Effective communication is critical to ensuring a good working environment. Workplace recognition is particularly effective when it comes to employee engagement, productivity, and wellbeing. While many companies may believe they show enough acknowledgment for their staff, a recent engagement and retention report indicated over 80% of employees wish their employer recognized their work more often.
The same report found that one-third of employees also find it hard to connect with their coworkers and the company culture. While employees appreciate flexible scheduling and the ability to work from home, many still desire face-to-face interaction for at least part of the week. With the pandemic forcing many companies to shift to remote platforms, employees feel disconnected, unrecognized, and unmotivated.
Recognizing past and ongoing achievements are essential for employee motivation and productivity. The pandemic has made this more challenging to achieve, but it’s well worth the effort. A Gallup Workplace report found that companies that focus on employee engagement have 41% less absenteeism than those that don’t. The research identified workplace recognition as one of the most effective ways to improve employee engagement and absenteeism rates.
While grand gestures aren’t feasible or realistic for day-to-day interactions, company leadership can implement the following to show employee appreciation:
Regular recognition. Companies can’t afford to wait until a holiday party to recognize employees. Yearly or quarterly recognition isn’t enough to sustain employee engagement. Weekly recognition yields the greatest returns on employee engagement. Recognition efforts don’t need to be over the top, either. They can be as simple as acknowledging an employee’s role in meeting a deadline or highlighting how their work contributes to the company’s goals.
If companies take too long to recognize an employee’s efforts, it isn’t likely to yield the desired outcome. Employees perceive delayed acknowledgment as a check in the box or that their company leadership didn’t notice their efforts in the moment.
Specific acknowledgment. Personalized acknowledgments will always produce better results than sending generic, canned messages to multiple people. When recognition is specific, employees are much more likely to repeat the action in the future.
Public encouragement. Thanking employees behind closed doors doesn’t foster a company culture of appreciation. Recognizing employees in front of their peers is a much more effective means of showing appreciation.
Recognizing employee efforts is an effective motivator. It improves employee engagement and has a direct effect on absenteeism. To learn more about reducing absenteeism in the workplace, contact the experts at Actec.