2011 August Archive - RecognizeThis! Blog

Archive for August, 2011

High Performance HR Systems – Behavior-Based Approach Is Critical

Recognize This! – Employee attitudes can flex to the culture they are in. Be sure to provide the best culture – a culture of recognition – to drive your company forward.

I follow several dozen news sites and blogs dedicated to HR, leadership, management, and employee recognition and appreciation. Out of these sites, there are a few that stand above the rest – my “go-to” sites for thoughtful analysis of industry research and insightful responses to trends. One of those sites is Bret Simmons’ blog on Positive Organizational Behavior.

One such insightful post Bret wrote last week on new research in the Journal of Applied Psychology on high performance HR systems, employee attitude and group performance. The full research is certainly worth a read, finding:

“The study demonstrates that building an effective HR system may have a powerful influence on the attitudes and behaviors of individual employees. Not only is this likely to create a more positive work place environment but it also seems to have an influence on departmental performance… This highlights the importance of not just managing based upon results but also paying attention to the role that attitudes and behaviors play in creating better results.”

While that finding is interesting enough, it’s Bret’s take on it that I find compelling:

“If your employees are not performing as well as you would like, it’s very likely because they are not very satisfied with their jobs and committed to the organization. Their lack of satisfaction and commitment is most likely a result of a crappy HR practice or system of practices. Stop blaming employees and fix the systems if you want to improve attitudes, behaviors and performance.”

I look at it this way. The attitudes (and behaviors) of employees are like a fluid filling a container – the attitude will swell to fill the culture provided. It’s up to leadership to create the appropriate “culture vessel.” A culture of recognition is the most powerful approach to positively and frequently reinforce desired employee behaviors and attitudes (ideally based on your company values). The system most likely to achieve this culture is strategic recognition in which such habits of detailed appreciation are encouraged, tracked and reported.

What kind of “culture vessel” are you creating for your employees?

Engaged Employees Are Still a Flight Risk, Unless…

Recognize This! – Highly engaged employees are not necessarily more likely to stay – unless you create a culture of recognition centered on meaningful work, teamwork, trust and respect.

Do you have highly engaged employees? Have you conducted surveys showing you have a respectably high rate of engaged vs. disengaged employees? What are you doing with those results?

Too often, leadership assumes achieving high engagement scores is enough. But an engagement survey is like any other – surveys without action are less than useless to employees. It’s what leadership does with their findings from the surveys that matter the most to employees.

Talent Management just published results of research from Accenture showing that evenly highly engaged employees are still a flight risk, highlighting:

Linking Engagement to Retention
The report details three employee beliefs that are important for sustained engagement:

I’m making a difference: Employees believe the work they are doing is important.

We’re in this together: Everyone is doing their part.

My company has my back: There is a culture of trust and respect.

Meaningful work in a climate of trust and respect is clearly a powerful indicator of a culture of recognition in which employees would not only want to engage but also stay for the long-term. Considering the high cost of replacing key employees and the difficulty in finding them (even in this economy), organization leadership should be doing all they can to create such an engaging culture.

To learn how, be sure to register for my webinar on Thursday with Bill Catlette, co-author of the Contented Cow series of books and the recent Rebooting Leadership. On 1^st September at 3:00 pm ET (Noon PT/8:00 pm GMT), we will share practical advice on creating such a culture that will engage employees while increasing retention, performance and productivity in today’s rapidly moving work environment. Register for “Building a Go-Fast Organization” today!

Perspective: Bring Balance to Employee/Employer Relations

Recognize This! – Changing perspective can often change the game.

Perspective on the workforce seems more necessary now than ever as the market enters another downward cycle yet companies have already cut their workforce to the bone. In such an atmosphere, it’s important to keep perspective – especially these two facets.

Perspective on Key Contributors

Seth Godin recently told this story about the Rolling Stones:

Keith Richards tells a great story about Charlie Watts, legendary drummer for the Stones.

After a night of drinking, Mick saw Charlie asleep and yelled, “Is that my drummer? Why don’t you get your arse down here?”

Richards continues, “Charlie got dressed in a Savile Row suit, tie, shoes, shaved, came down, grabbed him and went boom! Don’t ever call me ‘your drummer’ again. You’re my … singer.”

No drums, no Stones. Who’s playing the drums in your shop?

It’s a great story as a reminder that – though the front-man singer in the band is perhaps the most well known – those in the background (quite literally in the case of the drummer) are the ones that make the group, well, a group. Yet, the same would be true if only Charlie Watts were on stage. Each needed the other, as well as the rest of the band and crew, to be the Rolling Stones.

A manager can lead all he wants, but without a team of people to lead to complete projects of value to the market, what’s the point? Similarly, employees do need direction and leadership. Companies need both managers and employees.

Perspective on How the Work Gets Done

A friend showed me this video of 3-D Dodgeball – the schoolyard game taken to the next level by being played on trampolines.

Adding extreme height as well as vertical viewpoints only possible while flying through the air adds more elements of perspective on the game – on targets as well as how to avoid being the target.

Think what adding a different level of perspective could do to a project at work. Do you give your employees permission to look at a problem differently to perhaps arrive at a novel solution? Or does management insist on “this is the way we’ve always done it?”

How could your team or organization benefit from additional perspective?

Integrating People Strategies into Your Management Plan

Recognize This! – Too often, critical people management strategies – for risk and for reward – are ignored in overall business plans.

How strong is your company’s risk management plan? How strong is your human capital risk management plan? Recent research out of The Conference Board found companies do not incorporate human capital risk management issues into overall risk-management plans.

“At most companies, human capital accounts for at least half of operating costs and can have a significant impact on business results. However, the study finds that human capital risk (HCR) — which can range from unionization/labor relations to offshoring and outsourcing to staffing in a pandemic — tends to be siloed in human resources departments, away from the companywide assessment and mitigation processes of enterprise risk management (ERM). This arrangement prevents information about HCR from having a role in the comprehensive, aggregate view of risks, root causes, interactions and impacts through which leaders set priorities and determine overall strategy.

“‘Executives clearly recognize that human capital can have a make-or-break impact on business performance,’ [Mary B.] Young, [principal researcher at the Conference Board], said. ‘Yet few companies have a systematic process or structure in place to ensure that the full spectrum of human capital risks — not just a few, top-of-the-house issues like succession planning or the leadership pipeline — is considered as part of enterprise-level risk assessment and management.’”

I’m not surprised in the slightest by this finding. While the Conference Board report specifically looked at the negative side of the equation – risks, our own experience with organizations around the world has found the same to be true on the positive side with recognition and rewards.

As Eric Mosley, my CEO and co-author with me of Winning with a Culture of Recognition, say in that book:

If an investor asked, “What’s your strategic plan?” You roll out sixty-slide decks filled with product plans, customer profiles, marketing plans, and financial performance data. This planning is good. Yet when we ask executives, “Tell me about your recognition strategy,” they have no binder, no deck of slides, no metrics, no execution plan. Recognition, for all its importance, is an outlier, not subject to the same rigorous planning and monitoring as other management practices. Why is this?

Done strategically, recognition can be planned and executed in a company like any other management practice, and therein lies the opportunity for competitive advantage. Most of your competitors punt all responsibility for recognition to “Bob and Mary,” mid-level workers in the HR department. Bob and Mary are not required to operate recognition as a strategic practice, yet recognition is one of the few practices left that offers competitive advantage. Others, like compensation, financial discipline, and quality control are so well established that your competition manages these in essentially the same way as you. If you elevate recognition to the level of other strategic practices, you create a fresh competitive advantage.

How integrated are your people strategies – for both risk management and recognition and reward? Integrating the latter can go a long way towards reducing the need for the former.

Webinar 1st September: Building a Go-Fast Organization

Recognize This! – There is no point in going fast if you don’t know where you should be going.

I’m excited to be presenting once again with Bill Catlette, half of the partnership behind the Contented Cows series of books. Join us Thursday, 1st September, at 3:00 pm ET (Noon PT/8:00 pm GMT) for the webinar “Building a Go-Fast Organization.”

Last year, Bill and his partner Richard Hadden, presented with me on their latest book Rebooting Leadership. Continuing that conversation, Bill and I will be discussing out-takes from the book, including practical advice on what to do to improve performance and increase productivity in today’s rapidly moving work environment.

We will be discussing how strategic employee recognition can help you:

Get focused! Give your managers the tools they need to help their teams understand the big picture, top organization priorities, and how each employee can contribute to achieving those objectives.
Move fast! Learn how to use your company values and priorities as the basis for good systems that enable speedy, yet accurate and appropriate, decision making.
Develop trust! Overcome past obstacles and fears to help managers and employees alike build relationships of trust between each other and the organization as a whole.
Be recognized! Understand the powerful role of recognition and appreciation to engage employees so they can deliver better results more quickly and in line with what you specifically need.

Register today to join in the discussion.

Get the conversation started now. What are you doing to help your team move more quickly? Alternatively, how is your management team helping you to understand changing priorities?

3 Reasons to Rethink the Handwritten "Thank You" Note

Recognize This! – Rethink the “thank you” note to get the greatest organizational benefit.

People know I’m in the “thank you” business. It’s my job (and my pleasure) to help organizations get better at expressing appreciation for the efforts of their employees. Because people know my line of work, I’m often asked about my opinion on the handwritten thank-you note.

I’m of two opinions. In personal life, it’s appropriate and quite thoughtful to send a handwritten, detailed thank you note. In the world of business however, handwritten thank you notes present several challenges.

1) It doesn’t scale. – A CEO may believe strongly in the power of the handwritten thank you note. And there is no denying the impact receiving such a note has for the employee. Yet as a business grows, the CEO cannot write enough thank you notes to derive the benefit he or she is seeking. And no matter how firmly the CEO tries to institute the practice among managers, some simply will not write the notes and others will try but fail.

Strategic recognition using a technology-based solution, on the other hand, makes it possible for the CEO to set desired parameters (such as demonstration of the company values as the reason for recognition) and then encourage all employees – managers and peers – to recognize those desired behaviors and achievements in their colleagues. This is far easier to scale.

2) It isn’t trackable or reportable. – The handwritten note also does not allow for tracking of the giving and receiving of appreciation across the organization on a broader scale. When an employee is recognized for demonstrating the value of “innovation” for example, that can be tracked. If all recognition is tracked, management can gain – for the first time – deep insight into the understanding of the values across the organization and intervene when necessary.

My colleague Ben Miele explained this quite well last week when discussing the revelation at a client that R&D employees were being frequently recognized for “achieving results” but rarely recognized for “risk-taking” – precisely the opposite of desired behaviors in that department!

3) It isn’t visible and therefore shareable. – Perhaps the greatest benefit of an online strategic recognition solution is the option to share the recognition via secure Social Recognition across the organization’s network. This allows other employees to see and view the recognition, adding their additional “congratulations” and expressions of appreciation. This ability endlessly amplifies recognition.

Many organizations also have structures in place to notify managers of recognition given or for approvals at higher levels. Employees like this feature as they know their managers – possibly all the way to the CEO – see the recognition they have received.

What’s your take on the thank you note? When was the last time you received an expression of thanks – either in your personal life or at work?

“Push” and “Pull” Communications & Training Techniques for Recognition

Recognize This! – For best effect, communicate in ways that both intrigue (pull) and deliver needed information (push).

I enjoyed leading a webinar yesterday with HR.com on “The Art and Science of Recognition Training and Communications: The Push and Pull Effects.” In the webinar we looked at common marketing phenomena to understand how to best engage employees in recognition program training and communications for rapid adoption.

For example, Justin Bieber started his career with classic “push” marketing by posting his videos on YouTube. This led to fans requesting (pulling) Bieber sing their favorite songs. Both in combination led to Bieber very quickly becoming a viral phenomenon. Product placement strategies are a classic pull effect – think Ray-Ban sunglasses in the movie Top Gun, or Nike sneakers in Back to the Future - with stars “pulling” fans into using the products.

What does this have to do with employee recognition?

Look to these proven ways to create intrigue (pull) and share information (push) with employees about your recognition and rewards program. For example, how can you ensure the CEO and all of the C-suite are overtly seen to be using the recognition program? Or perhaps have your CMO or COO include statements about the recognition program in key speeches or employee communications they give quarterly. The goal is to get your recognition and reward program “product placed” in your company.

Why should you care about communications and training techniques?

The goal of any strategic recognition program is to create mass mobilization – to get employees excited, involved and focused on achieving the goals your program (whatever those goals may be). It’s this mix of both push and pull that makes mass mobilization possible.

Do you wish you’d participated in the webinar?

I’ll be giving this webinar presentation again through our own systems at Globoforce in mid-October. If you missed it and are intrigues by the topic, stay tuned here for more information on how to register for the October webinar.

Six Words about Work: What Are Yours?

Recognize This! – Appreciation creates winning cultures of recognition.

Mercer and Smith magazine are running a contest about work. From the submission website:

“Smith is teaming up with Mercer, a global leader in human resource consulting, outsourcing and investments, to bring you “Six Words About Work.” Every two weeks from now until Labor Day, we’re issuing a new “Six-Word Work Challenge.” One Six-Word entry per topic (per country) will win its writer the choice of an iPad2 or BlackBerry PlayBook. All entries are eligible to be part of a special “Six Words About Work” book. If your entry is selected, you get a free copy of the book.”

Following on Mercer’s recent global “What’s Working” survey (more details here), I’m interested in the stories people are telling. To compress your thoughts and feelings into 6 words is not an easy challenge. Here are a few of my six word statements:

Ignored, Demotivated, Underperform. Noticed, Recognized, Engaged.
When I’m thanked, my performance excels.
“Thanks” is easy, so give more.
Appreciation creates winning cultures of recognition.

What are your 6 words? Tell me in comments or on Twitter @DerekIrvine, then be sure to enter the contest!

Jerks at Work: You Get What You Pay For

Recognize This! – Why would you pay jerks more to make the entire workforce less productive?

Just last week I wrote about bullies in the workplace, saying the only thing you can do with bullies is to exit them from the organization. If your goal is to create a culture of recognition and appreciation in your organization, there is simply no room for those who believe bullying tactics work.

Bullies are culture killers and must be exited. Full stop.

But what about jerks? There’s two sides to the jerks at work story. First up, a limited study showing that working with jerks can cause early death. Then the Wall Street Journal followed up with a story that nice guys finish last – those awful jerks actually earn more over the course of their careers.

Employee Benefits magazine out of the UK picked up on this news and asked me my opinion:

“This is certainly a headline-grabbing survey: the meaner you are, the more you are likely to earn. What is particularly worrying about these findings is that they suggest organisations are actively rewarding bad corporate behaviour, or disagreeableness, rather than trying to instill more positive values.

“Every organisation has a series of values, which it expects its staff to align with, and it is highly unlikely that rudeness falls into that category. Why, therefore, are organisations choosing to reward these employees over others?”

Food for thought for leadership, certainly, who must consider do they want to go the lazy route and keep jerks on board or ignore their bad behavior without taking the steps necessary to reform their actions. Do you want jerks on staff who cause strife and distraction or do you want to create a culture and work environment in which committed employees who just want to get the job done can do so in a helpful, supportive and appreciative culture?

The latter culture of recognition is proven to increase employee engagement by double digits in less than a year. Since numerous organizations have proven the bottom-line value of increased engagement, why would management consider for a second keeping the jerks around?

Who’s Responsible for Company Culture?

Recognize This! – Every employee, at every level, is responsible for creating the company culture for all.

Expanding on my post yesterday about Zappos’ extraordinary culture and the three pillars underpinning it (values, service and experience), what’s the role of the leader? Tony Hsieh clearly made the call to invest the time and money necessary to create and reinforce a consistent culture in every employee. But is it always the CEO’s responsibility to create the culture?

Last month Kevin Eikenberry wrote on “A Leader’s Role in Culture Creation,” outlining three facts (quoting):

Culture belongs to all leaders, not just the C-Suite.
No one does it alone.
You are impacting the culture with everything you do.

I largely agree, with a few caveats.

1) The C-Suite sets and reinforces the culture. Pockets within a company can go “counter-culture,” but these tend to not last long. Employees learn to work within the prevailing culture – good or bad. The level and quality of work produced, however, is a direct correlation of the prevailing culture.

2) Employees contribute as much to culture as the leaders. The poor attitude of just one team member can drag down the entire team. This is especially true in light of research featured by Bob Sutton, “The main finding is that those who had unsupportive co-workers died at a much higher rate.”

This is food for thought for leadership, certainly, who must consider do they want to go the lazy route and keep jerks on board or ignore their bad behavior without taking the steps necessary to reform their actions. Do you want jerks on staff who cause strife and distraction or do you want to create a culture and work environment in which committed employees who just want to get the job done can do so in a helpful, supportive and appreciative culture?

The latter culture of recognition is proven to increase employee engagement by double digits in less than a year. Since numerous organizations have proven the bottom-line value of increased engagement, why would management consider for a second keeping the jerks around?

3) Think of culture like a bonsai tree. Culture can never be ignored or assumed to be “complete.” Culture requires constant attention and work – little tweaks here and there to keep the culture and the company growing along the right path.

What’s the culture in your company? Is it treated passively by management as something that “just is,” or is it something your management team – and every employee – work at every day?

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