Rewards and Recognition: 10 Ways to Keep Employees during Economic Downturn

By Barbara Mitchell
The Mitchell Group
Author, “The Essential HR Handbook”

Rewarding employees is especially important when the economic news is negative. But if sales or membership dues are down, how can organizations still come up with ways to reward their good employees without adding to an already stretched thin budget?

Following are 10 low or no cost rewards you can use to keep employees engaged when times are tough:

1. Say “thank you! — This costs nothing but goes such a long way with employees. Managers should say thanks on the spot but even better is when a manager says “thank you” publicly so that the employee gets recognition as well as the thanks. This is such a simple concept but it is amazing how rarely employees tell us they are thanked for doing a good job.

2. Send a hand-written note to employees to say thank you. — Very little in today’s technology-driven world comes in hand written form so a personal note will be a real highlight! Employees have been known to save hand-written notes for years.

3. Surprise employees with low cost items — Give managers a small budget and encourage them to come up with ways to surprise employees. The key here is “surprise”. If employees start to expect something will happen every Tuesday, the reward won’t have nearly the impact than if it is done on a random basis.

Examples include:

• Pizza delivered on a day when staff is particularly stressed over meeting a deadline
• Gift card given at a staff meeting to the person who comes up with the best idea to save money this month (and let the staff vote on who should win)
• Ice cream served on a hot Friday afternoon
• Passes to a local movie theatre when a highly anticipate movie is released

4. Lunch with the CEO or president and let the employee pick the restaurant. — Periodically invite a key employees who doesn’t normally have contact with a top executive to lunch with the CEO or other senior leader. This can also be effective if the lunch is held in the CEO’s office!

5. Provide a training opportunity. — Employees crave personal development so encourage key staffers by letting them take advantage of training and development opportunities.

6. Feature employees in your newsletter or your intranet. — Highlighting achievements that go “above and beyond” often gives them a real confidence boost. Use photos if possible. Send articles about employees to local newspapers for extra publicity for your organization and for the employee.

7. Provide a small supply of business cards to all employees. — This makes everyone feel special and there is something quite significant about seeing their name on a card with the organization’s name and logo.

8. Give employees the logo merchandise you give out at trade shows.

9. Ask employees what suggestions they have for improving the organization’s bottom line. — Then reward the best suggestions. Everyone likes to be asked their opinion.

10. Have the CEO or other top leader stop in department staff meetings thank employees for their contributions. — And be sure to have the CEO stay long enough to answer questions from those employees and collect the questions and answers and publish them in the newsletter on the company’s intranet.

SOME OTHER IDEAS TO CONSIDER

According to Bob Nelson, author of 1001 Ways to Reward Employees, there are three things to keep in mind when it comes to offering rewards:

• Match the reward to the person
• Match the reward to the achievement
• Be timely and specific

Plus, it appears that recognition is better than cash, according to a recent study by Wirthlin Worldwide, which asked people how they spent their most recent cash award.

Respondents said:
• Paid bills: 29%
• Don’t remember: 18%
• Never got one: 15%
• Gifts for family: 11%
• Household items: 11%
• Savings: 11%
• Special treat: 9%
• Vacation: 5%
• Other: 2%

REWARDS AND RECOGNITION GUIDELINES

Program should reflect organization’s values and business strategy
• Organizational culture
• Be true to your organizational values

Employees should participate in the development and execution
• Ask people what they want
• Form a committee to study what would work in your culture

*Programs can involve cash or not
• Cash is a short term motivator (unless you give out a lot of it!)
• Recognition may have a longer-term impact

Programs should have variety
• This is a case where one size does NOT fit all.

Programs should be highly publicized
• Use employee newsletters or other publications
• Orientation programs
• All Hands meetings

Programs should have a short shelf life and be changed frequently
• Employees have a short attention span
• Put a time limit to any program
• Re-introduce it at a later time

Train managers in how to use recognition and rewards
• Stress importance of programs and potential impact on productivity
• Inform how programs work and their vital role in success

Measure the impact
• Define success measures
• Track costs vs. budget
• Hold managers accountable in performance appraisals

Remember: Rewards and recognition are effective ways to “glue” your employees to your organization at any time but are even more important in today’s difficult times. It costs a lot to replace a valued employee so why not invest just a little to keep them with your organization.

ABOUT BARBARA MITCHELL

Mitchell is a human resources and organization development consultant who is widely known as an expert in the areas of recruitment and retention. She has experience in both for-profit and not-for-profit sectors and has consulted to a variety of organizations around the world.

She served in senior human resources leadership positions with Marriott International and several technology firms in the Washington DC area before co-founding the Millennium Group International, LLC (TMG) in 1998. She recently served on the Society of Human Resource Management’s Special Expert Panel on Consulting and Outsourcing in recognition of her expertise and long service to the HR profession. Barbara is a graduate of North Park University, Chicago, IL, with a degree in history and political science and has taken graduate level courses at UCLA.

In 2008, Barbara and fellow HR expert Sharon Armstrong co-wrote The Essential HR Handbook: A Quick and Handy Resource for Any Manager or HR Professional.

Read more HR insights from Barbara Mitchell and Sharon Armstrong.