The importance of recognition in a recession

Who knows where our economy is right now – Is it just “soft”? Are we in a recession? Is a depression coming? Regardless of where you stand, recognition should be at the forefront of your company’s strategy.

Employees at companies are scared. Are their jobs at risk? Will they get a bonus this year or a raise next year? How will they afford the rising cost of living and their mortgage? While compensation is important, don’t forget about the effect of reassurance, appreciation and recognition. These three factors are crucial in maintaining or even increasing performance, innovation and your company’s bottom line.

To illustrate this point, I offer you a hypothetical situation with 2 potential solutions.

Background: An employee hears rumors about their company – sales are slow, people may be laid off. Finances are tight at home and both you and your spouse become concerned about whether or not you are in the right job.

Solution #1:

Stay the course and ride out the downturn. Do your job and collect your check. Begin to entertain the thought of changing employers. Lose sleep at night and keep your thoughts to yourself. You don’t tell your spouse about your anxiety and don’t discuss your feelings with your co-workers or your boss.

Although this option is easiest, I offer it may not be the best. It provides no solutions for your company and sets forth a path of complacency and mediocrity.

Solution #2:

Do something. Be bold. Think outside the box. Innovate!

If you have these feelings, don’t you think your boss or co-workers do, too? Most managers do not want to hear complaints or fears. With that being said, I feel a combination of discussing your concerns along with offering solutions is a great path. If you start with your concerns and follow that with several ideas of how to improve the energy and innovation in your workplace, your manager will listen. Since this where my work lives, I want to give you some help. These are a few thoughts that will get your ideas flowing. Please feel free to apply in depth specifics to these ideas and present them to your supervisor and let me know the results! I am also here if you need help.

• Sales
  1. If your company doesn’t have a sales incentive program, put one into action. If you already do, consider refining it by adding new goals or adjusting it to recapture the hype behind the program. You can also add a short-term program for a one-time sales boost.
  2. Collect ideas from outside your sales department. Oftentimes great ideas are overlooked by the sales team. Bring in the whole team and collect ideas from customer service, operations, shipping department and management. Several ideas are sure to come from the meeting.

With either of these ideas, keep in mind that recognition for sales improvements is both a short and long term proposition. To recognize them today helps boost their ego, self-worth and confidence. The recognition will also pay-off in the long run with the employee feeling like their contributions are important and vital to the company’s success.  Sales awards are a great tool to provide this recognition. You can also choose an acrylic award, plaque or crystal award.

• Innovation Contests

Contests are a great way to build hype around the common good. Appreciating employees with awards, gifts and recognition in front of their peers are great ways to celebrate contest successes. Here are a just a few contests that we have provided awards for in the past.

1. Product improvements
2. Systems improvements
3. Cost cutting measures
4. Customer service improvements

• Training

Feel like yourself or co-workers are not trained well enough to provide a great value to the company? Suggest certification training or other types of training that improve and enhance the value to the company or customer. In difficult times, it is important to focus on improvement, not complacency. After training, make sure the employee is recognized with words of affirmation, a spot in the newsletter, or a smaller acrylic desk award so that the recipient’s accomplishment is reinforced.

• Motivation and Team Building

When the business environment is in turmoil, it is important to be aware of employee’s motivation as well as the health of the team. While contests are a great way to inject innovation and competition to the workplace, they are not the cure for happiness. If you need some fun and joy in the workplace, suggest it to your manager. Come up with a few activities that can occur either during the workday or off-hours. If there are costs involved, it is likely that your employer will be willing to contribute. Remember, anything that contributes to the employee’s happiness and well being is in the best interest of the company, both in good times and bad.

• Appreciation

Oftentimes, the biggest issue is feeling under-appreciated. Although this feeling can be real to you as an employee, asking for appreciation and getting it from your manager dilutes the feeling. As a solution for feeling under-appreciated, try taking a pro-active stance. Suggest different types of informal day-to-day recognition to your manager. This can take the form in a number of different ways such as posting thanks on a company bulletin board, intranet site, or simply thanking a co-worker in person or by email. These small words of affirmation are very effective in boosting morale and helping your company thrive in difficult times.

It is also important to work from inside out. Focus on your company’s issues first, and then perhaps recognize others outside your organization. While it is great to have a great internal structure, it is also important to note that there is a company brand that you are upholding. The time might come for your company to recognize vendors or others outside your organization. This can help with the long-term success of your company just as the internal recognition has.

At Trophies2go.com, we are committed to providing meaningful recognition to individuals and businesses. If you wish to discuss, please give me a call at 877-926-4700.

What is the difference between informal and formal recognition?

Recognition is important in the workplace as well as in the home.  It can come in different forms and can be applied at different times.  One of my favorite reasons for using recognition is motivation.

At home, I use recognition to motivate my children and use it to acknowledge and appreciate my wife.  The easiest way is to use informal day-to-day recognition.  Although sometimes I fall short, words of affirmation are a great motivator in keeping the family functioning.  Simple things like thanking my wife for cooking dinner, taking care of the yard or running errands in support of the family unit really charge her up and help motivate her to continue on…just surviving in today’s busy society can be a challenge - verbalizing to your spouse can affect the happiness of the family!  Same for the kids.  My oldest daughter is very smart and sensitive.  By praising her with atta-boys (or atta-girls), her spirit seems to be lifted.  In turn, she then seems receptive and motivated to doing homework and chores.  She also seems excited and energized to be a part of the family.

We also have a somewhat hokey family tradition.  We have a family ‘trophy’ comprised of a horse and 2 dogs that is titled ‘The Anderson Family Trophy’.  Each night (well, almost each night) the person who has the trophy recognizes another family member who did exceptionally well that day.  At dinner, the presenter gives the trophy to the winner and shares with the family why they deserve the award.  For us, it ends up pretty evenly distributed (as to not hurt anyone’s feelings), but the result is amazing.  We all feel like we are a part of a positive family.  This formal recognition is a great way to celebrate the accomplishments of the day.

In the workplace, informal recognition takes on the same tone.  Words of affirmation – to everyone - seems like it boosts morale and makes the job at hand more fun.  Although my co-workers may not realize this, but my day-to-day informal recognition includes a simple ‘Thanks’ when someone leaves.  It may be pretty simple to deliver, but I really think that acknowledging someone for putting in a solid days work is crucial to happiness.  I am very grateful when each of my co-workers spends a day out of their life with me.  Sure they get paid, but they could get paid anywhere, yet they choose to spend it at my company and help in our quest to provide recognition to others.  Other simple ways to informally recognize can include notes, cards, and thanks in the presence of others.

Symbols of formal recognition are what we provide.   I feel this is as important as informal recognition as it provides a sense of permanency to the accomplishment.  For kids, a simple trophy not only helps celebrate the completion of the season, but also motivates them to try harder next time and provides a feeling of ‘that was cool, I can’t wait until next season’.  For adults in the workplace, formal recognition is more complex.  Formal recognition is (and should be) thought out in advance.  Strategy, measurement and delivery of formal recognition should be pre-planned and aligned with the goals of the program.  Some of the most successful sales, service or training recognition programs we see are created with longevity in mind.  These programs have management buy-in, are taken very seriously, and are flexible enough to change.  The results of a successful formal recognition program are people who genuinely want to contribute to their company.  I feel that is a tremendous tool for any leader of a company or organization to understand and use.

As always, your thoughts and questions are welcome.  We at trophies2go.com are here to assist in whatever way possible…