Recognize Right Blog: Unlock the People Potential in Your Organization

Next week I will be presenting at the annual Motivation Show in Chicago.  Together with our client, Wolters Kluwer Law & Business, we will discuss how our online recognition platform enabled this organization’s managers to motivate their team members to improved performance.

Five years ago, Wolters Kluwer was looking for a flexible and reliable recognition tool that could be used throughout their organization.  And we had the answer.

Cindy Burrows is a training and development expert with Wolters Kluwer.  During the case study presentation, she will be sharing her journey over the past 5 years of incorporating her vision of accelerating learning and adoption of best practices. 

How she got there was through engaging managers and sales reps.  They started with centrally designed incentives and then turned the reigns over to each functional manager. Post program assessments were required to evaluate ROI. One focus of their incentive was utilization of their CRM system. Her basic strategy was “use it” – and she was right; the more contacts, the more sales. She also wanted to focus on their call center metrics of increasing knowledge, customer engagement, and cross selling, while utilizing a points-based recognition system to reward those who exhibited these behaviors and made improvements.

During this presentation, I will be over viewing effective online recognition tools and how achieving improvement toward your goals (and more) is possible. If you can’t make it to the Motivation Show, check out the presentations online after the conference.

I would like to commend Wolters Kluwer on their utilization of recognition to get more of what they want and to get greater financial growth.

We’ve recently been awarded the prestigious Circle of Excellence Award from Incentive Marketing Association (IMA). I’m very proud of my team as well as my client for creating such a powerful recognition tool.

Just as a little background, the IMA Circle of Excellence Award recognizes those companies whose incentive and recognition programs most successfully motivate their employees or customers. Our client, Scottrade earned the top award for the Best Employee Recognition entry, Above & Beyond.

Scottrade wanted to maintain their “family like” culture.  They wanted a recognition program to make Associates feel respected and appreciated by their peers and by management. The Above & Beyond  program was created and designed to give associates at all levels the power to recognize their fellow counterparts via an online recognition platform.  The process was simple and the results are astonishing. 

Scottrade’s focus is doing what’s right and providing exceptional customer service. Perhaps that’s why they’re rated by Fortune magazine as one of the “100 Best Companies to Work For” in 2009 . They have a great culture.

You might ask yourself, what is the “culture” of your company?  If you feel like your company needs a better culture, especially if you’ve had a lot of recent changes due to the economy, try recognizing the BEHAVIORS and ACTIVITIES you want.  Make sure you recognize the things that support your core values and help you deliver your company strategies – i.e., increase market growth, innovation, or customer satisfaction. Did you know companies with a culture that is aligned to their business goals routinely outperform their competitors? Some studies report the difference at 200% or more.

In addition to driving business results, recognition and incentive programs grow employee culture – encouraging loyalty, engagement, and enthusiasm for the job. Undoubtedly, a recognition program is the most effective way in creating your company’s culture. In turn, you’re going to create a positive, fun atmosphere with engaged and empowered employees!

Does your existing recognition program reinforce your company culture? What do think should be done differently?

When a client asks me questions on how to create a budget for recognition programs I respond, “You need to look at your company’s core values.”  There is more to planning a budget than just numbers.

First you have to ask yourself, what is my business strategy? What am I trying to improve and what is the perceived value? For example, you might focus on retaining employees, customer satisfaction or increasing employee engagement. What is its value to your company?  Maybe what you are spending needs to be reallocated.  Many companies are finding out that it is not spending more money, rather spending it differently.

One of our clients used to recognize employees with hosting a drawing for a big ticket electronic item.  To be included in this drawing, you had to complete a referral.  Instead of having a random drawing, spend those funds to recognize all who reach this bench mark frequently with smaller rewards.  When you recognize individuals for doing the “right things right” those behaviors are reinforced supporting what you are trying to accomplish.

Once you have the value determined, then you can start planning by answering the following questions:

1. How many people will be earning?
2. What type of behaviors (such as productivity, improvement, or recognition), and how many will you recognize for?
   1. Are the behaviors easy to achieve?  If so, give less for these behaviors.
   2. Are the behaviors a stretch to achieve?  If so, give more for these behaviors.
3. How many people do you believe will participate? (About 20% of people do not play in a recognition program.)

Finally, take your budget and parse out by the number of behaviors you will recognize for, the ability/difficulty to achieve these behaviors, the number of people who will earn awards and save some of those funds to recognize for improvement like MORE quality referrals or on time resolutions.

Last week I attended the Incentive Marketing Association (IMA) 10th Annual Executive Summit.  I attended an interesting breakout session regarding social networking.  I am sure you have heard the buzz about the various social networking services; LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc. You might be asking yourself, what is social networking and why is it so important?

According to Wikipedia, a social network service focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most social network services are web based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact. At this time, over 200 different networking services are available.

With these social network services, you can do your “homework” about a perspective client or a new hire.  For example, my daughter recently moved to New York and she needed to find a roommate and an apartment.  First she posted a message, researched her potential roommates (gaining knowledge about their background, family, education), and in the end, she was able to make a better, more informed, quicker decision. 

 It is true about the professional world as well.  About a month ago, we were asked to respond to an RFP.  How this company found us was through the social network world.  They searched for incentive and recognition providers through the various social networking services.  When I did eventually meet the key contact, it was amazing how much she knew about me.

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.  These websites are being used regularly by millions of people. Share your experience or successes about social networking services.

This past spring, my oldest daughter graduated from college. Where did the time go! She came to me with a plan of moving from our small community to the big city of New York. She wasn’t looking for my approval; she was looking for my advice to make this plan successful.

She is a hard-working, very determined, typical Gen Y. She knows what she wants and hasn’t changed much since her second birthday! Ironically, this generation doesn’t want to be told how to do something, rather told how to be more successful. 

She is finding out for herself how competitive the job market is, especially in New York. Because of this, she has become a master of “follow up” and “networking.”  Remember, this generation has grown up with computers, cell phones, and other gadgets us Baby Boomers hadn’t even heard of.  After she has an interview or attends a networking event, she uses all sorts of media to follow up and hopefully sets herself apart from the crowd.

As a rule, Gen Y’ers are looking for challenging positions which will generate immediate success.  They want to impress their new supervisor NOW.  How do you keep this group engaged and focused on what is most important to your business and retained as an employee?  According to research by the Center for Sales Innovation at St. Catherine University in Minnesota, there is a strong, positive correlation between recognition and job satisfaction.

Take a look at my article “To Engage Gen Y Workers, Adopt New Approaches”. Is your company doing the right things to keep this group engaged?  I would love to hear about it.

I presented at the Loyalty Expo in Florida the beginning of June and had an opportunity to have some very interesting conversations with other colleagues about motivating and incenting customers.  My presentation was focused on Best Practices … What’s New!  What’s new was recognizing customers for their knowledge and opinions.

Funny thing (or sad thing) is that the way many customers get valuable knowledge and information about your brand or product is through your companies’ employees. Best in Class customer engagement used online medium to reward for customers responding to surveys and sharing their opinions and knowledge.

Some of the rewards are additional privileges or special offer discounts.  A major food manufacturer enlists customers through advertising to sign-up to take a survey and receive a coupon for a featured product.  Shortly after the coupon is mailed, an electronic survey is sent to gain feedback on the product. 

Have you been involved in this yourself?  Could you see this working in your organization? Let me know.