Why Does Employee Recognition Matter?

 Rewarding and recognizing employees for performance has been in the business world since the beginning of the 20^th century.  With the unprecedented changes to our workforce due to the pandemic, recognizing employees and thanking them for their efforts has never been more important. 

A review of employee research and studies done over the last few years gives us a wonderful perspective of the many of the reasons that employee recognition does matter.  It is a significant strategy to employ especially at times like this when getting the right employees on the job and then motivating them to perform in the manner to achieve our objective.  There is no better time to make sure you use recognition to attract and engage your employees. 

Some reasons to remember why employee recognition does matter are: 

Recognition helps to relieve this workload stress. Due to the pandemic, many U.S. companies took cost-cutting actions that involved some sort of reduction in force, oftentimes increasing the workloads of existing employees, freezing salary increases, and reducing bonuses.

 Recognition helps to foster engagement. Gallup did a study that showed engaged employees are more productive, profitable and more customer-service-focused and more likely to stay on the job.  

Recognition drives higher return to shareholders.  A Watson Wyatt study showed that companies with effective recognition programs realized a median return to shareholders about double what companies without recognition programs achieved. 

Employee recognition can reduce turnover.  A Robert Half study, showed that 17 percent of good employees who quit their jobs did so because of lack of recognition.

Recognition builds confident employees.  According to Barbara Mitchell, a respected HR consultant, ”recognition shows confidence in employees, and confident employees are more productive.” 

Recognition encourages innovation. It encourages employees to come up with better ways to do a task resulting in higher productivity, lower costs or both. 

Recognition provides purpose for your employees.  Recognition is powerful because it answers a fundamental human need, the need to feel valued in what we do. 

Recognition increases productivity. In their book “12: The Elements of Great Managing,” Wagner and Harter drawing on ten million workplace interviews noted that variations in recognition and praise account for ten to twenty percent differences in productivity and revenue, as well as customer engagement. 

Recognition motivates repeat performance.  Robert Cialdini, in his classic book 'Influence’ noted that the principle of consistency means that when you show recognition of particular behaviors, you are encouraging more of the same in the future. So be sure to recognize what you want to encourage. An added bonus of focusing this way is that, due to the Law of Attraction, you are likely to find more behavior worthy of recognition.

 

Drive Wellness with Consistent Recognition Awards

 

At the beginning of every year, wellness is a top resolution for many folks.  In fact, research has shown that losing weight and becoming fit are the most common resolutions made for the New Year.  

Changing to a healthy lifestyle is a behavior issue, and a tough one at that.  It’s difficult to start and even more difficult to maintain changing to a healthy lifestyle.  The gyms are full in January and February and by the end of April, back to their normal levels.  It’s natural for people to stop doing what they don’t want to do without some positive reinforcement along the way.  

As many companies have done, consider using consistent and continuous reinforcement along the way.  Minimal gift card awards are idea to promote wellness efforts and keep people involved.  The economic benefits of a long term healthy lifestyle far outweigh the small cost necessary to keep an employee motivated to achieve success. 

We have several award systems available that are easy to implement and administer.  One may be just the one for you. 

Gift Cards Can be Used to Achieve Various Corporate Objectives.

 

Gift cards are used to attain many corporate objectives According to ongoing research done by the Incentive Research Foundation, following is a list of the main reasons given by companies using gift cards

 

Primary Objectives for Using Gift Cards	Ave. % of Responses
Recognize individual or team performance	75.5%
Boost morale	57.9%
Increase or maintain sales	46.4%
Build employee loyalty/trust	35.7%
Build customer loyalty/trust	32.9%
Improve customer service	31.4%
Foster teamwork	25.7%
Improve safety/reduce accidents	25.4%
Start/maintain business relationships	15.7%
Improve employee health/reduce insurance costs	14.5%
Create new markets	11.4%
Other	3.6%

 

 

If you want a truly successful recognition or incentive program, be award neutral in your decision of what awards to use in your program.  When you provide the awards that your people want, they work harder to achieve your objectives in order to attain them.

Are Gift Cards Used in Recognition Programs More Effective than Traditional Merchandise Awards?

 

In the fall of 2009, Incentive Magazine compared the effectiveness of gift cards to traditional merchandise awards in employee recognition programs.  Following are the results of that study. 

 

How Effective Are Gift Cards Compared to Merchandise	% of Responses
More effective than merchandise	64.7%
Equally as effective as merchandise	24.5%
Less effective than merchandise	2.2%
Do not use merchandise awards	8.6%

 

The Incentive Research Foundation has conducted this study every year since 2009, and the results have been very similar.  In fact, the data has been within +/- 5% of the original research.  This is not surprising to those of us who implement gift cards award systems in companies.  Gift cards have grown to be the single largest employee award in the industry.

 And the reasons remain the same: 

• Gift Cards aree easy to administer
• Gift Cards give your employees the award they want not the one you think they want.
• With Gift Cards virtually all of your recognition budget gets into the hand of your employees, where it belongs.

 

 

 

 

Gift cards are more effective than traditional merchandise awards for two simple reasons:  they provide the greatest choice at the greatest value to both the client and the award winner.  Nothing else even comes close.  Read more about why gift cards are the #1 incentive award.