Before we progress too much into this article, first we should discuss the meaning of “inner work life” – it is the emotions, motivations, and perceptions that constitute a person’s reaction to the events of the work day. Not only does this affect the overall person’s well being, it can ultimately affect the bottom line of your organization.  When people have a positive “inner work life,” they are more creative, engaged, productive, committed – and the list goes on and on.

One of the top job tasks as Senior Executives is enabling employee engagement throughout your forces and monitoring progress toward your defined strategy.  As a senior leader, typically you don’t have a lot of opportunities to affect the positive inner work life, but you would be surprised on how the smallest action such as what you do or say can make a huge impact to those on your team. 

These mistakes or traps, described by McKinsey Quarterly, fall into four categories.  These traps were derived from over 850 daily electronic diaries from upper or top-level managers. 

1. Trap 1 – Mediocrity Signals – Like all organizations, you desire greatness – using your mission statements to relay your message.  But are you sending mixed messages?  Are you sending messages that your organization is mediocre? Does your workforce think they work for a mediocre company?
2. Trap 2 – Strategic ‘Attention Deficit Disorder’ – Many top leaders are beginning to research new initiatives and strategies and then dropping those ideas before they can see if they are truly working.
3. Trap 3 – Corporate Keystone Kops – This trap was named after the Keystone Kops – the fictional policeman who wasted a lot of time, running around in circles and not accomplishing anything. When coordination and support are not visible at a company, people start to lack self confidence.  This makes it really hard to have a sense of purpose throughout your organization.
4. Trap 4 – Misbegotten ‘Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals’ – These larger than life goals can be so extreme they are seen as unattainable, causing much dismay throughout your organization.

As a top leader, how can you avoid these traps? For starters, you can ask yourself these questions:

1. When you communicate with employees, do you provide strategic clarity that’s consistent with your company’s capabilities and a clear understanding of where it can add the most value?
2. Can you keep sight of the individual employee’s perspective? 
3. Do you have any early-warning signs that indicate when your view from the top isn’t reality to what is on the ground?

This article states the importance of senior executives and how they can provide a sense of purpose and progress.  You are the front line to identify and communicate the higher purpose of what people can do within your organization.  Do this correctly, and you will create an environment that enables engagement and productivity.  What can you do within your organization to avoid the traps?  We would love to hear your thoughts.     

According to the Internet World Stats, there are over 660 million Facebook users. Can you think of an easier way to get a message out to your people? Social media offers a quick and easy way for peer-to-peer recognition and recognition of those who demonstrate company values and desired key behaviors.  This allows leaders within an organization to recognize above-and-beyond behaviors in a timely and fun way.  

Not only can social media be used to recognize others, it is a great vehicle to communicate the reward opportunities and remind them of company goals and key strategies – this will build excitement and engagement around your expectations. Others will view the recognition and why it was earned and that behavior will be replicated and repeated. 

According to the IMA Recognition Council Trends Survey, many organizations are already making some head-way with over 85% using social media to promote and market their products and services.  Using social media for rewards and recognition programs is definitely on the rise with 36% using social media during an incentive and recognition program – this would include communicating the opportunity and recognizing others. 

Social networking has encouraged new ways to communicate and share information which I believe in turn can improve your performance and the performance of others.  Is your organization using social media to share recognition experiences?

As a recipient of this prestigious award, it gives me the opportunity to again recognize and thank each one of my staff for the outstanding and innovative energy they put into every one of our clients’ projects and our own company. They are the ones that make Anderson Performance Improvement what it is.  Thank you TEAM!

Just a little background, HRO Today is the only publication dedicated to covering the outsourced HR services market, including both comprehensive and end-to-end services.

Results for the Baker’s Dozen are based upon a customer satisfaction survey completed by executives who are current buyers of rewards and recognition services. The Baker’s Dozen recipients were rated on the breadth of their service, the size of the programs they manage, and the quality of service provided – rankings and weightings are determined statistically, and all feedback is from customers. HRO Today received feedback from more than 230 verified customers. The resulting rankings are a trusted way to identify the best provider to meet an organization’s current rewards and recognition needs.

My staff and our tools make rewards and recognition programs simple, yet powerful by using one platform that can do it all. If you want to run a program for sales, peer-to-peer recognition or tackle a little of everything, our flexible online tool along with our talented staff can do it.  Take a look at the full story – I’d love to hear your feedback!

No matter what your company is trying to sell, a pair of jeans or the core technology for nuclear technology, the sales process does not vary – targeting, planning, messaging, collaborating, and negotiating.  The length and depth of each step may vary by industry, but the sales cycle steps do not. To make a sale, a sales force is “highly encouraged” by management to complete each step, but are they doing each step “right”?

To create a sales incentive program focused on behaviors, it is important to identify types of behavior that are measurable and ultimately lead to sales success.  Possible measurable behaviors are:

• Complete a specified number of account plans
• Create a list of companies you would like to target
• Identify the economic buyer / influencer within target account
• Complete a certain number of sales calls
• Attend customer feedback meetings

In 2010, less than half of all salespeople hit or exceeded their sales quotas.  You might find this data alarming! Implementing a behavior-based sales incentive and recognition program can increase this percentage and lead to greater closing rates and higher margins.  

For example, a large telecommunications organization was suffering from a deficient sales funnel. The objective of the program was to increase the accounts in the sales funnel and ultimately increase sales.  Each participant was rewarded for targeting ten accounts with a mix of products/solutions and closing sales to those targeted accounts.  The program resulted in a 500% ROI!

Sales incentive programs almost always are viewed as having worked well if they create impressive and permanent improvement in sales volume that endures well after the programs have ended. Rewarding your sales staff on sales behaviors will produce those lasting effects! Is your organization including behavior-based sales incentives in their total rewards package?

Less than half of employees (43 percent) who responded to the survey said they receive adequate non-monetary rewards and recognition for their contributions at work; only 57 percent reported being satisfied with their employer’s work-life practices. Just 52 percent of employees said they feel valued on the job, only two thirds reported being motivated to do their best at work, and almost a third (32 percent) indicated that they intend to seek employment elsewhere within the next year.

Although times have been tough for many organizations everywhere, APA has recognized those employers who have stepped up to the plate and understand the link between employee well-being and organizational performance.  These employers reported an average turnover rate of just 11 percent in 2010 – significantly less than the national average of 38 percent as estimated by the U.S. Department of Labor. Additionally, only 6 percent said they intend to seek employment elsewhere within the next year, compared to 32 percent nationally.

This is the perfect time to create a culture of recognition within your organization! Creating a culture of recognition with your workforce is good for employees and great for business.  Recognition leads to happy, motivated, and engaged employees. Make it a daily goal to recognize someone in your organization.  Did you recognize someone today?

During this seminar, I discussed the results in a case study highlighting our client’s success using recognition to ramp-up their training efforts.  Here are a few highlights from the case study: 

• Situation – Large organization was experiencing insufficient and ineffective training.
• Objectives – Management wanted to improve sales skills and solution-selling, increase sales, and increase multiple product selling.
• Solution – Reps were awarded for taking and passing online quizzes about new products, selling techniques, and typical objections.  Team Leaders were also rewarded if 75% of their team participated and passed the quiz.
• Results – The results were astonishing!  Sales increased in excess of 20%, Rep retention also increased, and the program ROI was over 240%!!

The Corporate Executive Board (CEB) recently released the results of a survey of 50,000 employees from more than 50 companies across multiple industries stating almost 2/3 of all employees are only 33% as productive as they can be because they don’t understand what they are asked to do, nor have the knowledge to do it.  

How can companies gain a competitive advantage when many of the employees don’t have a clear vision and knowledge of the corporate goals? CEB has identified that companies need to align their employees with their corporate strategies. A great way to share and educate strategies/goals to associates is through a knowledge-validation system and training, with recognition. If they know it, reward them!

Many progressive companies that are tying recognition to their training efforts are realizing these benefits: 

• Boosts Confidence and Improves Performance – Give your employees the knowledge, and confidence will grow!
• Engagement Increases – Employees will become more engaged because they have the knowledge.
• Builds Loyalty – Those who gain knowledge about their role, products, and company are most likely to be long-term, dedicated employees.
• Speed to Market – Employees will learn quickly and are more apt to learn the knowledge NOW!
• Provides Coaching Opportunities – Managers can easily see who will benefit from additional training.
• Builds Best Practices – Employees who learn best practices will put them to use – particularly if they are rewarded for doing so.  

Take a look at your organization’s training efforts.  Are you spending thousands of dollars on training initiatives without desired outcomes?  Recognize those who validate the knowledge!

The IMA recognizes the “Best in Class” incentive and recognition programs and honors companies and their partners. The Circle of Excellence Award is based on a broad range of criteria including scope of the program, creativity, and most importantly, results.

We developed “Move It” to increase the physical activity of employees and educate them about health and wellness. Participants can earn points for healthy habits and physical activity. Each day, we track the number of steps and total minutes of activity. Participants are also presented with a Challenge-of-the-Day; a fun, short, wellness tip. Each day it is a different, challenging topic; for example, today we are challenged to do lunges when you go to the lunchroom, break room, etc. 

Because all employees participated in the “Move It” program, it resulted in a noticeable impact on our culture. Some changes that resulted from the program were replacing soda machines with filtered water, instituting walking meetings, and offering healthy foods for birthday celebrations.

Not only has it made a huge impact on our culture, it has added a fun element to our workspace! The wellness points earned from “Move It” are added to an already existing online award point account where employees are also recognized by peers and managers for outstanding contributions as well as years of service. More and more employees are redeeming the points earned for “wellness” type rewards; one employee used her points to purchase a treadmill.

Has your organization instituted a health and wellness program?  Is your organization rewarding those who exhibit healthy habits?

This survey consisted of 1,176 companies in 23 countries, including 314 U.S. firms, conducted in May and June.  Only some of these U.S. companies surveyed are acknowledging their workers are feeling overloaded and overstressed.  Sixty-one percent of the companies said their cost cutting has increased employees’workloads, while 53% said cost cutting has made it harder for employees to manage their work-related stress.  Engagement has suffered as well; it has made it tougher for workers to maintain a healthy balance between their work and personal lives. Our nations’ workforce is being spread way too thin!

To make things worse, workers are feeling under-appreciated. Fifty-two percent of employees said their employer has done nothing to reward their achievements in the past year, and 59% said they are making the same or less than they were two years ago, according to an August survey by Glassdoor.com, a career and workplace community.

“While employers have been focused on cost cutting and rightsizing during the
downturn, employees are often left feeling stressed, overworked and underpaid,
and a little recognition can really go a long way,” states Robert Hohman,
co-founder and chief executive of Glassdoor.com in a press release.

Even if promotions or raises are not in the budget, something as small as ‘a great job’ or ‘thank you’ from a supervisor or peer will help employees feel more appreciated. And yes, it does go a long way!  We are constantly hearing great stories about employees thanking their leadership for even the smallest recognition during these tough times.  Recognition makes people feel like winners and, guess what, winners keep on winning!  It is positively contagious.

This is the perfect time to create a culture of recognition. Statistics show companies who recognize their people outperform companies that don’t by 30 to 40 percent. Recognition leads to happy, motivated, and engaged employees, and that adds to the bottom line – both in employee retention and net revenue.

So what is next for the U.S. workforce?  Many companies want to get back to the basics and include non-cash incentives as part of the plan. Has your company instituted a recognition system?

“People may take a job for more money, but they often leave it for more recognition.” – Bob Nelson

This statement is so true.  It is so important to recognize someone for a job well done.  Make it a daily goal!

Did you recognize someone today?

The donor approached a top advertising agency with his ideas and then joined forces with Outdoor Advertising Association of America.  The messages are simple, yet motivating, using facts about past recessions and straightforward, light-hearted messages; one of the billboards can even be spotted in Times Square. Some of the messages read “Interesting fact about recessions…they end” and “Self worth beats net worth.”

These motivational messages are not selling anything, just merely uplifting the American spirit and are designed to remind us of what makes this country great.  The Recession 101 messages can be seen on numerous outdoor advertising formats including billboards, street furniture, and transit hubs in over 2000 locations.

Have you seen any of these Recession 101 billboards?  What are your thoughts?