Don’t Do Engagement – Do Engaging

Virtually all employee engagement efforts begin with some kind of logically designed survey that will give management some kind score from which you can implement some kind of process to influence that score.  The score can be 1 to 5, or 10 or even 1 to 100.  It theoretically gives management some kind of engagement continuum to measure how well your employees are engaged, or not pending your point of view. 

On a broad scale we suppose it does tell you at least something about the overall feeling, mood, temperament, attitude or general frame of mind of the company.  So now you have a place from which to change, based on all the tools you put in place to drive engagement.  And management will do what they are supposed to do, they will attempt to achieve the goal…total employee engagement.

Sorry to say, that’s not possible, has anyone ever achieved total employee engagement?  Companies love to work from objective “To Do” list of engagements so they can check the various items off the list.  Help with personal growth? Check.  Fully involved Wellness program? Check. Implement continuous feedback? Check.  Make work fun? Check. Establish company wide recognition effort? Check. Encourage experimentation? Check.  Implement another engagement survey?  Check.

So what now? You moved the score up a few notches, what’s left?  As you add new benefits or programs engagement scores will rise and then most likely fall back.  There won’t be an end, you will always have an average score.

The only real important element is the fact that you are engaged.  Safety experts prove that all the time by simply paying attention to the workers and recognizing their positive safety performance.  Other consultants have proved that simply paying attention to workers can improve productivity. 

Is employee engagement really about employee engagement or about management engagement?  We’re talking about all of management, from front line supervisors thru the department and division level to the executive floor.  When they are engaged with the employees, listening to them, relating to them, encouraging them and even correcting them, your employees will be engaged.  And when you build a company from that perspective, and as engaged employees move into management your company will continue to grow and change. 

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net

Make the most of your gift card program

(Excerpted in part with permission from National Gift Card Corp.’s white paper “Getting the Most Out of Your Gift Card Program,” www.ngc-group.com/blog/industry-news/getting-the-most-out-of-your-gift-card-program)

When gift cards are referred to as “the reward of choice,” the description comes with solid research. A study by the Incentive Research Foundation (IRF) and the Incentive Gift Card Council (IGCC) found that U.S. businesses spent $22.7 billion on cards for employee incentive and customer loyalty programs. While more than 59% of businesses rely on non-cash rewards, a full 87% of those companies are using gift cards. 

Data from the company's perspective includes: 

• 60% of companies using gift cards favor them for ease of administration
• 59% cite broad audience appeal, 52% for redemption and flexibility
• 48% appreciate a gift card’s perceived value over cash rewards
• More than 75% of gift card program owners believe they “are among the most effective of all rewards – especially in driving loyalty and engagement.” 

Data from the recipient's perspective includes: 

• The largest share of respondents – 44% – say gift cards, not cash, are their favorite award type
• They appreciate the redemption flexibility gift cards offer: the ability to redeem them in a brick-and-mortar store, at an online retail site, or via a phone order.
• Recipients find gift cards have greater and longer-lasting impact than cash rewards
• More than 79% of the study said they remembered what they purchased with their card
• More than 79% linked that positive memory of the gift back to the people or company that awarded it.

Electronic gift cards are increasingly popular. Through codes delivered via e-mail and mobile devices, they allow for immediate rewards, offer a variety of redemption choices for issuers as well as recipients, and are an environmentally friendly way to deliver awards.

Purchasing gift cards

Sending employees to purchase gift cards at retail locations or “card malls,” while appearing on the surface to be an easy purchase decision, can actually cost a company more than it may realize.  In addition to travel time while it takes only a minute or two to activate a single gift card at a retailer’s point of sale (POS) terminal, the task multiplicity of activating and verifying a large quantity of cards (not to mention dealing with various denominations within the purchase) takes much longer, and could be prone to error.

The grossed up average hourly wage of the above, amortized over the volume of the cards purchased can be substantial.  It can easily amount to over 10% of the purchase.  Other cost considerations would be lost time productivity, actual travel costs, and in particular safety and security concerns.  

Consider using a third party B2B gift card provider to do your gift card sourcing. According to Sales and Marketing Management Magazine (July, 2013), “you get client support, fulfillment services, budget control, cardholder support, and more.” By using an outside source

Most card providers perform this service for fees added to the face amount of the cards purchased.  Ultimate Choice provides this service without fees.  

Choosing a card or cards

You can find almost any gift card imaginable.  So what gift cards should you use?  Do you want to offer just one or two cards, or more?  How many different cards should you offer?  Many companies avoid the entire issue by using an open looped bank card that can be used to make purchases anywhere the card is accepted.  But these cards will have fees as high as 10% of the value especially for lower denominations, and are very difficult to use when combining them with other forms of payment…an occurrence that happens more often than expected. 

In our experience the best motivation for your employees will come when you offer them any card that they want.  If you want them to perform, let them have what they want, instead of what you want them to have.  Using a B2B card provider will do just that.  There are many to choose from.  In your selection process, please include Ultimate Choice, we think we offer the best solution at the absolute best price. 

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net

Formula for the #1 Best Employee Recognition System Ever

First:

Every day you go to work, find at least three of your employees whose performance is worthy of your praise.

Second:

Tell them sincerely that you appreciate their efforts

Third: 

Say thanks and hand them something tangible as an award

It doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that!

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net

The Caveats of a Digital Point Based Award Systems

Point based award systems have been in the incentive industry starting in the fifties.  In those days all the rage was issuing paper checks worth thousands of award credits or points that were redeemed for merchandise awards out of physical catalogs.  These ubiquitous points’ schemes now permeate the marketing world in all sorts b2b as well b2c programs. 

With advancing technology these software incentive management tools offer an ever increasing number of features and mechanisms for “limitless options in one simple solution,” designed to free you up and make all your incentive programs worry free!  Really?

The web is full of these systems, some very sophisticated, and it seems that every full service awards company has their own.  As new software companies spring up with the next “digital points system for the ages”, one seemingly better than the next, we think it is important to let you know that with these, the devil is indeed in the details.  And in the planning and design phase these details are critical to cost and how effective the program will be.  Before you decide on a points based system, remember the phrase Caveat Emptor, or let the buyer beware.  Here are just a couple of important details to be aware of.

Value you ascribe to a point.

To be frank, points based systems were originally invented to hide the price of the

merchandise awards.  At the time they were substantially higher than retail and by using thousands of points for an item, it was difficult to determine the actual value of that item.  With the advent of online merchandise portals it is relatively easy for your participants to determine the real value.  By simply dividing the value you determine the item to be from an online search by the number of points necessary to redeem for the item value per point is readily available.  Take the time to do a random check of items offered to see if they are competitive.  If experience is a guide….you will find that most will not be.

How and when you pay for the points

Whether you pay for the points when you issue them (most suppliers love this approach) or when they are redeemed, opens up a can of worms called “breakage” or “non-redemption.” Regardless of all the mumbo jumbo provided by the supplier, including the scare tactic of which way does or doesn’t have income tax liability, it is typically not in your interest to pay for these points on issuance….period!  We will be happy to consult with you on this particular subject if the facts are being distorted.

The complexity of your point earning rules structures

With any of these systems it’s relatively easy to download a list of participants and the

points earned for a program part.  But we have not seen one system that will take your various raw data that combines to determine how many points were earned based on the specific rules and do those calculations.  That tedious and time consuming chore is up to you.

Buying more features than you need

You don’t need a sledge hammer to crack a walnut.  All of these systems have many more features than you will ever use.  In a survey we did of customers a few years back, the average company that had multi-featured systems used less than 25% of them.

Who controls the award portfolio in your system

This is a critical point often overlooked in the buying process.  Most of these suppliers have come to realize that the profit in selling these systems is in the awards, not the software. 

They often give away the software at cost or for nothing to be able to sell the awards.  When they control the awards piece they control the ongoing profitability.  This is often at the expense of your participant where only a portion of your overall program budget gets to them in awards.  And wasn’t that the idea in the first place?

There are many more caveats that you should consider when you’re in the process of implementing a points based award system.  There’s not enough space to enumerate them here but we would be happy to discuss them with you.  Just let us know.

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.netultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net