement, respondents endorse these actions:
• Listen to employees’ opinions (71%)
• Communicate clear expectations (68%)
• Give recognition and praise (58%)”

That’s a pretty straightforward path for managers:
1) Listen – really listen – to me.
2) Clearly tell me what it is you need me to do and why.
3) Let me know when I’ve delivered what you needed. Recognize me!

How well do your managers follow those three steps with you? Do you believe you’re listened to? Do you know what is expected of you? Are you told – in an appreciative way – when you meet those expectations?

Also, don’t forget I’m moving to my own Recognize This! blog on Monday, May 2. Subscribers will move with me. If you want to subscribe to the corporate Globoforce Blog for new multi-author content on Globoforce news, events, customers and products, please subscribe here.

Increase Productivity by 31% Just by Saying “Thank You”

2011-04-25T03:15:00.002-04:00

Recognize This! – “If managers just increased their praise and recognition of one employee once a day for 21 business days in a row, six months later, those teams as opposed to control group had a 31% higher level of productivity.”

Please, if you do nothing else with anything you read in my blog, take 15 minutes to listen to this podcast on HBR by Shawn Achor, CEO of Aspirant and author of The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work.

If you can’t listen in, the post below is quoted highlights from the podcast:

This is research about how you affect the bottom line. And that requires changing the formula for success. People used to think if you worked harder right now, you’ll be more successful. If you’re more successful, you’ll be happier. This is wrong for two reasons:

1) If we follow that formula, we never get to happiness, because every time we get to success, we move the goal posts of what success looks like. If happiness is always on the opposite side of success, we push happiness over the cognitive horizon.

2) More importantly, your brain works in the opposite order. When your brain is positive, it outperforms your brain when it is negative, neutral or stressed.

When we’re at work, our brain is usually negative neutral or stressed, which hamstrings our brains ability to deal with all we could if our brain were positive.

You can change your brain and rewire it much more quickly than we thought was possible. If managers just increased their praise and recognition of one employee once a day for 21 business days in a row, six months later, those teams as opposed to control group, had a 31% higher level of productivity.

Think about what a 31% change in productivity would look like and what a small change in recognition practices would require.

One thing we suggest is when you open your inbox every day, write a 2 minute email praising and recognizing someone. You just activated 21 people in your environment making it easier to have a feedback loop with your people in your circle. Your brain also begins to recognize that you also have a lot more social support in your network. The greatest predictor of your success and happiness during a time of stress is your social support network. If you create social cohesion at work and home, you start finding more meaning at work, connect to more people, and your job satisfaction and life satisfaction skyrocket.

“When companies decide to invest in their employees to make sure they have a positive and engaged workforce, they’re reaping back a long term return on their investment that’s much higher than what they put in initially.”

I challenge you – take the 21 day experiment. Take 2 minutes every day for 21 days to recognize and praise one person. See how that changes your own positive perception of the workplace as well as those around you.

A Task Force for Employee Engagement?

2011-04-22T03:57:00.001-04:00

Recognize This! – Is another “initiative” the way to go to help employees overcome lingering recession fears and re-engage in the workplace?

The press in the UK has been buzzing these last couple of weeks with news of the reinvigoration of the Employee Engagement Task Force initially launched after the publication of the Engaging for Success report, more commonly known as the MacLeod Employee Engagement Report, issued in 2009.

The goal of the task force seems to be to offer practical opportunities, guidance and methods for increasing employee engagement, including a forum for the sharing of best practices.

Timing couldn’t be better as another survey of 4,400 UK companies found 45% of employees are keeping their heads down to avoid layoff in an environment in which 1 in 4 companies are ignoring the need to engage top performers. Why does this matter? Shouldn’t companies be happy employees are “buckling down?” Not in this case. Risk averse employees are also producing less and innovating less out of a desire to “just get the job done and don’t rock the boat.”

Overcoming this fear holdover from the recession is a key goal of employee engagement initiatives to be addressed by the task force, though Les Allen made an excellent observation about this in his Business Performance blog:

“The Government will need to be mindful that raising levels of employee motivation and engagement is not simply a matter of pushing out another multi-million dollar initiative or two. Employee enthusiasm must be built into the fabric of an organization. Employee engagement can’t be just another “bolt on” or flavor of the month.”

Helping employees build that enthusiasm requires giving them a reason to be enthusiastic. How do you that? By recognizing employees frequently and on-the-spot for achievements and demonstrations of your company values that contributed to those achievements. Doing so links them more closely with their colleagues and your firm, encouraging them to repeat those success-driving behaviors.

Do you think this task force is the way to go? If you were a part of it, what would you recommend or contribute?

The Failure of the Annual Performance Review

2011-04-21T04:36:00.002-04:00

Recognize This! – Annual feedback (if that) does little to motivate, inspire or keep employees on track.

Our semi-annual survey of U.S employees, the Globoforce® Workforce Mood Tracker™, found an overall dissatisfaction and disconnect among U.S. employees regarding both the frequency and effectiveness of performance reviews. (Read the news.)

• 53% received a performance review annually
• An alarming 22 percent reported never having a review at all.
• 24% dread the annual review more than anything else

A measly 7% receive monthly reviews of their work. When you look at all of that, it’s clear that companies have substantial motivational issues on their hands at performance review time. And who can blame the employees or the managers who have to review them? As our CEO, Eric Mosley, said in a press release last week on this topic:

“Providing employees with feedback and recognition only once a year is not only unfair, it minimizes the importance of each and every one of those people to the organization. An ongoing, 365-day review process that accurately measures employees’ year-round performance not only displays achievements, it uncovers the true leaders and influencers across the organization. This type of approach, driven by a strategic recognition program, provides employees with the feedback, appreciation, and direction they need to approach their peak performance level.”

What can you do instead?

Provide true meaning and value: Map all types of reviews (recognition and feedback) to specific company goals or values so you can provide employees with better understanding about the value they deliver to an organization.

Give feedback regularly and in the moment: Reviewing and recognizing employees on-the-spot gives employees the information they need to align their performance to desired goals and values on a daily – not yearly – basis

Be honest with yourself and your employees: Supplement old annual review processes with new recognition strategies to give employees a year-round feedback programs and managers greater workforce knowledge for employee performance optimization throughout the year.

Here's a news clip about the findings:

What else would you do to make the performance review process more timely, realistic and appropriate to employee and employer needs?

Free Webinar TOMORROW, April 21: Impacting Engagement in 2011

2011-04-20T03:02:00.001-04:00

Recognize This! – It’s our responsibility – every one of us – to create a work environment in which our peers, colleagues, superiors and subordinates want to engage.

I’m co-hosting a complimentary webinar tomorrow with BlessingWhite Employee Engagement Practice Leader, Mary Ann Masarech, on the key drivers for increasing employee engagement and creating high performance cultures in 2011.

Join us tomorrow, Thursday, April 21, from 1:00-2:00 (Eastern) as we discuss findings from our own separate studies showing only 1/3 of employees are engaged in their work and another 1/3 are looking for a new job this year.

In our 60-minute webinar, Mary Ann and I will be laying out a practical approach to employee engagement that evaluates the role of leaders in creating an engaging work environment through a culture of recognition tied to corporate values. Focusing on these key drivers of engagement can help prevent this mass exodus while also increasing productivity and overall business performance.

You can register for the webinar now and send in any questions you would like us to address via comments to this post.

What other elements of engagement would you like us to address?

Generations vs. Life Stage * What’s More Important in the Workplace?

2011-04-19T03:57:00.003-04:00

Career Advisory Board

Recognize This! – Forcing an “understanding” of a group of people based on an arbitrary designation will lead to incorrect assumptions and disengagement.

When you think of your workforce as a whole, how do you categorize them in your mind? By generation or by life stage?

A good deal of press and research seem to be devoted to “generations in the workplace” – GenY/Millennials expect ABC whereas Boomers prefer XYZ. I tend to fall in the other camp, though. As I wrote about a few months ago on Compensation Café:

Whether 26 or 46 years old, people with children tend to have more in common than singles of 26, and singles of 46. Comments I’ve received from readers are nearly universal in tone to this one:

“I want recognition, not some fussy bonus thing once every year or two but simple, frequent ‘Thanks, that was great and it really mattered!’ I want to see some understanding that I have a life outside work that is more important to me than some new fancy title. I want to work where I'm not expected to check my personality at the door and be a cog. I want to get out of this silly face-time model and, as I did in a previous job, use social media for virtual presence so I can work from anywhere. I want to be treated like the trustworthy, professional, hard-working grownup that I am. I'm a 56 year old gen Y and agree with you that generations aren't so different. We're all changing together while leadership models aren't keeping up.”

Relying too strongly on “generational expectations” simply leads to a disconnect in expectations as illustrated in the chart at right (from Career Advisory Board, full infographic available here).

“Millennials” want meaningful work, high pay, and a sense of accomplishment for what they do. Is that very much different from what you want? It’s not for me.

Tell me – do you identify more with those of the same “generation” as you or those in the same “life-stage?” What are the most important factors to you at work?

Launching “Recognize This!” Blog in 2 Weeks!

2011-04-18T11:31:00.000-04:00

Recognize This! – Always make room for your people to grow their individual talents while making room for others to join in the fun!

I’m excited the time has come for me to expand this blog and launch it separately from the Globoforce corporate website. I’m taking this approach now for two key reasons:

1) Expand range of discussion to include the talent management spectrum
In the last three years of blogging, I’ve tended to focus on strategic employee recognition and rewards and how those programs influence employee engagement and performance management. But the power of recognition extends beyond those topics across the entire talent management spectrum from recruiting and on-boarding through to succession planning and exiting. I’m excited to dive more deeply into those areas in my new blog, Recognize This!, starting Monday, May 2.

2) Broaden the scope of the Globoforce blog to many more voices of insight and expertise
I’ve had the honor and the privilege of being the “voice of Globoforce” in the blogging community for the last three years. But we have many more experts in employee recognition and strategy who deserve a platform. On May 2nd this blog, the Globoforce Blog, will become a multi-author corporate blog discussing the latest Globoforce news, events, products, strategies and other insights into strategic employee recognition.

What This Means for You/Logistics

For my current blog subscribers, I’ll be moving the email and RSS subscription lists directly over to my new Recognize This! blog since the content and format will be largely the same. You will not need to do anything to continue to receive these posts and updates.

For my Twitter followers, I’ll be launching my own Twitter handle - @DerekIrvine. You can follow me there as well as @Globoforce.

For future Globoforce Blog subscribers, you will need to subscribe to the new multi-author GloboBlog, even if you are already an email or RSS subscriber here. It would be unethical for me to duplicate the subscription information onto a new blog that subscribers did not originally sign up for. You can go ahead and subscribe now if you like, though active posting is not scheduled to begin until May 2.

Let me know if you have any questions about the new blog structures. I’m very excited about the new approach!

Recognition & Reward Program Best Practices

2011-04-15T07:58:00.009-04:00

Recognize This! – Reinforcing behaviors in a timely way will always be at the top of my recognition best practices list.

Ascent Group recently came out with their annual Reward & Recognition Program Profiles & Best Practices. The report is well worth the investment. Highlighting just a few of the key findings:

“Reinforce behaviors and reward results. Recognize the right behaviors and communicate such that the employee’s behavior becomes a model within the work group.”

When you define the behaviors that reflect your values, your employees begin to see the values come alive in their daily work.

“Be timely, specific, and communicate! Make sure you recognize behavior and reward results in a timely manner so employees know exactly why they are being recognized.”

Recognition given at the annual banquet or performance review does nothing to reinforce in the moment precisely what it is you need them to repeat. Make sure messages of recognition are specific and reference the value demonstrated.

“Match the reward to the person and the achievement.”

Every person is different. A BBQ isn’t motivating for a person who lives in a high-rise apartment building. A gift-card to a steakhouse isn’t rewarding for a vegetarian. Let your employees choose what’s personally memorable and culturally relevant for them – from 2,500 brands and 25 million options around the world.

“Involve employees in the design and refinement of your reward and recognition programs.”

One of our 10 tactics discussed in Winning with a Culture of Recognition, involving employees – from every division, region and level – turns employees into program evangelists, ensuring rapid program adoption.

“Don’t just offer rewards and recognition for front line employees – extend the program to cover all employees in the department so the entire group is working towards the same goals.”

One of our 5 tenets of strategic recognition also discussed in our book, giving the opportunity to all to participate not only reinforces the needed behaviors and values across your entire workforce, but makes it possible to measure the understanding and demonstration of those values by employee, division, region and company as a whole.

“Look to technology to facilitate program administration and tracking.”

Doing any of this strategically – especially on a global scale – is far beyond the capabilities of an Excel spreadsheet. Take advantage of our Global Strategic Recognition solution to eliminate the administrative overhead, hassle and risk associated with old-school tactical approaches to recognition and reward.

“Measure the effectiveness and impact of your reward and recognition programs.”

Without a strong technology solution, it’s impossible to measure results. Our real-time In*telligence reports let you customize dashboards and reporting elements to deliver the status updates and success metrics your executives demand.

I encourage you to download the full report. Tell me, what other best practices would you highlight for recognition and reward programs?

Five Steps to Change Your Company Culture

2011-04-14T04:55:00.003-04:00

Recognize This! – Behaviors drive values drive culture. You cannot change the culture unless you address the underlying behaviors.

As the employee engagement discussion has grown, so has the discussion about the importance of company culture. After all, what is it you’re hoping employees engage with? As the importance of culture has surged, so has the resurgence of Edgar H. Shein (recently profiled in a Q&A in Strategy+Business).

For example, Schein explains the why well-intentioned efforts at culture change fail:

“They think that to change culture, you simply introduce a new culture and tell people to follow it. That will never work. Instead, you have to conduct a business analysis around whatever is triggering your perceived need to change the culture. You solve that business problem by introducing new behaviors. Once you’ve solved your business problems this way, people will say to themselves, “Hey, this new way of doing things, which originally we were coerced to do, seems to be working better, so it must be right.”

Using that as a starting point, here are five steps to changing your culture.

1) Do the business analysis to identify the culture you need to succeed – Is that culture innovative (Apple) or iterative? Low-cost (Wal*mart) or high-end (Lord & Taylor’s)? This is a critical definition as it will guide all future decisions.

2) List the values you believe are inherent in such a culture – If you want an innovative culture, you would likely include values such as “questioning."

3) Define the behaviors underlying each of those values – Under the value of “questioning,” you might include behaviors like “looks for a better way to do things,” “offers critical feedback in a desire to improve,” and “accepts feedback willingly.”

4) Communicate those behaviors to employees so they are understood in their daily work – Unless you communicate the behaviors underlying the values to the employees, they won’t understand what it is you need them to do.

5) Positively reinforce demonstration of those behaviors with frequent recognition – Such reinforcement, given to anyone at any level who demonstrates the needed behaviors in line with the values, ensures employees will repeat them, creating a continuous circle.

Or, as Schein explains it:

"One electric utility company I studied, Alpha Power — I can’t reveal its real name — was under pressure from regulators to improve its environmental record. Management told employees, 'Every oil spill on every sidewalk must be reported immediately and cleaned up.' A lot of electrical workers said, 'That's not me. I’m not a janitor. I splice big, heavy cables.' Alpha responded that this was an order, not an option, and that workers would be trained in cleaning up spills safely.

"Some electrical workers quit, but most were retrained. After about five years, the workers were asked, 'How do you feel about Alpha’s environmental policies?' They answered, 'It's the right thing to do. We should be cleaning up the environment.' That wasn’t what they’d said five years earlier. But once they embraced the behavior, the values caught up."

Change the behaviors, change the values, change the culture. Do you agree?

Company Values Are Vital to Culture * Whether You Follow Them or Not

2011-04-13T04:43:00.005-04:00

Recognize This! – Employees will follow your lead on what you truly value based on what you recognize and reward.

Frequent readers of my blog know how I feel about company values and their influence on the culture of the organization. Ann Rhoades, president of PeopleInk and a founding executive of JetBlue (whose values are a topic of praise and a mini case study in our book Winning with a Culture of Recognition) wrote an entire book on the topic: Built on Values: Creating an Enviable Culture that Outperforms the Competition. She gave some highlights in a recent Smartblog post, saying:

“Just by looking at the behavior of leaders, you can tell what the values of a company really are. And all too often, those lived values bear almost no resemblance to the stated values — those lofty statements painted on the walls or sanctified in a mission statement. … Your values will be perceived as hollow and meaningless unless you base compensation and rewards on expressions of the behaviors that go along with the values.”

I couldn’t agree more. Regardless of the STATED values, it’s the TOLERATED values around which the culture is formed. Making the stated values and the tolerated values one and the same is possible through strategic employee recognition – structuring your recognition and rewards program such that:

1) Every recognition given is linked tightly (and with a detailed message about how and why) to a company value demonstrated. -- "Ann, great job on the MacGuffin project. The way you rallied everyone from multiple parts of the organization to pull together a comprehensive, detailed response embodies what we mean by 'Teamwork.' I'm sure your efforts will be the linchpin to our winning this business."

2) Such recognition is given frequently -- It doesn't do Ann any good to be reminded of her achievement a year later in her performance review or at the annual banquet if she barely remembers the MacGuffin project. If your goal is to encourage frequent repetition of such actions -- make it memorable in the moment!

3) Such recognition is given to 80-90% of employees, not just the top 10% of elite -- Far more than your top 10% are working hard every day to deliver the results you need. You must encourage all of them to repeat the actions and behaviors you've defined as necessary for success. In fact, research shows focusing on the top 20% is “a corrosive approach that discourages cooperation and initiative.” (Workspan magazine, December 2010, membership required)

In my organization, the values with more power and influence are the:

Tell me about your company culture. Do the company values as stated mean anything?

Can Saying “Thank You” Change Your Life?

2011-04-12T04:35:00.003-04:00

Recognize This! – The power of “thank you” can dramatically change your workplace, too.

John Kralik certainly thinks so. After watching everything in his life, personally and professionally go from bad to worse (and complaining about it all the way), John tried the opposite approach – looking for something to be grateful and writing a thank you note every day of the year. After 365 notes, John took stock, finding:

"When you appreciate something, it comes again. If I was thankful for clients paying their bills, they seemed to pay faster. If I was thankful for cases, they seemed to come more."

There is power in positivity in the workplace, too. Scientists have run the studies for us, proving that receiving a simple thank you increased the likelihood of a person’s willingness to help again in the future by 100%. A different study by McKinsey reported 67% say praise or recognition from a direct manager is an effective or extremely effective workplace motivator.

How do you implement this idea of saying “thank you” in the workplace? It’s easier than you think if you just give people the mechanism (employee recognition) to do so, the guidance on why, and the example (from the highest levels on down) of others doing the same.

Jonathon Hogg of PA Consulting discussed this in a Financial Times article earlier this year:

“Companies can also explore ways of developing systems to recognise the efforts of individual employees. These are mechanisms that show people how their work contributes to the organisation’s achievements, and to encourage them to appreciate the efforts of colleagues. Nine months after security software provider Symantec [watch Symantec tell their own story] launched its global programme, called Applause, employee engagement scores rose by 16 per cent.”

Do you believe in the power of positivity – that saying “thank you” can change your life? Tell me a story of a time when hearing or saying “thanks” really impacted you.

Signs Employees Are Ready to Walk and What You Can Do to Retain Them

2011-04-11T04:20:00.004-04:00

Recognize This! – Employees are regaining control of their value in the workplace.

Where does employee retention fall in your priorities for 2011 list? Too many are still complacent, believing the poor job market will keep workers in place. But hiring is steadily ticking up and unemployment steadily falling.

How at risk are you? According to MetLife’s Ninth Annual Study of Employee Benefit Trends:
• 1 in 3 employees are a flight risk
• Employee loyalty at a three year low, dropping 11 percentage points (after a steady decline)
• Employee satisfaction is also dropping at a rate of 8 percentage points over the last three years

Since employers also admit being less focused on employee satisfaction and work-life balance at the same time they’re report dramatic productivity gains is it any wonder employees are less loyal to the companies trying to wring blood from a stone?

Forbes reported a much worse scenario of 74% of workers would consider leaving if offered another job. What will you do when those top performers do choose to leave for a better environment? Towers Watson tells us 52% of US employers say it’s difficult to attract “critical skill” employees and 25% say it’s hard to retain top performers.

Signs employees are ready to walk:

1) You no longer value employees. Have you stopped recognizing and appreciating your employees for the good work they do? Our Employee Mood Tracker found 78% say being recognized for their efforts motivated them in their job. Simply saying “thanks!” has a powerful effect. Towers Watson research found “reward policy and practice is the number one driver of intent to stay.”

2) You haven’t communicated change. Yes, change is inevitable. And usually employees will be on board with it — if you tell them what you need them to do, not just the esoteric “change.”

3) You’re ignoring employee well being and engagement, even as the economic environment improves. What does this mean? When I feel valued – when I believe my contributions are helpful to my team members, my customers, my company – I perform at my peak. But only 10% of employees feel like they’re vital company assets. Employee engagement is another key indicator of intent to stay. If people are engaged with their work and the culture of your company (their working environment), they will not easily leave.

Where does your company lie in this picture? Ready to make good on the “employment promise” to do right by employees or still living in the recession mindset of “employees are just grateful to have a job?”

Top 5 Critical HR Priorities: #5 Performance, Planning, HR Effectiveness

2011-04-08T03:11:00.006-04:00

Recognize This! – HR priorities are many. Solving one can be the solution to many others.

Concluding my week-long series on the Top 5 Critical HR Priorities for 2011 from the Corporate Leadership Council HR global agenda poll, is a tie!

Priority 5 for HR in 2011: A Tie! -- Improving Employee Performance, Workforce Planning, Improving Strategic Effectiveness of HR

Improving Employee Performance has a lot to do with management of the company culture itself. Two research studies on this topic seem to contradict each other. The first argues changing culture is hard because it’s “sacred.” If you break culture down into climate, and then into habits, change becomes easier because are more willing to change habits. Based on brain science, the second study argues habits are, in fact, hard to change because doing so is actually painful, requiring a conscious override of “deeply comfortable neuronal circuitry. But (and this is a critical point I think the first researcher would also agree with):

“Therefore, to engender change among people in an organization, it’s important to keep attention focused on the desired end state, not on avoiding problems. This goal-directed positive reinforcement must take place over and over. The most effective way to achieve this is to set up practices and processes that make it easy for people to do the right thing until it becomes not only second nature, but an ethic taken to heart (and to the brain) by the entire company.”

Managing goals has just as much to do with improving employee performance. An HBR blog pointed out:

“For goals to be meaningful and effective in motivating employees, they must be tied to larger organizational ambitions. … No matter what level the employee is at, he should be able to articulate exactly how his efforts feed into the broader company strategy.”

Articulating goals and strategy and appropriately recognizing those who achieve the goals is all well and good for improving employee performance, but that requires retaining key employees, which is likely why Workforce Planning is of equal concern to HR pros. The Corporate Leadership Council says 27% of high potential employees plus another 20% of non-high potentials are actively planning to leave their jobs in the next six months. An Accenture survey found 30% were ready to switch employers. More concerning is results from an American Psychological Association survey showing just over half of employees feel valued on the job. This doesn’t necessarily mean they want higher pay. Only 43% said they receive adequate recognition for their contributions at work.

Solving this last challenge would help dramatically in Improving the Strategic Effectiveness of the HR. As discussed in my Monday post, CEOs don’t see the performance and ROI benefit of employee engagement and employee recognition. The two are closely linked. My CEO, Eric Mosley, explained this well in an article in last month’s Chief Executive magazine:

“If recognition is implemented in a strategic way, it gives senior management a new window into the health of the organization. Acting as a barometer for engagement and employee performance, companies can monitor how often recognition occurs as well as in which divisions, geographies and teams. ... The link between prolonged neglect of consistent recognition and deteriorating company health is not always realized -- the focus is on productivity rather than on what LEADS to productivity (i.e., happy, fulfilled employees who are fully engaged in their work).”

Can you prove the value of what you do to bottom-line?

What is your top priority for 2011:

Prior posts on 2011 Top HR Priorities
Priority 1: Improving Senior Leader Capabilities at Managing the Workforce
Priority 2: Improving Manager Capabilities at Managing Their Direct Reports
Priority 3: Engaging Employees
Priority 4: Managing Organizational Change

Top 5 Critical HR Priorities: #4 Managing Organizational Change

2011-04-07T03:20:00.008-04:00

Recognize This! – Values + Strategy + Recognition = Effective Communication of Change Needs

My fourth post in a series about the Top 5 Critical HR Priorities for 2011 from the Corporate Leadership Council HR global agenda poll, continues to bring together the learnings from Priority 1, Priority 2 and Priority 3.

Priority 4 for HR in 2011: Managing Organizational Change

It’s not surprising this is a hot topic in today’s economic environment. I’ve written before about the impact of the recession (and the resulting changes in company strategy and objectives) on employee understanding of those changed objectives and what that means in their daily work. Recent research from Booz & Co. reported “56% of executives say ensuring day-to-day decisions are in line with strategy is a significant challenge.”

Getting this right is now more crucial than ever. Numerous indicators point to an improving economy and job market. Employees have more options for employment. Customer budgets are opening up. What are you doing to effectively and appropriately redirect employee energy to those projects and strategic targets you need them to hit? How are you ensuring this message is carried accurately to all global locations so no employees feel like outcasts?

Employees are more than willing to work on these priorities – if they know what they are. Commenting on results from research conducted with Gagen MacDonald, an APCO Worldwide senior executive commented:

"The large gap between employee and employer connection we've seen in the last two years is alarming. It's clear from the survey results that to close this gap, CEOs and their executive teams need to have clearly defined company values aligned with their business strategy and support … and regularly communicate those values personally."

There’s no better way to do this than through strategic employee recognition in which employees are frequently recognized every time they perform in such a way that demonstrates a company value while contributing to achieving a strategic objective. This deeply ingrains in employees – in the most positive way – what it is the company needs from them to succeed.

But also never forget the power of the trend setters in your organization. Who do you think sets fashion trends? Designers? Celebrities? Wrong. It’s Pantone – the color company.

You’d likely be surprised at who the true trend setters are in your organization – the behind-the-scenes leaders others look to for how to behave, respond and perform. You can easily uncover these trend setters by strategic application of social recognition – drawing on the wisdom of crowds within your organization to find those most recognized and most appreciated. Those are the people who will carry your torch of change most effectively throughout the organization.

Are you experiencing organizational change? Has your company, team or product line shifted direction? Do you know what you should be doing now in support of change? How is that communicated?

Prior posts on 2011 Top HR Priorities
Priority 1: Improving Senior Leader Capabilities at Managing the Workforce
Priority 2: Improving Manager Capabilities at Managing Their Direct Reports
Priority 3: Engaging Employees

Top 5 Critical HR Priorities: #3 Engaging Employees

2011-04-06T03:58:00.016-04:00

Recognize This! – Don’t trust “fixed grin” employee engagement scores as an accurate representation of how employees really feel.

In this third in a series of posts about the Top 5 Critical HR Priorities for 2011 from the Corporate Leadership Council HR global agenda poll, Priority 1 and Priority 2 drive Priority 3.

Priority 3 for HR in 2011: Engaging Employees

I can’t seem to read my email in any given day without seeing another employee engagement research report, each riddled with stats. Here’s just a sampling from the last couple of months:

* 45% said improving employee engagement is a top challenge, and 70% expect that challenge to intensify. (UNUM)
* Employees’ levels of engagement are much lower than they were pre-recession, with levels of commitment to the organisation dropping by 17 percentage points since 2006. (Mercer)
* More than half of CEOs are not engaged in engagement, 22% do not understand it, 19% don’t see the business benefits, and 15% are aware of the concept but not ROI from it. (HR Magazine)
* 69% of Canadian companies consider low employee engagement a major issue in their organization. (Poll)

Or what about these stats telling the reverse story:
* 2010 stats show an increase in overall engagement of 8% from 2008 levels and 12% from 2009 (DecisionWise)
* Employee engagement levels remained steady in 2008 and 2009 (Gallup)
* Some HR leaders faced an unexpected challenge when employee engagement scores came in for 2010: Engagement data wasn’t low enough! (TLNT)

What’s going on here? With the latter set of stats, it’s clear employees are putting on a “fixed grin” and surveys certainly don’t tell the entire engagement story.

What can be done about it? The Canadian research points out that the employees aren’t necessarily lacking in motivation, but managers (direct and senior leaders) aren’t creating conditions that engage employees. In that poll, 58% said managers at all levels need to give more praise and employee recognition. CIPD agrees with research citing feedback, praise and recognition as one of the most mentioned management competencies for supporting employee engagement.

Why should you care? One survey of hospital staff found that facilities with higher employee engagement also had much higher handwashing compliance. So what? Think about it in a hospital environment. More handwashing means less transference of germs between patients, which means potentially fewer incidences of hospital-acquired patient illness and even death. That’s a good reason to focus on increasing engagement to me!

Prior posts on 2011 Top HR Priorities
Priority 1: Improving Senior Leader Capabilities at Managing the Workforce
Priority 2: Improving Manager Capabilities at Managing Their Direct Reports

Critical HR Priorities: #2 Improving Manager Capabilities

2011-04-05T08:49:00.001-04:00

Recognize This! – Line managers must improve ability to respect, trust and care for their employees, too.

Continuing our look at the Top 5 Critical HR Priorities for 2011 from the Corporate Leadership Council HR global agenda poll, the requirements for achieving priority 2 are quite similar to priority 1.

Priority 2 for HR in 2011: Improving Manager Capabilities at Managing Their Direct Reports

Just as senior leaders must demonstrate respect, trust and caring for the workforce they manage, so too must line managers show the same for their direct reports. But now it becomes much more personal.

RESPECT
Line managers must be careful to remember that respect is a two-way street. If they want the respect of their direct reports, then managers must show respect for their direct reports as well. Dan McCarthy points out, “Respect is not something you only give away when it may serve your needs." The same is true of employee recognition. You don’t show your appreciation for your employee efforts only when those efforts directly work to your advantage. You should also be liberal with your thanks when your direct reports may have performed well in helping another manager, team or department.

TRUST
Trust is often more easily gained by direct managers than senior leaders who are more removed from employees. But as with respect, trust is a two-way street. As Bret Simmons says, “You have to earn it by the way you behave toward them. Your people need to believe that you are competent and that you care.”

CARE
One way to demonstrate to employees you care about them is by taking the time to talk with them, to clearly communicate what you need them to do, praise them when they’re doing it well, and offer constructive feedback when they need improvement. Harvard Business School research showed employees overwhelmingly prefer a manager who is likeable to a person is very skilled but terrible at communicating.

Oft-reported Google research into their own employees (in an effort to “build a better boss) found:

“What employees valued most were even-keeled bosses who made time for one-on-one meetings, who helped people puzzle through problems by asking questions, not dictating answers, and who took an interest in employees’ lives and careers.”

What does that tell me? Employees want bosses to be present, patient and honestly interested in the people they manage. How do you or your managers stack up? Take my quick poll:

My direct manager demonstrates respect, trust and caring:

My direct reports would say I demonstrate respect, trust and caring:

Prior posts on 2011 Top HR Priorities
Priority 1: Improving Senior Leader Capabilities at Managing the Workforce

Top 5 Critical HR Priorities: #1 Improving Senior Leader Capabilities

2011-04-04T08:39:00.000-04:00

Recognize This! – Senior leaders need to improve respect for employees, trustworthiness, and caring to better manage the workforce.

The Corporate Executive Board recently shared with us the Top 5 Critical HR Priorities for 2011 from their Corporate Leadership Council HR global agenda poll. Each day this week, I’ll address one priority.

Priority 1 for HR in 2011: Improving Senior Leader Capabilities at Managing the Workforce

Senior leaders constantly juggle innumerable priorities, each often requiring a different capability. Which should HR focus on to help senior leaders improve? I suggest senior leaders can’t hope to manage effectively unless they have the respect and trust of their teams. Their employees must also know the senior leader cares about them as people, not just “human capital.”

RESPECT
Paul Marciano, author of Carrots and Sticks Don’t Work, recently offered seven “critical” ways managers show respect for employees. His way was employee recognition: “Thanking employees and acknowledging their contributions on a daily basis.”

I don't know if Paul listed these in order of importance, but there is no denying that acknowledgment of ourselves, our work, and the value of our contributions goes a long way to telling us we are respected in the workplace. Paul’s last item was trust: “Demonstrating faith and belief in their employees’ skills, abilities, and decisions,” which leads in the next capability senior leaders need to manage the workforce.

TRUST
BlessingWhite’s CEO points out that without trust in leadership, employees question where they fit in the company. Towers Watson’s 2010 Global Workforce Study found “the most desired leadership characteristic is to be trustworthy, but only 47% of respondents agree that their leaders are, in fact, trustworthy.”

Why is this? Les Allan suggests on his Business Performance blog: “It can be more difficult to ascribe honorable motives to a ‘faceless’ leader.” To become more present to employees and “add a face,” senior leaders must show they care.

CARE
In his book The Thank You Economy, “King of Social Media” Gary Vaynerchuck, said:
“I care more about my employees than I do my customers, and I care more about my customers than I do breathing.”

Do you care more about your employees than you do breathing? Do your employees trust you? Do you have respect for them? If not, I can guarantee they do not respect you, trust you, or care about you and your success.

Stop Turning Rewards into an April Fools Prank

2011-04-01T03:17:00.002-04:00

Recognize This: Poorly structured recognition programs can be more damaging than no program at all.

Dan McCarthy, author of the Great Leadership blog and a person I respect, recently blogged “Without Integrity and Trust, Rewards and Recognition are Meaningless."

Dan points out that poor program design allows for participants to “game the system” and “do whatever it takes to gain the advantage and win at all costs.”

And the money quote from Dan: “Rewards and recognition are supposed to motivate, inspire, and not create cynicism and mistrust.”

That’s why we so strongly advocate strategic recognition programs in which the focus is on appreciation, not competition. Incentive programs, in which people compete against each other for a prize, can have their place, but far more prevalent in the culture should be an employee recognition program in which all employee are encouraged to notice and appreciate the good work of their colleagues.

The key to structuring recognition and rewards to avoid “gaming the system” lies in creating a common "language" of recognition that is understood by all employees, regardless of where in the world they may work, job duties, or level within the organization. That's why we recommend the company values (and demonstration of them in daily work) as reasons for recognition and reward -- then publicizing that (as appropriate) through internal social recognition mechanisms.

This helps all employees understand what it takes to be recognized -- especially if a detailed message is included describing precisely why the employee deserved recognition -- and prevents such gaming.

Have you participated in a recognition, rewards or incentive program in your workplace? What was your overall sense of the program? One that could be “gamed” to the advantage of the highly competitive? Or one that allowed all employees to demonstrate their excellent capabilities and achievement, for which they would be recognized?

Also, don’t forget to tweet your tips for employee appreciation and recognition using hash-tag #appreciationtip to be entered to win a copy of the Winning with a Culture of Recognition eBook or Amazon Kindle pre-loaded with the eBook.

Every Employee Owns Their Own Business

2011-03-31T03:05:00.004-04:00

Recognize This: No one owns “human capital” except the individual human.

Any entrepreneurs out there reading this blog? Any small business owners?

I would argue every employee reading this blog is a small business owner – you own your “human capital assets.” You make the decision every day whether you are bringing all of your talent, skills, efforts, creativity and desire to “do a good job” to the workplace.

However, for the vast majority of workers, we cannot rely on a “workforce of one.” We must work with and for other people to get the job done. Perhaps along the way we can have fun, too.

A couple of months ago Fortune magazine came out with their Best Companies to Work For list. While the list itself is interesting, I was more caught by how the Great Place to Work Institute, the non-profit that compiles list, defines a great place to work:

“A great place to work is one in which you trust the people you work for, have pride in what you do, and enjoy the people you work with.”

Since we all choose to bring ourselves to work every day, I think we can all choose the attitude we bring as well. I choose to trust those I work with, take pride in what I do, and enjoy the people I work with. It certainly colors my attitude every day. I like to think it makes it easier for those who work with me to feel the same.

Do you work in a “great place to work” – even if the company didn’t make the “official” list? Tell me the company and why it’s great!

If you can, join me for my last session at the complimentary IHR Rewards & Recognition virtual conference at 11:00 (Eastern) in which I'll be presenting The Future of Rewards and Recognition.

Fear or Excitement: Employee Attitude Closely Tied to Company Success

2011-03-30T03:36:00.004-04:00

Recognize This: Stamping out fear of failure will help your company flourish.

Richard Branson, serial entrepreneur, and head of Virgin Brands, attributes his success to the people on his team. There’s a reason he’s one of the world’s wealthiest people – entirely self-made. Perhaps we should listen to his advice:

“A successful business isn't the product or service it sells, its supply chain or its corporate culture: It is a group of people bound together by a common purpose and vision.”

What binds the “group of people” in your organization together? A mutual desire to continue getting a pay cheque and (for my American colleagues) health care? Or a mutual belief in the goals of the company and the value of that vision in the marketplace?

Casting the vision all can believe in and work hard to achieve is just the first step. How do you keep people bought in over the long-term? How do ensure people don’t lose sight of that vision? Again, from the master:

“Rather than focusing on mistakes, a leader needs to catch someone doing something right every day. If this culture of fostering employee development through praise and recognition starts at the top, it will go far toward stamping out the employee fear of failure that can stunt a business, particularly in its early days.”

Branson will be first to admit failures in his business ventures. But he will never lay the blame at the feet of his employees.

What’s the atmosphere where you work, especially as we finally begin to move out from under the lingering effects of the recession? Fearful of stepping out on a limb with a new idea or approach? Or excited to offer new ideas that might lead somewhere very intriguing?

There's still time to join me for the complimentary IHR Rewards & Recognition virtual conference and attend today's session at 12:30 (Eastern) in which I'll be presenting with Betsy Walker from Quintiles, a Globoforce customer, on The New R&R: Increasing Retention Using the Power of Recognition.

Why Focusing on Shareholder Value Is Wrong

2011-03-29T03:28:00.005-04:00

Recognize This: Shareholder value will never guarantee customer satisfaction or an increase in their purchasing behavior.

Is your company a slave to the quarterly analyst call? Are you focused, before all else, on increasing shareholder value as the best marker of company success?

Even Jack Welch has denounced this as a dumb idea. More voices continue to chime in, most recently Roger Martin, dean of the Roman School of Management at the University of Toronto, Canada, as quoted in TLNT:

“Concentrating primarily on creating shareholder wealth is ultimately a loser’s game. The reason: the only sure way to increase shareholder value is to raise the market’s expectations about the organization’s future results. Unfortunately, executives simply can’t do that indefinitely.… Talented executives can grow market share and sales, increase margins, and use capital more efficiently, but no matter how good they are, they can’t increase shareholder value if expectations get out of line with reality.”

Instead, Towers Watson (authors of the article) suggest:

“Instead of training her gaze directly on shareholder returns, a high performing executive leader should pay attention to the performance of employees and the linkage of employee performance with customer satisfaction and purchase behavior.”

If employees are focused on making customers happy such that they buy more, shareholder value is sure to increase. But there’s no guarantee with the reverse equation of shareholder value first, employees and customers a far-behind also-ran.

In fact, Gallup research found causation between employee engagement and financial success. Guess what? Working for a financially successful company does not necessarily make employees more engaged. But engaged employees do drive financial success.

One way to accomplish this is by including “customer satisfaction” as a reason for recognition in your strategic recognition and rewards program. Doing so reinforces for all employees the value the company places in focusing on the customer, and gives employees an opportunity to acknowledge each others’ efforts in making customers happy.

What does your company focus on at its key marker of success? Shareholder value? Customer satisfaction? Employee retention?

Also, don't forget to join me for the complimentary IHR Rewards & Recognition virtual conference tomorrow and Thursday, March 30-31, especially for my two sessions:

March 30, 12:30 (Eastern) - Presenting with Betsy Walker from Quintiles, a Globoforce customer, on The New R&R: Increasing Retention Using the Power of Recognition
March 31, 11:00 (Eastern) - Presenting The Future of Rewards and Recognition

How to Stop Talking AT Your Employees

2011-03-28T03:14:00.003-04:00

Recognize This: If you want employees to think like “owners,” give them a reason to care about the business like an owner would.

I’ve heard nearly every cliché under the sun for employee:

· Team member

· Partner

· Customer Success Enabler

· Owner (at an ESOP company)

What others have you heard? Why do I bring this up? Because too often such cliché attempts to “get employees to care more about the business” are undertaken as the solution. How ridiculous.

Judah Schiller, CEO of Saatchi and Saatchi, recently had this to say on Huffington Post:

“Many companies are still missing the boat when it comes to getting their people to show up at work with their hearts, minds and bodies present. Most employees view work only as a means to an end--a way for them to collect a paycheck and receive health benefits. Part of the problem is that companies consistently fail to make a strong connection between their own "big picture" and its relevance to their employees. They continue to talk at rather than with their workers, dictating what's good for them, rather than making an effort to understand their wants and needs.”

Yes, employees want to understand the big picture. But simply telling them the big picture doesn’t accomplish the goal. You have to make that big picture real in their everyday work. And you can’t do that through a slick communications program, online newsletter or Twitter campaign.

If you want to make your “big picture” matter to your employees in such a way that they are focused on helping you achieve it in their daily work, you need to make it real for them. The best way to do that is through strategic recognition in which you tell employees – frequently, honestly and specifically – how their individual efforts are helping the company succeed. Praise them when they get this right. Make it real in their daily work and connect that to how those efforts are contributing to achieving the company’s strategic objectives.

It takes a bit more effort than announcing all “employees” are now “team members,” but the results are far more effective – and you may have some fun along the way.

Free Recognition & Rewards Virtual Trade Show * March 30-31, 2011

2011-03-25T15:20:00.000-04:00

Do you wish you could attend more events that would contribute to your knowledge and efficacy as an HR professional, but budgets are too tight to allow for it?

Join me for the IHR Rewards & Recognition virtual conference March 30-31. The complimentary conference lets you attend live Virtual Workshop Sessions, which are eligible for HRCI re-certification credits and IHR credits. You’ll also be able to visit virtual exhibitor booths and network online with other HR professionals with the same questions and concerns you have employee recognition and rewards.

I'm excited to be presenting with Betsy Walker from Quintiles, a Globoforce customer on The New R&R: Increasing Retention Using the Power of Recognition on Wednesday, March 30, at 12:30 (Eastern).

Then I’ll be presenting again on The Future of Rewards and Recognition on Thursday, March 31, at 11:00 (Eastern).

You can register now for these sessions and any others you might find interesting. You can also learn more and visit the virtual trade show floor.

Attendees to our sessions will also receive a free excerpt from our book, Winning with a Culture of Recognition, the step-by-step guide to implementing a strategic recognition solution that is guaranteed to increase employee engagement by double digits in less than a year.

Pruning Your Culture Tree

2011-03-24T16:41:00.000-04:00

Recognize This: A little careful pruning and nurturing goes a long way in managing your company culture.

I'm thrilled to appear on the cover of the March/April 2011 issue of Engagement Strategies Magazine. In the Q&A-style article, "Authenticity, Tree-Pruning and the 'Wisdom of Crowds'," I explain the critical link between employee recognition, employee engagement and managing your company culture.

A couple of excerpts:

ESM: What you see as the link between recognition and engagement? Is a “culture of recognition” really necessary to create an engaging work environment?
Irvine: The link, as I see it, is that recognition is the fastest way to employee engagement. There are many different contributory factors, but I would contend that recognition is one of the fastest and most efficient in the overall armory of tools that people have available to boost employee engagement.

Click through to read the case study example I share of why this is true.

I also comment on the importance of proactively managing your culture:

Companies have to ask themselves: “Are we managing our culture, or is our culture managing us?” There’s a lot of debate out there as to whether culture is manageable or not. But I would say culture is a bit like a bonsai tree. It can be steadfast and strong, but it requires deliberate nurturing in order for it to grow in a particular way. If you aren’t careful about your tree, if you cut it the wrong way or neglect it; you can create a rather ugly looking tree – or culture.

Do you agree? Is culture something that can be directly managed, or only endured? Is recognition the fastest way to engagement?

Limiting Employee Recognition Only Limits Potential Improvement

2011-03-23T14:43:00.000-04:00

Recognize This: Putting limits on employee recognition only limits potential impact on employee engagement, productivity, performance and retention.

Adding to my thoughts on appreciation tips that have been tweeted to #appreciationtip (and keep those tips coming) is this one:

"As you sip your morning coffee, remember it's never too early to thank your employees."

I like this tip not for the obvious inference of "recognize early and often," but for the more subtle message of "even new hires can do extraordinary things."

A recognition policy I've never understood is "New hires must be on board 90-days (or some other arbitrary length of time) before they can participate in the appreciation or recognition program."

Why? Are they not likely to do something extraordinary during those months? Personally, I can think of countless examples of a new hire, with their fresh eyes and clear perspective, seeing a challenge or opportunity long-timers had struggled with and arriving at a simple, elegant solution. Should they not be recognized and appreciated for that, just because "they haven't been here long enough?"

What do you think? Are there any good reasons for a 90-day (or similar) moratorium on recognition for new hires?

Your Appreciation Tips: Regular Chats = Employee Appreciation

2011-03-22T14:47:00.000-04:00

Recognize This: Regular chats with employees are a form of appreciation.

For the last couple of weeks, I've been asking you to tweet your tips for employee appreciation to #appreciationtip. Doing so enters you to win an eBook copy of Winning with a Culture of Recognition or a Kindle preloaded with the eBook.

I've received some good tips. Keep them coming!

This tip came in from @Nancy_Carbone: Have regular casual talks w/employees. Chance 2 lrn abt pros, cons & achievements. It's motivating & shouldn't be annual.

Nancy is correct, indeed. When the primary interaction on goals, achievements, feedback and areas for improvement is an annual performance review, it's no wonder employees become disconnected from their managers and disengaged with their work.

Making time in your day and extending the effort to have regular, casual conversations with your employees is itself a powerful form of employee recognition and appreciation.

Is improving employee engagement on your to-do list? If you're a closed-door, heads-down kind of manager, opening yourself up to your employees frequently and regularly could be a powerful first step in improving relationships and, ultimately, engagement.

Virtual Book Club * Learn How to Bust More Employee Appreciation Myths

2011-03-21T10:49:00.000-04:00

I greatly enjoyed our Mythbusters: The Employee Appreciation Edition webinar with David Zinger, founder of the Employee Engagement Network, and Zane Safrit, author of Recognize Your Employees – 52 Weeks, 52 Ways.

The overall theme of the discussion during the webinar came down to the need for employers to pay attention to employee needs. David made the point about “caring made tangible” – the first priority is to notice and truly see what is going on with people around us.

Webinar participants shared their own myths as well, such as: “Certain cultures don’t appreciate recognition.” My bust to that myth is as simple as: “The only qualifying factor for the need for recognition is to be a member of the human race.” Our clients have proven the fallacy of this myth, which I’ve written about in “Overcoming Stereotypes,” my contribution to Chris Ferdinandi’s Do Amazing Things.

The idea of “tangible caring” is at the heart of employee appreciation and engagement. It’s far too easy to overlook the need to engage employees, but vast research on the positive financial and personal boost from recognition proves how critical making the effort is today and in the years ahead. Just one statistic we mentioned in the webinar is that 78% of employees say recognition motivates them in their job.

This boost in motivation is as simple as: “I notice you and your good work. Thank you for it.” What’s our excuse to not give that recognition – every day, to the vast majority of employees?

If you weren’t able to join us, watch the webinar now, then tweet your own tips for employee appreciation and recognition using hash-tag #appreciationtip. If you do, you’ll be entered to be entered to win a copy of the Winning with a Culture of Recognition eBook or Amazon Kindle pre-loaded with the eBook.

Be sure to get your copy of Winning with a Culture of Recognition and then join us for our upcoming Virtual Book Club discussion. We’re planning the virtual book club for early next month. I’ll be sharing more details on how you can participate in the book club as we get closer. I look forward to diving into the book and your thoughts together.

GenY Grows Up * How They Will Manage the Workplace

2011-03-18T03:11:00.000-04:00

Recognize This: The “young ones” soon become the leaders. GenY will forever change management – for the better.

GenY and their needs in the marketplace is frequently a topic for bloggers.Usually, the attitude is one of annoyance about GenY’s need for constant praise, recognition and rewards, or their preference for team-oriented work.

But always remember – GenY, like every generation before them – will grow up. That doesn’t mean, however, their work preferences will change. It’s far more likely GenY will forever influence the way work (at least until the next generation comes along).

James Kerr in a recent post on Management Issues put it this way:

“Today's organizational designs will likely be deemed obsolete. Millennials will demand a shift away from ‘command and control’ reporting lines to more cooperative-based leadership models that provide greater autonomy and freedom of choice in the way work is performed. …

“Clearly, a greater degree of emotional intelligence will be required by senior leaders so that they can proactively guide organizational transformation while continuing to grow and evolve successful enterprises.”

Are you ready for a “cooperative” work style? How does your team function today? What would be your preferred style – either in an individual contributor role as a manager? Do you see these changes happening already?

Performance Appraisal Games on Compensation Café

2011-03-17T03:57:00.006-04:00

Recognize This: Performance appraisal/salary increase games make everyone losers.

I blog regularly on Compensation Café. Last month, my posts dealt with the games we play with performance appraisals and salary increases.

In my first post, I outline three of the most common games and their hallmarks.

Game 1: Relying on the Appraisal as the Primary Means of Feedback

Game 2: Ranking Performance

Game 3: Differentiating based on Pay Increases

In my follow-up post, I discussed that although many have advocated just dropping the performance appraisal, in reality these have become so embedded in the people process, removing the annual review entirely is simply not feasible or desirable in most organizations.

The answer to “what should we do instead?” lies in solving the inherent problems with the games we play in the first place:

1)    A general dearth of feedback in the workplace today
2)    A company culture that tolerates head-in-the-sand management
3)    Reliance on too few tools for accurate performance assessment.

Hop over to the Café and read the full posts, then come back and tell me, have you ever played one of these games (unwittingly or otherwise)? What other games do you see being played with employees? How else would you recommend solving the problems we play with performance assessment? What other ways of assessing performance more accurately, fairly and frequently would you recommend?

Differentiating Employees: Why Not Let Them Do It Themselves?

2011-03-16T03:49:00.003-04:00

Recognize This: No one knows the contributions and achievements of an employee as well as everyone does.

In Monday’s post, I discussed the problem of differentiation creep in the workforce – how the percentage of exceptional employees is increasing as the percentage of poor performers is decreasing.

What’s the solution to the problem? The Workspan article (“Measuring Employee Performance the Right Way,” January 2011. Membership required.) gets close:

“People need to know how they are doing, and individual performance feedback should come as soon as possible on a direct basis when employees achieve, or fail to achieve, their objectives – project completion, outstanding service, missed targets, goal achievements and so on.”

I agree with that statement 100% -- but it doesn’t go far enough. If you truly want to differentiate employees, let them do it themselves. Let all employees recognize excellent behaviors, actions and results demonstrated or achieved by their colleagues. Require specifics on what was done and why it was important. Now you have a much more complete picture of employee achievement throughout the year – from the wisdom of crowds.

What are your solutions for differentiation creep?

LAST CHANCE * Appreciation Myth Busters Webinar TODAY

2011-03-15T03:35:00.003-04:00

This is your last chance to register for today’s Appreciation Myth Busters webinar (Eastern Time).

Join David Zinger, employee engagement expert and founder of the Employee Engagement Network, Zane Safrit, author of Recognize Your Employees - 52 Weeks, 52 Ways, and me as we:

· Bust the 10 most common myths about employee appreciation and recognition in the workplace today

· Share proven strategies for addressing low levels of appreciation

· Ask webinar participants to share their own appreciation myths as well as challenge our panel of experts on how to eradicate these myths from the workplace.

Be sure to register for the free webinar today, and share your appreciation myths (and myth busters) in comments.

And keep tweeting your tips for employee appreciation and recognition using hash-tag #appreciationtip to be entered to win a copy of the Winning with a Culture of Recognition eBook or Amazon Kindle pre-loaded with the eBook.

Differentiation Creep

2011-03-14T03:13:00.004-04:00

Recognize This: No one wants to be “the bad guy” in performance reviews and differentiation.

Ever since “Neutron Jack” Welch popularized the “differentiation” approach to performance management in which employees have been segregated by their managers into performance levels of top 10%, middle 80%, and bottom 10%, people managers and HR pros responsible for them have tried to make differentiation work.

The problem for managers is trying to (somewhat) arbitrarily lump employees into these categories in a once-a-year effort to remember an entire 12 months’ worth of performance and achievements. The problem for employees is average and low performers don’t realize their performance is not exceptional.

The result? Differentiation creep. Workspan magazine (“Measuring Employee Performance the Right Way,” January 2011. Membership required.) recently published research showing:

“While high performers are increasing in relative numbers by leaps and bounds, there is also a depletion in the population of low performers.”

Why is this happening? Two reasons:

1) Managers don’t want to make the hard choices of who appears in the bottom 10%, or they’ve truly hired well and none of their employees are poor performers.

2) Managers lack enough insight into employee contributions to make correct differentiation decisions.

Are you seeing differentiation creep in your workplace? Before I share solutions on Wednesday, how do you solve differentiation creep?

Kindness or Meanness * Which Is the Better Management Tactic?

2011-03-11T03:30:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

An American colleague of mine used this phrase recently. It came to mind when I happened to read these two article on kindness and meanness in the workplace. While I certainly don’t think of employees as flies, the truth of the aphorism still resonates.

Writing in the New York Times, Bob Sutton, author of Good Boss, Bad Boss, said:

“Widespread meanness not only damages people; it also increases costs and undermines performance by driving out good employees at alarming rates. Numerous studies have also shown that people respond to demeaning and disrespectful bosses and co-workers by calling in sick more often, making fewer suggestions, working less hard and doing lower-quality work.”

Quite true. Management by intimidation must end. The evidence is clear that mean management styles, even just by ignoring employees, does no good and great damage.

In counterpoint to meanness is Davia Temin, CEO of Temin and Co., writing in Forbes about kindness:

“I am here to tell you that it need not be so! I firmly believe that kindness can still infuse winning, tough-minded, smart, highly competitive and driven organizations. In fact, it can fuel them, and make them even better-functioning, even more outstanding. And it can make those extreme hours we spend in the office that much more pleasant, even fulfilling.”

I know which environment I’d rather work in, and indeed, do work in today. What about you? Is your day more filled with meanness or kindness?

REMINDER * Appreciation Myth Busters Webinar * March 15

2011-03-10T03:32:00.002-05:00

Don’t forget to register for our Appreciation Myth Busters webinar Tuesday, March 15, at 11:30 (Eastern Time).

David Zinger, employee engagement expert and founder of the Employee Engagement Network, Zane Safrit, author of Recognize Your Employees - 52 Weeks, 52 Ways, and I will be:

· Busting the 10 most common myths about employee appreciation and recognition in the workplace today

· Sharing proven strategies for addressing low levels of appreciation

· Asking webinar participants to share their own appreciation myths as well as challenge our panel of experts on how to eradicate these myths from the workplace.

Be sure to register for the free webinar today, and share your appreciation myths (and myth busters) in comments.

Observations from the 2011 HCI Human Capital Summit

2011-03-09T04:08:00.001-05:00

Recognize This: Can recognition help build a great culture? Dan Pink & Facebook think so!

I’m at the HCI Human Capital Summit this week in Atlanta and have been really taken by two presentations. First, Dan Pink, whom I love for his passionate exploration into the new truth about what motivates us at work. He once again set down his manifesto of what’s required for a win-win relationship between corporation and employee. Dan’s agenda of Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose is set to create better performance and personal satisfaction in equal measure. He tells how “now that” instead of “if then” rewards and feedback plays a vital role in this, helping to create the culture that sustains these core motivators.

Without any formal overlap, I earlier saw a presentation from Stuart Crabb, Director of Learning and Development at Facebook, and couldn’t help but think about how all of the HR strategies he described where so aligned with Dan’s mantra. He spoke about freedom to choose work, a strengths-based HR philosophy, and of course lots of passion! A real eye opener about Stuart’s presentation was research he shared about how Facebook finds that their high proportion of GEN X and Y workforce. These groups are in need of constant praise and constant feedback, with GEN Y having a particular preference for co-worker recognition. This is such the case at Facebook that they have actually abolished the annual appraisal and instead rely on a constant feedback and a constant “Thanks” recognition mechanism.

Not to mix the presenter’s words too much, but it seems like Facebook has really have figured out that constantly recognizing and feeding back on mastery, purpose and autonomy creates a company culture that feeds our true motivators.

Appreciation Myth Busters Webinar * March 15

2011-03-08T03:29:00.006-05:00

“A paycheck is thanks enough.” “An annual performance appraisal is suitable feedback.” “Incentives are the best means of motivating all employees.”

Are you as sick of these employee appreciation myths as I am? Join me

and industry experts David Zinger and Zane Safrit for a webinar on Tuesday, March 15, at 11:30 (Eastern Time), as we bust the 10 most common myths in the workplace today about employee appreciation and recognition.

David, employee engagement expert and founder of the Employee Engagement Network, Zane, author of Recognize Your Employees - 52 Weeks, 52 Ways, and I will also reveal the techniques that truly work. We’ll be looking to webinar participants to share their own appreciation myths as well as challenge our panel of experts on how to eradicate these myths from the workplace.

We’ll also share proven strategies for addressing low levels of appreciation, including strategic recognition and effective engagement principles. Get this right and you’ll see the measurable benefits directly to your bottom line.

Everyday Appreciation Giveaway * Submit Your Tips to Win!

2011-03-07T03:20:00.003-05:00

I’m thrilled that the eBook version of Winning with a Culture of Recognition has arrived! You can get your digital version of the guide to strategic recognition, the fastest and most effective way to improve employee engagement, performance, motivation, and productivity, at more than 60 web properties and digital readers, including the Apple^®iBookstore, Amazon^® Kindle^®, Barnes and Noble^®, and the Sony^® eBookstore^®.

But for my blog readers and Twitter followers, I’m also offering a chance to win a copy of the eBook or our weekly prize of an Amazon Kindle pre-loaded with our eBook.

Daily Appreciation Tips: Every business day through April 8, 2011, I, or a Globoforce team member, will share a proven tip for engaging or recognizing employees. Tips will be marked #appreciationtip on Twitter.

Help me out with tips and be entered to win. Tweet your own employee appreciation tips or retweet mine, being sure to include the #appreciationtip hash-tag. Daily winners will be randomly drawn from all tip submissions. Each week we will draw one winner to receive an Amazon Kindle, preloaded with Winning with a Culture of Recognition.

I’m looking forward to learning from you. I plan on blogging about the best tips I receive, too, with full credit given to the originator. Tweet your tip today!

NOTE: Full contest rules are available.

Employee Appreciation Day Should Be a Reminder Only

2011-03-04T03:03:00.005-05:00

Recognize This: Claiming today as the only day to appreciate employees is just silly.

Today is officially Employee Appreciation Day. What does that mean to you? Because the calendar told you that you should, will you take a moment today to actually appreciate your employees? Or is the day just a continuation your daily efforts to show your employees how valued and valuable they are to your organization?

I argue Employee Appreciation Day should be treated like Mother’s Day. Sure, on Mother’s Day Mom may get some well deserved extra attention and appreciation, maybe “breakfast” in bed made and served by her kids. But is that they only day mothers should be celebrated and appreciated for all they do?

Of course not! When your mom gave you a ride to an extracurricular school event or friend’s party that she didn’t have to, did you thank her? Of course you did! I’m sure you can think of countless other ways your mom deserved your thanks every day.

The same is true for our employees. Today should be nothing more than a reminder that we should appreciate our employees and their efforts every day – perhaps put a bit of extra effort into our appreciation today.

What are you doing to appreciate your employees today? Or how have you been shown appreciation? Tell me your stories – the good, the bad and the ugly.

Help Employees Align & Connect to Increase Employee Engagement * Lessons from BlessingWhite

2011-03-03T10:04:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: People need a sense of connection and contribution to truly engage in your organization.

I was honored to host a webinar through Human Capital Institute (HCI) with BlessingWhite’s employee engagement practice leader, Mary Ann Masarech, yesterday. She gave color to the findings of their 2011 Employee Engagement Report.

Key take-aways from the webinar:

· In every region of the world, more employees planned to leave in the next 12 months, with the percentage saying “no way would I remain” doubling (from 2008 to 2010). Globally, only 30% are fully engaged. 17% are disengaged. Australia/New Zealand and India have the highest engagement numbers; China has the lowest.

· Employee engagement occurs when employees are making the maximum contribution while enjoying the maximum level of satisfaction. Engaged employees are using their talents to make a difference in the bottom-line.

· Older employees and those higher up the ranks are more engaged. Mary Ann believes this to be because those in the upper ranks or who have been around longer feel they have more control over their work experience and greater insight into company strategy than those who are younger and at lower levels.

· Employees closest to customer contact are most engaged. – Sales, HR/Training and Marketing. Least engaged are IT, R&D and Finance.

What does this tell me? People need a sense of connection and contribution – insight into the company strategy, connection to the customers who see the end result of efforts, and the knowledge that their efforts matter.

Mary Ann said in the webinar:

“I’ve heard Derek speak about recognizing and rewarding people for what you actually want them to do to drive your strategy. We found that the disengaged and the hamsters/honeymooners [those who are working hard, but not necessarily contributing well] were most in need of alignment. They need greater clarity about what they need to do, when and how to make the company successful. They are disconnected. You need to make sure all of your business process focus on that clarity piece.”

Register for one of the recast sessions on HCI to learn more about:

1) What you should not do to increase engagement

2) What does work to increase engagement

3) The responsibilities of executives, managers and individuals for engagement

“What, Exactly, Do You Want Me to Do?” Factors of Change

2011-03-02T03:58:00.001-05:00

Recognize This: Employees may buy into the need for “change,” but they won’t know how unless you tell them in a way meaningful to them individually.

Steve Roesler, author of the excellent All Things Workplace blog, recently wrote on change management.

He told the story of the company president who laid out the perfect story for why a change in the corporate culture was necessary, getting discussion and total buy-in along the way. Everyone was on board. Then a manager asked: “I just need to know one thing: what, exactly, do you want me to do?”

That’s the crux of change management challenges, isn’t it? People may agree the proposed change is good and the right thing to do, but if they don’t know how to contribute to that making that change happen, you’re not going to get anywhere.

The same is true here. “What, exactly, do you want me to do?” Getting people to agree to the *VALUE* of a proposed change is not the difficult part. Helping them implement the many big and little steps to make that change a reality -- now that's a challenge. Clearly telling people is certainly the first step. But then positively recognizing people and reinforcing those behaviors, efforts or outcomes is critical to making the change real for every employee.

Like I said last month: Seek out behaviors you desire as foundational to your culture. Praise the people demonstrating those behaviors. Repeat. Often.

How successful have change initiatives been in your company? Did you understand exactly what you needed to do to bring about the desired change?

Webinar TOMORROW with Blessing White on 2011 Employee Engagement Report Results

2011-03-01T03:54:00.003-05:00

Don't forget to join the webinar I'm doing tomorrow at 3:00 Eastern Time with Blessing White, discussing findings from their 2011 Employee Engagement Report.

Hosted by the Human Capital Institute (HCI), Mary Ann Masarech, head of BlessingWhite's Employee Engagement practice, will be discussing with me surprising findings of this recent report I highlighted in an earlier blog post.

We’ll share with you the post-recession factors impacting employee engagement and how focused initiatives, such as strategic recognition, can impact the organization at different levels to build a comprehensive employee engagement initiative.

Join us for this free, one-hour webinar, as we:

• Define engagement in a way that is actionable.
• Assess current engagement levels by seniority, generations and industry.
• Evaluate the role that leaders play in driving engagement.
• Develop solutions to leverage your leaders and yourself.
• Outline the key drivers of individual employee engagement.
• Understand the implications of engagement for your organization and how to best create an environment in which employees want to engage.

Register now!

More How & Why; Less What

2011-02-28T03:41:00.001-05:00

Recognize This: Recognition is a powerful tool for reinforcing the “how” and the “why” as well as the “what.”

Employees usually know the “what.” They know they must achieve X goal by Y date or they will be dinged on their performance review.

Employees understanding is much less for the “how” and the “why” – precisely why it’s important that they achieve X goal by Y date and exactly how would be the best way to do it in keeping with the company values. Which approach – pushing the “what” only or reinforcing the “how” and the “why” as well – is more effective?

Bob Brennan, president and CEO of Iron Mountain, explains the difference this way:

“We have a set of core values that are important to us, and they’re mostly around candor -- really to generate speed, action orientation and a sense of security. We’ve got 21,000 people, so we have a lot of people who are managing others. What are the traits we want in leaders? How do we help them understand in very descriptive terms what we expect on a day-to-day basis? That’s different from driving clarity around outcomes, or how they link to broader strategy.”

WHAT – defines the goal to be achieved.

WHY – gives meaning and purpose to their efforts, a key factor of employee engagement and motivation.

HOW – defines acceptable parameters. For example, if social responsibility is a company value, then faster delivery will not be tolerated if doing so harms the environment.

The hallmark of truly strategic recognition is a focus on reinforcing the “why” and the “how” as well as the “what.” What kind of recognition do you experience at work? Are you recognized only when a goal is achieved or is the manner in which you achieved the goal equally important?

Employee Well Being and Recognition

2011-02-25T09:39:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: “Well-being is the next employee engagement.”

Five years ago when Eric Mosley, my CEO, and I began talking about employee engagement as a critical outcome of employee recognition and an even more critical component of company success, we had to spend a good deal of time explaining the concept as the majority of HR pros and influencers had never heard of it.

Now we’re seeing a new trend on the horizon, one not yet receiving much air time or understanding – employee well-being.

I don’t mean “wellness.” Well-being is a much broader term, defined by Gallup as: “all the things that are important to how we think about and experience our lives.” Gallup continues:

“Our teams were able to establish the relationship between wellbeing and everything from healthcare costs to productivity levels. It’s now possible to show how an employee with higher wellbeing costs less to insure, boosts performance, and creates engagement.”

Tony Schwartz, author of The Way We Work Isn’t Working, agreed in a blog post on Harvard Business Review:

“So what most influences employee engagement? … The degree to which employers actively invest in meeting the multidimensional needs of their employees.

“The second core need all of us share is to feel emotionally secure — meaning valued, recognized, and appreciated. Less than 40 percent of employees worldwide feel their managers are genuinely interested in their well-being. Only one out of ten employees feel they're treated as vital corporate assets. …The vast majority of employers fail to recognize a simple and immutable truth: how people feel at any given moment profoundly influences how they perform.”

That’s certainly true for me. When I feel valued – when I believe my contributions are helpful to my team members, my customers, my company – I perform at my peak. I’m running on a pure sense of that what I do really matters within the big picture.

Is the same true for you? Would you say your manager is interested in your well-being? When you do feel like “you’re a vital corporate asset,” does your performance improve?

Webinar March 2 with Blessing White on 2011 Employee Engagement Report Results

2011-02-24T08:08:00.005-05:00

I'm quite excited about a webinar I'm doing with Blessing White next week, discussing findings from their 2011 Employee Engagement Report.

Hosted by the Human Capital Institute (HCI), Mary Ann Masarech, head of BlessingWhite's Employee Engagement practice, will be discussing with me surprising findings of this recent report I highlighted in an earlier blog post.

We’ll share with you the post-recession factors impacting employee engagement and how focused initiatives, such as strategic recognition, can impact the organization at different levels to build a comprehensive employee engagement initiative.

Join us for this free, one-hour webinar, as we:

• Define engagement in a way that is actionable.
• Assess current engagement levels by seniority, generations and industry.
• Evaluate the role that leaders play in driving engagement.
• Develop solutions to leverage your leaders and yourself.
• Outline the key drivers of individual employee engagement.
• Understand the implications of engagement for your organization and how to best create an environment in which employees want to engage.

What else would be useful for you to know out of this webinar?

Today on Compensation Café: Signs Your Recognition Program Is in Trouble

2011-02-23T11:40:00.001-05:00

Recognize This: If people aren’t appreciating each other, your employee recognition program is a failure.

Check out my post on Compensation Café today, Signs Your Recognition Program Is in Trouble, in which I discuss three signs you know your employee recognition program isn’t working:

1) A visitor’s reaction to the general atmosphere upon crossing the threshold is, “I’m glad I don’t work here.”

2) A consultant is the first person to make a 28-year employee feel like his thoughts and opinions are valuable and listened to.

3) Employees aren’t participating in the program, no matter how good you think your recognition and rewards program is.

In the post, I dive more deeply into the drivers behind these signs of program failure and what you – at any level in the organization – can do about it.

I also mention our own survey results, announced today:

“The first semi-annual report for the Globoforce Workforce Mood Tracker shows recognition ambivalence among today's employees in the United States. While 68 percent of those surveyed feel appreciated at their jobs, an alarming 41 percent of workers are not satisfied with the level of recognition they receive for doing good work. Indicative of both the infrequency and non-personal nature of many of today's employee recognition programs, 43 percent of U.S. workers had not been recognized in the past three months. More importantly, a startling 55 percent felt they were not rewarded according to job performance, indicating a critical disconnect between recognition and performance.”

These results parallel findings from a SmartBrief on Workforce poll earlier this month in which only 15% agreed their incentive program is effective.

Click over to Compensation Café and let me know -- What signs of a recognition program in trouble have you seen? What are your recommendations to fix such a program?

Take Charge Now BEFORE Your Best People Walk Out the Door

2011-02-22T04:00:00.006-05:00

Recognize This: Your best people are planning on leaving as soon as they can. What are you going to do about it now?

Your best people are planning on leaving as soon as they can. The evidence is piling up. Now the Corporate Executive Board (CEB) is reporting:

“Our most recent data clearly show that employee distraction, demoralization and disengagement are at an all-time high. In fact, the statistics for high performers -- the best and brightest talent -- are equally alarming, with nearly a third planning to leave their current jobs within the next 12 months.”

Think about your staff for the moment. Categorize them in your mind so you’re considering your truly top performers. One-third are leaving in the next year. Try to imagine how the work will get done as well without 1/3 of your top performers. How’s that picture look?

Why You Should Care

CEB continues: “It will be extremely difficult to expand revenue and productivity with a workforce that is unfocused and under-performing, or if turnover becomes a concern.”

Your best performers are often your leaders in the office as well – good attitudes, a willingness to coach others. Lose those people and the ones remaining will certainly lose focus. But even before that step, Those who are just thinking of leaving are already distracted from their work with those thoughts and plans. Can you afford that?

What You Can Do about It

The CEB suggests: “Recognize and reward employee contributions: Differentiating among employees is surprisingly hard for managers but organizations must arm them with the tools and guidance to ensure that their employees feel valued for their individual achievements.”

The best tools – your company values as reasons for recognition; frequent employee recognition based on those values; the ability of any employee to recognize another based on those values.

What are you doing right now to keep you best employees? What's your company/manager/leadership doing to keep you?

What Culture Did You Create in Your Company during the Recession?

2011-02-21T04:05:00.003-05:00

Recognize This: The good times are over for companies that took advantage of the recession on the backs of their employees.

Did you (or your company) resort to any measure necessary to survive the recession – layoffs, salary cuts or freezes, etc? Or, if your honest with yourself, did you use the recession as an excuse to perhaps trim a bit more than necessary, knowing the remaining employees would take on the additional work, for no additional pay because of their fear of losing their job, too?

If you (or your company) fall in the latter category, the day of reckoning has arrived. As reported in TLNT:

“For employers that have used the economic downturn and the scarcity of jobs to justify squeezing every drop of productivity out of workers at the expense of the employees’ mental and physical well being, this turnaround sounds a death knell, not for the companies necessarily but rather for the way they have been treating their staff.

“The end is near for those practices as well as for the peace of mind that staff will remain loyal and in place. In fact, for employers who took this tactic, voluntary turnover is almost certain to rise dramatically as their employees learn there are new outlets for their efforts and talents. In addition, these employers likely will have a more challenging time making new hires as word of their actions gets around and impacts their reputations.”

In the age of Glassdoor and the like, you can’t afford for a miserly, whip-cracking, threatening reputation to get out. Sure it may have served you well in the short-term, but payback is coming.

Good employees always know what they’re worth. And I don’t mean just monetarily. They know they are worthy of respect, fair play, recognition and rewards for their efforts, and a work environment that encourages employee engagement.

What kind of culture have you been working in the last couple of years? Intimidation and fear or respectful and engaging? If the former, what are your career plans in the next 12 months?

The Message Is More Important than the Style

2011-02-18T03:48:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: Don’t legislate recognition too much. Leave plenty of room for employees to express their true thoughts and emotions.

The power of recognition lies in letting employees voice their true thoughts and feelings of appreciation to their peers and colleagues. To get the most out of your strategic recognition program, give employees guidelines, but let them tell their own story of appreciation.

Possible guidelines:

1) Always include the company value demonstrated or strategic objective contributed to in the recognition message. This brings the values and objectives to life in the daily behaviors and efforts of employees.

2) Write a detailed message of appreciation expressing precisely how the person being recognized contributed and why that contribution was important within the bigger picture. This helps employees understand that their daily work has greater meaning and purpose beyond the day-to-day.

That’s it. Step back and get out of the way. Of course, we have our five tenets that underpin the success of a strategic recognition program, but as far as the daily sharing of appreciation, it’s as simple as the above.

End your week on a positive note. Share your appreciation with a colleague today.

Tell Your “Secrets” to Improve Your Career

2011-02-17T03:43:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: If you’re not replaceable, you’re not promotable.

Last holiday season, Steve Boese related a sweet story on traditional family recipes in his HR Technology Blog.

In the post, Steve tells of his mother and her special stuffing that was venerated throughout the family.

“But no one knows how, exactly, to duplicate Mom's stuffing. She never shared the recipe, never revealed her secrets. She, I suppose, was successful in keeping 'Joan's Stuffing' as a legendary fixture in the family history. We will never have it again, because no one really knows precisely how to mix, measure, prepare, and serve the dish the way she did for all those years.

“What she did not fully understand, even if she had carefully recorded the recipe, and made sure that the next generation could precisely and honorably replicate the dish, it still would always be her dish. The stuffing, the pie, the potatoes - whatever, they are just food. The legacy of Mom and Grandma isn't about food, it's about how they took care of you, and your brothers and sisters, and everyone else that they touched. What makes me sad it that I don't think we let the Moms and Grandmas know this often enough, and they feel by clinging to their secret recipes we won't be able to forget them.”

The same is true in the workplace. When we withhold knowledge, often in an effort to protect ourselves and our “place” in the team, we also make ourselves irreplaceable. And as a boss of mine once told me, “If we can’t replace you, we can’t promote you.”

Steve’s second point is just as powerful. We don’t tell the people important to us – at home and at work – just how much they are appreciated and valued. Perhaps if we did, it’d be easier to “share the secret sauce.”

Employees Don’t Know Your Objectives & Don’t Care

2011-02-16T03:31:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: If you want your employees to care about your strategic objectives and work to achieve them every day, you better make it clear what those objectives are in their daily work.

How about some frightening statistics to shake up the middle of your week? (Quoting from Fake Work research as cited in TLNT):

• 87% of employees are not satisfied with the results of their work at the end of most weeks
• 73% of workers say their organizations’ strategies and goals are not translated into specific work tasks they can execute.
• 70% of workers do not know what to do to support their organizations’ strategies and goals.
• 81% of workers do not feel a strong level of commitment to their organizations’ strategies.

Let’s boil that down. People don’t know what you want them to do, don’t know how to do it anyway, don’t particularly care, but at least they’re somewhat dissatisfied for it at the end of the week.

Spouting strategies does little to align employees with your goals. It’s not that employees don’t want to help the company achieve its strategic objectives. It’s that they don’t know how. That’s where strategic recognition comes in as a very powerful tool for communicating both what the company needs down and how each employee contributes to that. When you thank an employee – specifically and with details – for achieving an objective (including a description of the work and the objective) it becomes clear to the employee how they are helping.

Do you know your company’s strategic objectives? Do you know how you contribute to achieving them in your daily work? Do you care?

The Importance of Recognition Done Right

2011-02-15T03:16:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: How you praise is as important as when.

I follow a lot of blogs in the HR and leadership space, as I’m sure you do, too. One I recently started enjoying is Respectful Workplace. A post at the end of last year has resonated so strongly with me, I must share it with you. In “The Power of Recognition,” Erica Pinsky wrote:

“Rather it is the daily practice of recognition – the thank you’s , great job, we couldn’t have gotten here without your input, you are a valued member of this team – that inspire many of us to want to continue making an effort. Let’s face it, whatever our job, task or profession, we want to know that what we are doing matters. We all want to know that others appreciate the effort we make. And unless someone is doing that on a regular basis, chances are we won’t feel valued or appreciated, which often translates to a lack of motivation and the inevitable drop in productivity.”

Erica’s covered all the basics here – frequency, sincerity, timeliness – and the strong link between recognition, performance and productivity.

Wally Bock, author of the excellent Three Star Leadership blog, made a similar case, but also highlighting what should not be praised:

“I do not praise thee for capacity. You do not merit praise for being smart or talented or any other gift you have received without merit or effort on your part.”

That may seem counter-intuitive, but your smarts, talents and other gifts are what you brought to the table in the first place. It’s how you choose to use those talents that merits praise and appreciation.

What do you think? Did Erica and Wally get it right? Is there anything else that should not be praised that many assume should?

Global Integration of People Systems Delivers More to Your Bottom Line

2011-02-14T03:01:00.004-05:00

Recognize This: Global integration of talent systems delivers 38% more Return on Equity (ROE).

Why should you care if your talent management systems and programs align with your company values and strategic objectives? Simple – you’ll see a much higher return on equity (ROE).

Ernst & Young reported in the January 2011 issue of Workspan Magazine (“Think Global, Act Global,” membership required):

“Companies that aligned their talent management programs with their business strategy enjoyed a 20% higher annual return on equity (ROE) over a five year period than those that did not. Returns were even more dramatic among those companies that integrated talent management programs, processes, and IT systems/processes on a global scale. These companies experienced an ROE over five years that was 38% better than those that did not.”

That’s precisely why we strongly advocate in our strategic employee recognition programs that customers:

1) Align business objectives and company values with reasons for recognition to make these come alive in the daily work of employees

2) Launch their programs to ALL employees in ALL global locations simultaneously, both to prevent any employees from feeling like “second-class citizens” if they’re not included in the initial launch, and to ensure program consistency on a global scale

3) Integrate recognition with performance management systems

Not only will you gain a much more complete and accurate understanding of how well your employees know and contribute to strategic objectives, you’ll also dramatically increase your return on equity.

Not a bad reason to go global and go integrated.

Overcoming Confusion, Fear and Complacency to Engage Employees

2011-02-11T03:32:00.005-05:00

Recognize This: Intent without action is more than worthless – it could actually contribute to additional disengagement.

Wrapping up our week-long look at the Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study on employee engagement attitudes in the board room, the greatest challenge is the same is in many initiatives – taking action.

“Strong opinions might not translate into visible action. A sizeable discrepancy exists between what companies say about the perils of disengagement and how far they will actually go to confront the problem.”

The lack of action is likely due to three reasons:

1) Confusion – too much advice from too many sources on what to tackle first, making it easier to choose to do nothing.

2) Fear – concern that the “wrong” action might be taken, making engagement worse.

3) Complacency –it’s easier to stick your head in the sand and hope it all goes away. After all, it’s not really that bad, right?

Let me make it simple for you. Employee engagement boils down to this: does the employee understand their role in the organization, realize the importance of that role to company success, and desire to contribute their all achieve that success?

Strategic employee recognition is a powerful tool for engaging employees because it communicates clearly, frequently, specifically and in a timely way to all employees, individually: what they are doing that is being done well, what is valued and appreciated by the organization, in a way that encourages the employee to want to repeat it.

And our customers have proven time and again that doing so can increase employee engagement by double digits in just 12 months. It really is that easy. Say “thank you” – specifically, meaningfully and often – and people will be more engaged with you, their team and the company as a whole.

Links to all posts on Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study:
Part 1: C-Suite Blind to Reality of Employee Engagement
Part 2: The Board Must Care about Employee Engagement for Improvement to Be Seen
Part 3: Many Managers Won’t Act on Engagement Unless Empowered by the C-Suite
Part 4: Who’s the Bigger Problem: GenY or Long-Serving Staff?

Who’s the Bigger Problem: GenY or Long-Serving Staff?

2011-02-10T02:22:00.006-05:00

Recognize This: All employees – regardless of generation or length of service – need reasons to engage with your company and strategic objectives.

Which demographic poses the greatest challenge to raising engagement levels in your organization: GenY (new) employees or “lifers” (those who have been with the organization for many years)?

According to the Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study we’ve been looking at all week, the C-suite seems to have drunk the Kool-aid on GenY, believing them hardest to engage. But other senior staff believe long-serving staff are the greater challenge:

“Long-serving staff pose the greatest engagement challenge. Respondents believe overwhelmingly that it is hardest to raise the engagement levels of ‘experienced and long-serving staff’. Again, however, C-suite executives reach a different conclusion from those below them. Only 27% of CEOs believe that this group presents the greatest challenge in raising engagement levels, as opposed to 57% of senior vice-presidents, heads of departments or business units. The C-suite is more likely than others to say that the under-25s represent the most problematic group of employees, in line with the current management orthodoxy surrounding Generation Y.”

As I’ve said before, GenY styles and expectations are really no different than those who preceded them – a desire to know that the work they are doing is correct, useful and meeting the requirements. Like all “new” employees, they’re often trying to “prove” themselves and their value to the organization.

For some long-serving staff, however, it can be easy to fall into a rut, even if that rut is a productive one. Once complacency settles in, how engaged are you really with your work, the customer or the company’s goals?

Of course these are broad brush strokes. I’m being overly simplistic, I know. I’m curious, though. Who do you side with? Is the C-Suite right that GenY are harder to engage? Or are the vice presidents and business heads correct that long-serving staff are more challenging?

Links to all posts on Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study:
Part 1: C-Suite Blind to Reality of Employee Engagement
Part 2: The Board Must Care about Employee Engagement for Improvement to Be Seen
Part 3: Many Managers Won’t Act on Engagement Unless Empowered by the C-Suite

Many Managers Won’t Act on Engagement Unless Empowered by the C-Suite

2011-02-09T03:54:00.003-05:00

Recognize This: People quit bosses, not companies.

That oft-quoted truism was proven once again in the Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup 2010 study on employee engagement we’ve been looking at this week. Another key conclusion:

“Middle managers are not deemed responsible for employee engagement. The low proportion (13%) of C-suite executives who believe that line managers and middle managers are ‘chiefly responsible’ for staff engagement is unlikely to boost the people-management skills of such managers. If they are not considered responsible no matter how good or bad they are, why should they try? The potential negative repercussions could be significant, since around two in five of those not in the C-suite believe the ‘motivational ability of one’s line manager’ (the most selected survey option) to be a considerable contributor to employee motivation.”

Yes, executives are responsible for setting the vision and goals for employee engagement, but managers are responsible for executing that vision. As I wrote about last month, “managers act as coaches to facilitate their team members’ engagement journeys.”

Until executives are willing to admit that managers – and their daily actions that have repercussions on their staff engagement levels – are the linchpin in engagement (and they certainly don’t seem to now), many managers won’t feel compelled to step up.

That’s why we encourage defined KPIs for managers for employee recognition activity – a proven means of increasing employee engagement by double digits.

How do you ensure managers understand their responsibilities for the engagement of those who work for them?

Links to all posts on Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study:
Part 1: C-Suite Blind to Reality of Employee Engagement
Part 2: The Board Must Care about Employee Engagement for Improvement to Be Seen

The Board Must Care about Employee Engagement for Improvement

2011-02-08T03:03:00.003-05:00

Recognize This: If employee engagement isn’t a board-level concern, it’s not really an important initiative.

Many say the follow-through is the most important part of the golf swing. The same is true in critical corporate initiatives.

Continuing our look at the key findings of the Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study on employee engagement views from the boardroom, consider this question: If engagement isn’t a board-level concern, is it really an important initiative in the company?

In our book Winning with a Culture of Recognition, we address this quite clearly. “Securing executive sponsorship” is one of our five tenets of Strategic Recognition, and “Start the Tempo at the Top” is one of the 10 tactics underpinning those five tenets. If your executive team does not believe employee engagement is a problem to be solved, or at the very least, a desirable area to invest time, measurement and efforts at continual improvement, then there is little hope of success.

A key conclusion of the Economist study is:

“A significant mismatch exists between words and deeds on engagement. There are clear inconsistencies in our survey findings, which suggest that words come more easily than concrete actions. For example, 84% of survey respondents say that ‘disengaged employees’ are one of the three biggest threats facing their business. Yet it appears that little is done to identify, support or even ‘weed out’ unengaged staff. For example, only 12% of respondents report that their companies ‘regularly and often’ tackle staff with ‘continually low engagement’. Even according to C-suite executives alone, engagement is discussed ‘occasionally’, ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ at board level in 43% of companies.”

Only 12% tackle those with continual low engagement? Barely more than half address engagement at the board level? How can you claim that disengagement is “one of the three biggest threats” if you don’t invest the energy and focus at the most senior level?

Keep in mind the causation found by Gallup – engaged employees generate financial success, not the other way around. I’d think company boards would be quite interested in any *guaranteed* means of generating financial success, wouldn’t you?

Links to all posts on Economist Intelligence Unit/HayGroup study:
Part 1: C-Suite Blind to Reality of Employee Engagement

C-Suite Blind to Reality of Employee Engagement

2011-02-07T08:58:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: If you can’t acknowledge you have a problem in the first place, you have no hope of solving it.

The Economist Intelligence Unit and HayGroup came out with very interesting research late last year: Re-engaging with Engagement: Views from the boardroom on employee engagement. This week, we’ll look at some of major conclusions of the report and how they impact you.

“The C-suite displays a consistently 'rose-tinted' view of engagement that is not shared lower down the ranks. One important revelation from our survey is the huge disparity between the views of many in the C-suite and those of less senior directors, including just a single rung below board level. For example, 47% of C-suite executives believe that they themselves have determined levels of employee engagement, a view shared by only 16% of senior directors outside the C-suite. More than one in five in the C-suite believe that employees are ‘much more engaged’ than those in rival firms, compared with only 7% of respondents outside the C-suite.”

I see two key problems here:
1) If you’re not willing to acknowledge the problem, you have no hope of solving it.
2) Reality of a situation may be best assessed by those closest to the workers and the work being done.

What’s the reality in your organization? Does the CEO truly lead engagement efforts? Do the actions of the C-suite ultimately determine how engaged employees really are? Do you think the employees in your company are “much more engaged” than those in rival firms? What’s the “reality” from your level within the organization?

People Are Not Cogs in a Machine

2011-02-04T03:44:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: Individuals bring much more to your workplace than their skill or ability.

In a recent post on Fistful of Talent, Josh Letourneau related the story of Bob. An average, some might even say “mediocre,” employee with no stand-out defining elements of his performance that raised a red-flag when he handed in his resignation. The HR pro figured she’d just replace Bob with a similarly skilled employee.

As Josh points out, the HR pro is missing the key trigger here. Bob is not a cog in a machine that can be switched out. Bob’s connections – his interactions with others, his conversations, his relationships – that’s what made Bob a valuable contribution to the organization. If you insist on the “machine” metaphor, losing Bob would be more equivalent to removing both the Bob “cog” and all the surrounding gears, springs and connecting wires.

Work today is more about the networks we interact in, the people we interact with as we transact business. When we lose an employee, either through actual leaving the workplace or just disengagement in the work, we lose all they bring with their networks and interactions on a daily basis.

Let’s stop looking at our employees as parts in a machine that can be easily replaced and start noticing them for what they are – important elements to how we all work who are fundamentally caring, feeling beings who need appreciation for their work and validation that what they do has meaning.

Where you work today are you seen as a cog in a machine or important contributor within a much wider network?

I Got More Money in My Paycheck?

2011-02-03T03:32:00.003-05:00

Recognize This: Cash rewards go unnoticed, leaving no impression on employees of your appreciation for their efforts.

To my American friends and colleagues: Did you notice the extra money in your paycheck? According to an article in last week’s Boston Globe newspaper, most didn’t.

“‘What?’ said the professor waiting for a train at South Station. ‘I get extra money?’ asked the mom with her son. ‘I didn’t realize that,’ said the guy getting his shoes shined. Three weeks after a payroll tax cut took effect, few people are noticing the extra money — $40 a week for some, $10 to $30 a week for most — that Congress put in their paychecks.”

As I’ve written many times before, cash rewards do nothing to reinforce the messages you’re trying to send. Employees often don’t even notice it in their paychecks. As one client told us after surveying their 300,000+ employees, of those that even realized they’d received a cash reward, 29% used it to pay bills and 18% didn’t remember how it was spent. Is that what you were hoping to achieve?

Or, as one Globoforce colleague of mine recently related:

“At my last company, I got a $500 bonus directly into my direct deposit account. From the time I left work to the time I arrived home, my wife saw that bonus in the bank account and went shopping with the girls. I never even saw it.”

Do you want your employees to actually notice and value the appreciation you give them? Find another way than cash to recognize them.

Generations in the Workplace

2011-02-02T08:37:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: Increasing recognition in the workplace isn’t a solution for Gen Y employees. It’s a solution for ALL employees.

Admittedly, I know little about American Football, and even less about college football. But I was deeply intrigued by a recent post of Kris Dunn’s (the HR Capitalist) on the “Oregon Funk” of the Oregon University football team.

Apparently, Nike designs and provides a different uniform for every game. Some like them, some hate them. Or, as Kris puts it:

“Traditionalists hate the Oregon uniforms and the Oregon basketball court. I'm guessing the kids they recruit LOVE IT ALL.

“And at the end of the day, that's really all that matters, isn't it? The vibe helps them acquire talent in their demographic.”

This made me think of the ongoing discussion of Gen Y in the workplace and whether their perceived need for constant recognition and feedback is a good or a bad thing. Dan Pink’s take is:

“The problem isn’t that the Millennial are wrong. The problem is that they’re right. The workplace is one of the most feedback deprived places in modern life.”

Tying the two together, Gen Y are the new generation in the workplace. They are bringing to light a long-term problem in the workplace we’ve all come to accept as “just the way things are.” Bottom line: more recognition doesn’t benefit just Gen Y. It benefits us all.

You CAN Manage Your Culture. Behaviors Are the Key.

2011-02-01T08:45:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: Changing and managing your culture is simple, but not easy. It begins with finding and praising the behaviors you want to underpin your culture.

We’re often asked about our book Winning with a Culture of Recognition: “Is it really possible change and proactively manage a company culture?”

Unequivocally, yes! And doing so is relatively simple. But it’s not easy.

The steps you need to take to change and manage the culture you want are fairly straightforward, as discussed quite eloquently in a recent Strategy + Business article, “Stop Blaming Your Culture,” by Jon Katzenbach and Ashley Harshak, but finding the courage, diligence and desire to take those steps is not easy.

The first step – an important realization – is that you cannot deny the power of the culture you already have. Rather, you have to find ways to work within that culture to encourage only those behaviors you want to see influence the new culture you desire and to discourage behaviors you don’t. Katzenbach and Harshak put it this way:

“You need to focus on specific behaviors that solve real problems and deliver real results. This, in turn, enables people to experience the results of thinking differently. Experience becomes a better teacher than logical argument.”

Or, for a practical example they use in the opening paragraph of the article:

“It would have been easy for Gray (new commandant of the US Marine Corps) to blame the damaged organizational culture for the problems he inherited, and to launch a formal, full-scale change initiative. But instead, he began to praise and seek out elements of the old Corps culture, such as the ethic of mutual respect.”

Seek out behaviors you desire as foundational to your culture. Praise the people demonstrating those behaviors. Repeat. Often.

Simple, but not always easy.

Why Cash as a Reward Won’t Change Your Culture

2011-01-31T08:31:00.000-05:00

Recognize This: How you reward employees is a key indicator of underlying company culture.

We’re often asked why we don’t encourage the use of cash as a reward in strategic employee recognition program. The simple answer is: cash = compensation. Rewards must use a different “currency” than cash or employees will lump your “rewards” into their paycheck, guaranteeing it will become an expectation.

A better question to understand is: What kind of company culture do you want? A culture of appreciation or of compensation?

Your culture is built on the interactions and conversations that happen every moment of every day between your employees. Building that culture begins by encouraging recognition between and by all employees, yes, but it also builds on the rewards employees can enjoy that links the behaviors and actions they were recognized for to the memorable rewards they choose.

When that reward is cash, you can’t – as our client Symantec explained – have a conversation with colleagues, “Oh, I got $500 dollars.”

But when the reward is in a form that gives the flexibility of cash for limitless options, but with a result that employees can share and talk about with each other, you build a culture of appreciation. “Yeah, I went to the spa and had the most relaxing and rejuvenating massage treatment.”

Those are the conversations happening every day in the hallways of Symantec, reinforcing just how much the company values and appreciates the good work their employees do every day.

What kind of culture are you building in your organization?

"Why Recognition Matters"

2011-01-28T04:06:00.004-05:00

I'm thrilled with an interview about our book, Winning with a Culture of Recognition, that appeared Monday on The Hiring Site.

In the interview, I answered some of the questions my CEO and co-author, Eric Mosley, and I often receive about the book:

* How is this book different from other management books?
* What exactly is "strategic recognition?"
* What does it mean to "win with a culture of recognition?"
* Why is recognition so important?
* What makes companies with a culture of recognition different than others?

This is just one of great pieces of media coverage the book has received. One of my favorites was this interview on Fox News with Eric:

If you're looking to increase employee engagement, strategic recognition is one of the most powerful, proven tools for doing just that.

Do Amazing Things * Overcome Stereotypes

2011-01-27T03:45:00.002-05:00

Recognize This: We all have the capacity to do amazing things. We need the desire – and sometimes courage – to do so.

Chris Ferdinandi, Renegade HR blogger, has done it again. For the second year in a row he has published a strong compendium of advice from HR experts on how to be amazing in 2011.

I’m honored to have my contribution on “Overcoming Stereotypes” included in “Do Amazing Things” this year. An excerpt:

“One [stereotype] we often hear in our line of business is: ‘People in China don’t want to be recognized individually.’ A client of ours proved this false simply by giving it a try. When implementing a new, first of its kind, global employee recognition program to all 33,000 of its employees, HR leaders knew the large contingent of employees in China couldn’t simply be ignored. … After program launch, the leadership team was pleasantly surprised to discover China had the fastest rate of adoption for greatest number of employees of the new employee recognition program.”

Other strong contributions from HR pros I respect include:

• Fail More (Chris Ferdinandi)
• Simplify, Simplify, Simplify (Lance Haun)
• Values, Not Words (Ben Eubanks)
• Break Out of the Boundaries (Paul Hebert)
• Become the Collaboration Leader (Steve Roesler)
• Be Curious (Ann Bares)
• Shadow Someone (Trish McFarlane)

I encourage you to read the eBook for great additional advice and thought leadership. What would you add as your recommendation to Be Amazing in 2011?

Making Your Company Values Real in the Daily Work of All Employees

2011-01-26T10:33:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I wrote about the importance of company values as the glue that holds us (employees, managers, leaders) together as we face unprecedented change in the workplace.

I received this comment to the post on HR.com:

“At the Manufacturing Skills Australia conference Prof. Alan Patching (Program Director 2000 Olympic Games) gave a great presentation. To open he asked the audience of 500 'does everyone in this room work for an organisation with company values?' A smattering of people raised their hands so Alan went to each one and asked them to detail those values to the audience. No one could remember them. My question to you is if company values are so crucial why isn’t it taken up by the workers?”

This is an excellent question and very important point about company values. Most people in an organization have no idea what the company values are. More importantly, even more have no idea what those values mean in their daily work.

Getting a group of people in a room to decide on the values, creating posters and plaques to hang those values on the wall, perhaps sending out a communications campaign about the values – none of these are worthwhile or in the least effective in making your values real to every employee.

Sure, we’d like to help your employees recite their values. But we’re far more concerned about your employees having the values so deeply ingrained that they both live out those values in their daily work and notice when colleagues around them do the same.

This is the power of Strategic Employee Recognition in which you:

1) Purposefully tie every recognition moment in the company to a company value
2) Detail more specifically how the person’s behaviors, actions or achievements reflected the values in contribution to project/customer/company success
3) Encourage everyone to notice and appreciate these “value demonstrations” in their peers and colleagues

When you do this, every employee now not only knows the values, but also knows what those values look like in their day-to-day efforts, knows the company considers these efforts and value demonstrations important, and is encouraged to repeat them.

If you make your company values real in this way for every employee, I guarantee they will be “taken up by the workers.”

Do you know your company values (no peeking at the plaque on the wall)? More importantly, do you know what those values look like in your daily tasks.

Values * The Glue Keeping Us Together during Change (Insights from HR Directors Business Summit)

2011-01-25T10:57:00.000-05:00

I enjoyed dinner last night with several leaders of HR in various businesses. A common concern to all them seems to be the whirlwind of change currently blowing through these organizations. The forces of change I described in my post/report yesterday are real and seem only to be getting faster. The resulting question on everyone’s mind was: How do we keep everyone with us during all this change?

I started today hearing more of the same - from both the President and the Chief People Officer for McDonalds UK & Northern Europe. They painted a candid and thorough picture of the challenges McDonalds has faced over the years and how they have evolved their people management model to react.

Particularly striking to me was how Chief People Officer David Fairhurst shared the many changes occurring in the workplace and society in general, making the case that "we need a glue that will hold everything together with all these changes happening." That glue he identified as company values. "Values are like fingerprints. Nobody's are the same, but you leave 'em all over everything you do" - a quotation from that other HR luminary - Elvis Presley!

I couldn’t agree more - values can be the glue holding employee needs and company success requirements together. As employees face so much change – at a pace that is historically the most rapid we've ever taken a workforce through – we need our employees to be resilient and have a clear line of sight for how we want to succeed together. Values can give this line of sight, and of course a values driven, strategic recognition program, is a proven robust approach to make these values come alive and be lived everyday in the corporation.

Values too was on CEO & President Jill McDonald's agenda when she highlighted as one of her top three priorities the need to break down silos and embed corporate values to create what she called a "connected organization". Her other two priorities included employee engagement for trust, and developing future talent.

Let me ask you, how do you plan on keeping everyone during all this change? What’s your “glue” to hold everyone together? What are your top three priorities for 2011?

Learnings from HR Directors Business Summit

2011-01-24T14:04:00.001-05:00

I’m greatly enjoying my participation this week at the HR Directors Business Summit in Birmingham, UK. I’ve already learned a tremendous amount and am looking forward to some interesting sessions on Gen Y tomorrow.

Today, Professor Lynda Gratton from London Business School led us in a great start, sharing shared research on the "Future of Work." She described the five forces at work, which are creating the future: Globalization, Technology, Demography, Low Carbon and Society Changes. Key insights she offered for coping in this new world are:

1) Encourage collaboration, especially online between teams and the generations
2) Encourage open innovation
3) Build strong cultures & values
4) Invest in your own ability to have specialist skills
5) Realize the days of the generalist are ending fast

Professor Paddy Miller from IESE Business School really captured my attention with his definition of employee engagement. Contrary to the many finely crafted definitions we've all seen, his was that engagement is a Puzzle! Each puzzle has similar parts, but each company needs to figure their own puzzle solution. I couldn’t agree more. There is no cookie-cutter solution to employee engagement. Each company must (to borrow from Professor Gratton) build on their own values to create strong cultures in which engagement can thrive.

I presented myself today on strategic recognition and how it varies from other more traditional employee recognition. I was delighted to share the platform with our client Ingrid Waterfield, UK Head of Rewards at KPMG. She took the audience through the case study of their journey at KPMG as she shared the dramatic increases in levels of participation in their recognition program, even as budget costs were reduced! If you’d like to hear more about this, watch the webinar KPMG recently presented.

More tomorrow from the HR Directors Business Summit. In the meantime, do you see any additional forces at work that are creating the future of how (and why) we work? What’s your definition of engagement? Do you think it’s a puzzle, unique to each company, or more universal to most?