By Alison Grenier and Sarah McVanel
It’s fair to say that most organizations have some way of recognizing their best people. In fact, the Conference Board of Canada’s (CBOC) 2017 report, “The Power of Appreciation,” shows that Canadian organizations spend on average $139 per FTE annually on employee recognition.
And this makes good business sense. Recent research from Great Place to Work® shows that organizations that celebrate success also ranked +11 to +18 per cent higher in key business outcomes such as discretionary effort, cooperation, pride and overall impressions of the workplace than those who did not. In essence, the stronger the cultures for celebrating success, the stronger employee discretionary effort, cooperation, pride and overall impressions of the workplace – all good news.
It’s not what you do – it’s how you do it
The CBOC’s study shows that the number one way that organizations are currently recognizing their employees – through long-service awards and celebrations – are both costly and not the best way to ensure employees feel valued. Public celebrations are not necessarily what everyone prefers (for some it’s downright embarrassing!) and having to wait until a designated time and place to say thanks doesn’t make sense in our instant gratification culture.
So, what’s a leader to do? How can we most effectively recognize employees to boost engagement and retain top talent during this current talent shortage?
Individual recognition matters
Three separate datasets from GPTW, CBOC and Metrics@Work (referenced in Forever Recognize Others Greatness) all point to the importance of individuals being recognized “in the moment” by their direct supervisor and colleagues as more desired than corporate celebrations. Quite simply, 90 per cent of employees report most valuing a verbal thank-you, personalized words of acknowledgement and a written thank-you, in that order. These are simple no-to-low cost options that demonstrate appreciation for good work and extra effort.
Quite simply, 90 per cent of employees report most valuing a verbal thank-you, personalized words of acknowledgement and a written thank-you, in that order.
But how could it be that straightforward?
GPTW research corroborates that while any effort to celebrate success are statistically significant in higher trust, your ROI will be greatest when investing in practices that focus most specifically on recognizing and appreciating employee efforts and accomplishments versus more generalized workplace celebrations.
It’s not about throwing out what works; if your employees look forward to receiving their milestone award, kicking up their heels with each other during the holidays or have a tradition of honouring retirees, keep that as part of the mix. Just make sure you equally value the human touch element of recognition, with fiscal resources as well as time, attention and managerial resources.
A “need to have”… not just a “nice to have”
If you think this sounds all “touchy-feely,” consider the data. When your team knows their contributions are valued, needed and appreciated, they will work harder for you, trust the organization more and be more likely to stay. That makes good business sense. And before you start thinking this is going to take too much time to intentionally show appreciation to individuals, consider how much time you spend recruiting, interviewing, retraining, mentoring, conflict managing, performance managing, and problem solving. Consider also what you would prefer to do with your time; what would make your quality of work life higher?
Let the floodgates open!
It’s not rocket science to be the leader or colleague that people want to work with. Creating high trust, deeply collaborative and healthy workplace cultures is becoming one of the most important roles a leader has in today’s rapidly changing, fiscally restrained, high paced, and talent crunched work environment. How empowering it is to know that your actions today can help make a meaningful shift to workplace satisfaction. That you can be that manager or organization that people want to work for. Let the candidate floodgates open.
Alison Grenier is Head of Culture and Research at Great Place to Work Canada. Sarah McVanel is the Founder & Chief Recognition Officer at Greatness Magnified.