Your employees are the heart of your company, and you want them motivated, agile, and adaptable. To have the best-performing employees, you would be served greatly by regularly recognizing their positive qualities.
Only by recognizing and rewarding their excellent characteristics can you grow them and keep their performance high. The power of frequent employee recognition is that it is a low-cost, high-impact activity.
Only about a third of employees think they are properly recognized in the workplace. Therefore, companies need to do better concerning employee recognition. The following is how they can harness and benefit from the power of employee recognition:
Increased Employee Engagement
According to Gallup, many American firms are experiencing low employee engagement rates. One of the premier benefits of frequent employee recognition is that it leads to higher employee engagement rates. Firms can achieve up to 3 times more employee engagement than they did before.
When employees are completely engaged in their work, productivity will undoubtedly increase. With better productivity, comes better company resource management and efficiency, which reduces costs.
Increased employee engagement also means better performance, particularly compared to your competitors. Therefore, frequent employee engagement can improve your business across the board.
Reward Employees
Employee recognition comes in different shapes and sizes. Though intrinsic motivation has been shown to be more effective than extrinsic motivation, the latter still has a tremendous effect on results. Therefore, be sure to reward your employees whenever appropriate.
Employee rewards, particularly to top-performing staff, should be a regular part of your employee recognition efforts. The key is to match the rewards to the individual, as employees are motivated by different rewards. It is best to consult employees on their preferred method of appreciation.
An end-of-year ceremony where the company rewards the employees is an excellent starting point. However, more regular recognition is more effective and powerful. You should hence consider a more consistent employee recognition program, for example, an employee of the month program.
Retain Your Best Employees
Staff turnover is an excellent metric by which to judge a firm’s success. It is challenging for any company to keep its best employees, especially in extremely competitive industries like tech or finance. Regularly recognizing your employee’s performance will help you retain your best performers.
There are many incentives you can use to retain top employees. Performance-based compensation, opportunities for career advancement, and ownership options are outstanding options for employee retention. However, recognizing employees’ efforts regularly, trumps them all.
Creating a culture of employee recognition shows employees that the firm values them and constantly reaffirms that. Employees are more likely to stay at a company that values them even when there might be better opportunities elsewhere.
Timing Is Key
To most effectively harness the power of employee recognition, you must do it fast. Timing is paramount because the longer it takes for managers and executives to recognize employees’ efforts, the less authentic the recognition is likely to feel.
For employees to see recognition as meaningful, it is best to act promptly, which is why regular recognition is so important. For example, only recognizing employees’ performance at the end of the year might be too late.
Having a formal recognition system could help your company recognize employees in time.
On the other hand, being adaptable and showing employees gratitude as often and swiftly as possible is the best way to achieve perfect timing. Even small acts of recognition can carry significant weight if the timing is right.
Improve Employee Recognition In Your Organization
Recognizing your employees’ efforts goes a long way and will keep your staff motivated to go the extra mile. Use the information above to utilize the power of frequent employee recognition. You will be surprised by the results. Remember, timing is essential, and employees value different forms of recognition.