3 Simple Guidelines You Should Follow For Effective Recognition
Match the reward to the person – Start with knowing your employees and their personal preferences, and reward employees in ways they will truly find rewarding. Such rewards may be personal or official, informal or formal, public or private, and may take the shape of gifts or activities. To save yourself from guessing what employees may like in terms of effective recognition; just ask your employees what they most value. Give employees an index card and ask them to list forms of recognition they like, which is what several organizations do.
Match the reward to the achievement – Effective reinforcement should be customized to take into consideration the significance of the achievement and the amount of time spent on a project. Obviously, an employee who completes a two-year project should be rewarded in a more substantial way than one who simply does a favor for you. And, of course, the reward should be dependent upon the amount time you have to plan and execute it and the money you have to spend.
Be timely and specific – To be effective, rewards need to be given as soon as possible after the desired behavior or achievement. Those that come weeks or months later do little to motivate employees to repeat their actions. You should always explain why an employee is receiving the reward. Once you have consistently rewarded desired performance, your pattern of recognition may become more recurrent as the desired behavior becomes habitual. In fact, research shows that recurrent reinforcement becomes more effective in sustaining performance in the long run.
Category: Recognition
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