Chris Robertson, Negosentro | People are naturally competitive. Your goal as an employer is to bring out that competitiveness in a safe environment. It might seem easy to give an award. It’s meant to boost the productivity in the workplace. It is supposed to give your employees something to work forward to and something to strive for. The problem, however, is that if you have a narrow margin for what warrants an award, you might see the opposite effect happen. This is typically because people who are not eligible for the award this time might not consider trying to win and decrease their productivity levels.
The secret is to reward employees based on their unique strengths. Giving awards should only be second to the other reward programs that your company can offer. Here are five suggestions to increase the value of your rewards amongst your employees:
- Milestone Rewards
Rather than pitting employee against employee, reward the milestones of each employee. This can be anything from an email thanking an employee for a year’s worth of service to custom glass awards that reward an employee after they complete so many sales. When you don’t pit employees against each other, and instead reward them based on a set of standards that anyone can reach, you find an increase in productivity.
This is because your employees can’t dismiss these milestone rewards because they aren’t eligible for them like with other awards like “Best Salesperson”. These awards are given to their personal growth.
- Specific Praise (And Criticism)
Honest, specific feedback is more rewarding than you might thing. When someone does a good job, and they know it, it is incredible rewarding to praise them on specific points rather than simply telling them that they did a good job. Further, being specific in why one employee did well will set precedence to your other employees. The same goes with criticism.
- Make the Workplace Happier
The ideal workplace is one where every employee is happy to be there and happy to work there. Small treats like buying lunch can go a long way in improving the relationship that your employees have with their workspace. As a minimum, you should provide snack foods, coffee, and tea to keep your team going.
- Offer Team Rewards
Your employees need to work as a team. One way you can increase teamwork and team relations is to reward team performance. For instance, is a team closes a deal or finishes a project, give them a budget to go out and have celebratory drinks. To go even further, make sure that you reward the most valuable members of the team. Top performers can feel demotivated if everyone gets the same rewards, and poorer performers have no incentive to increase their productivity.
Use multiple approaches to both reward and critique employees so that personal growth and teamwork improve. You want to be fair when you are rewarding your employees and recognize the personal achievements. Set a list of milestones that every employee can reach and provide an incentive for them to reach it sooner, be specific with your praise, and offer treats and rewards for good teamwork behavior.
