An Important Insight for Employee Morale

One of the activities I love to do is to bring clarity to the commonly used language we use in our everyday work as managers, leaders, and HR professionals.

One set of words we use frequently, related directly to employee morale, are (1) appreciation, (2) rewards, and (3) recognition, and they are typically clumped together. Each has its own definition and impact.

It's useful to understand this because, as we know, they are all essential to feeding and maintaining employee morale and motivation. Maintaining morale is not optional, but I see in many cases it is taken for granted.

As we help clients implement our Distinct Leader Blueprint - morale maintenance is the 8th building block out of 9 - and understanding the following will provide an opportunity for more meaning and impact.

Including the 3 listed above, here are the 5 most popular, and their definitions:

1. Recognize - notice its existence
2. Acknowledge - an external expression of the fact, importance or quality of
3. Appreciate - recognize the full worth of - its value to...
4. Reward - make a gift (give a thing or serve) of something to (someone) in recognition of their services, efforts, or achievements
5. Celebrate - mark something of meaning with fun, partying, excitement, praise, or honor

As you review these, here's what you might notice - each provides a different human experience. We commonly use some of these interchangeably - e.g. recognize - acknowledge, however, there is a difference.

For example, you can recognize someone's activity - internally notice it - and yet not acknowledge it  - externally express it. Each of these serves its own distinct purpose. Of note, you have to have the first - recognized from the inside - for the others to occur.

Here's another example: receiving appreciation from a manager has a different feeling/experience than receiving it from a colleague or a team.

I also think #5 celebrating holds its own very unique impact. I don't think we do this enough...even in life in general, let alone in the work environment.

Just in case you've forgotten, all 5 are not optional to being an effective leader-manager, talent management, nurturing employee engagement... you get the point.

For those of you who consistently read our work, you know our philosophy - meet the human needs, and the most important needs of your business and/or organization will be met as well.

2 Coaching tips:

1. Notice the distinctions and use them accordingly. Make a plan!
2. Customize your rewards - survey your team members to find out what is personally meaningful to them. You can even categorize the rewards based on $ value - for example: under $25, $50-100. A company I worked for (#1 on the INC 500 list) did this - under $25.00 metro cards were popular (this was in Chicago), $50-100 - dinner or theatre tickets... are some examples.

Several years ago there was a survey done of a group of health care workers. The question was asked, "What is the one thing you would like from your boss?" The #1, most popular answer was a handwritten thank you note. Interesting...

If you'd like some creative ideas, here are a few great resources I've referred clients to throughout the years. Bob Nelson put out a series of books with a variety of themes related to rewards, motivations, engagement, and so on. It's titled 1501 Way to Reward Employees - this link leads to his book on Amazon.

And lastly, this month on YouTube - I'm starting a series on performance management. We're breaking it down and making suggestions on how to modernize approaches and practices - you don't want to miss it! Subscribe here. By the way, I even ask the question, "Is your approach to performance management damaging your team or company culture?" I welcome your comments for a robust dialogue.

Until next time - support your success!

- JoAnn