Think about a time when you went out of your way to complete a project and achieved the desired results. If your manager and teammates vocally appreciated your hard work, this likely helped you feel valued and enhanced your motivation to take on future projects with enthusiasm. If it was the other way around, and no one recognized your achievement, you may have lost the motivation to do your best.
Recognition goes a long way in driving better performance and reducing employee turnover. According to a Glassdoor survey, 53% of respondents would stay longer at their organization if they were appreciated for their efforts. Let's look at how organizations can build a culture of recognition.
Educate managers and C-level leaders
Managers interact with employees daily, and they usually understand employee output better than anyone else. When immediate managers provide recognition for specific accomplishments, employees are assured that their work is noticed and valued.
Educate managers about the benefits of genuine recognition. Help them understand which actions should be recognized, and encourage them to appreciate employees during these moments. Giving timely feedback and explaining how an employee's hard work contributed to your organization's success makes all the difference. It's essential that you also encourage company leadership to recognize employees regularly, as their words of appreciation can have a huge impact and further motivate managers to practice recognition.
Ensure transparency in the process
The first step towards transparent recognition is employees' awareness of company expectations and recognition practices. For example, your organization may recognize employees when they take the initiative to start new projects, or when they come up with an innovative solution to business challenges. Whatever these accomplishments are, be sure to communicate them to your employees. It's always good to praise employees in front of their peers, as it can motivate other employees to go the extra mile.
For further transparency, encourage managers to identify their own biases, as any favoritism or preconceived notions will lead to unfairness in the process. Check out this blog to understand the different unconscious biases that performer raters may project onto employees. Provide a weekly or monthly forum for each one of your employees to talk about their achievements so that you don't miss any of them.
Help employees appreciate their peers
Facilitating peer-to-peer recognition is one of the best ways to embed recognition deep into your company culture. It'll go a long way toward building a positive and supportive workplace, where employees work together, share ideas, and appreciate each other for their hard work. To encourage peer-to-peer recognition, set up a group, forum, or tech tool where employees can come together to appreciate each other. You can also make this initiative more fun by organizing a team get-together and encouraging employees to send a shout-out to their team members.
Offer meaningful rewards during performance reviews
To have a greater impact on your employees, you could go beyond appreciating them through words and offer exciting rewards. Incorporating this into your performance appraisal cycle can help you recognize employees fairly, and they'll also be more aware of what led to the recognition. You could also adopt a points-based rewards system to provide rewards that'll matter to your employees. To make this process seamless, it's essential to have a comprehensive rewards and recognition platform that works well with your HRMS.
Vantage Circle integrates with Zoho People to make it easy for HR teams to reward employees during performance reviews. While Zoho People enables managers to set goals for their teams, track performance, and identify top performers, Vantage Circle enables them to offer suitable rewards to employees. Learn more about Vantage Circle's integration with Zoho People.
Tie recognition to your organization's core values
A recognition program that directly aligns with company values will make it sustainable. Encourage managers to explain how an employee's achievements line up with those values, and reward employees who consistently act in accordance with company's overall mission. For instance, if teamwork is a core value, peer-to-peer recognition can reinforce that value. If it's commitment, you would recognize employees who are extremely passionate about the work and constantly innovate to come up with better solutions.
Fostering a culture of recognition
Timely and meaningful recognition keeps employees motivated. When they know that their work is valued, they're less likely to switch jobs. We hope this post gave you a clear idea of how to build a culture of recognition!
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