Make Their Day Blog

Is the economy affecting employees’ sense of being valued? Are the lack of raises, reduction in benefits, and increased workload having their toll? People who don’t feel valued aren’t usually engaged or motivated, so knowing the effect of economic changes on sense of value is important information for companies struggling to stay productive.

Over the course of  six weeks Make Their Day conducted a survey that asked:

“Do you feel more or less valued than a year ago?”

Of the 247 people who responded, the largest percentage (42%) said they feel less valued than they did one year ago. In contrast 31 percent reported no change and 28 percent said they feel more valued. Given the circumstances in most organizations: cutbacks, downsizing, extreme budgeting, it doesn’t seem surprising that people might feel less valued than they did a year ago. What you might find surprising is why they feel less valued.

The most sited cause of significant change in the way they feel was not pay, benefits, or work overload. It was the behavior of the manager or supervisor (49%)!

It always seems to come down to the relationship of the individual to the manager. People can tolerate just about anything but a manager who doesn’t seem to care. Here are a few comments from respondents who stated that they feel significantly less valued now than a year ago:

My manager is less positive.

There is less communication.

Managers are too busy trying to be heroes to their managers.

My manager is angry and disengaged.

These comments seem to indicate that there are more than a few managers who also feel less valued. Organizations often forget the importance of manager engagement in maintaining employee engagement. The following comment is from a respondent who says he/she feels significantly more valued, shows the value of engaged managers:

We have had no cost of living increase for two years in a row, the bonus plan has been stopped, and staff meetings no longer have lunch provided. My “living” costs continue to go up even though my bring-home income has decreased. This, obviously, does not feel good.

A few months ago we (”the staff”) put together three pages of grievances for and about “the management” along with suggestions for improvement. The management responded immediately and positively! We’ve been working with an outside consultant to ensure that everyone treats each other with dignity and respect. What a turn-around! It was risky, because there’s good talent out there that could potentially replace us. The way management handled this has made all of us feel more valued, as you can imagine.

This respondent doesn’t say what the grievances were, but clearly feeling respected was at the core of their concerns. Their managers’ engagement and interest in making improvements in spite of the economy really turned around a difficult situation. I hope employees recognized their managers for  coming through for them!

To see the results of this survey click here.

Brooke Thomas came up with an award that I love!

She writes:

A couple of months ago, we were getting ready to launch a new application to the whole company. Our last gating milestone was our internal validation process for which we had only one regular employee (and two recently hired temps who weren’t up to speed yet). These validations are extremely tedious and it takes a special someone to march through them.

This employee was extremely stressed out and working long hours. I sent her a Mike Rowe “Dirty Jobs” life sized card board cut-out with a note, saying I realized her job was very tough right now but I was sending her some ‘help’ in the form of Mike Rowe. Needless to say everyone in her office loves Mike and she can in turn ‘loan’ him out when others feel like they have thankless dirty job.

I hope it turns into a sort of ‘underground’ peer recognition program.

Very creative Brooke!

The Dirty Job award acknowledges that achievement doesn’t always mean doing something grand or exciting. Sometimes it just means rolling up your sleeves, getting dirty, and getting the job done!

The best ideas always seem to come from readers. Do you have an idea to share?

We are wrapping up a really tough year. We have experienced layoffs and budget cuts and are all struggling to do more with less.

Many people were laid off this year. Some are back to work, at least with temporary assignments. Others are still struggling to find work. It can be really demoralizing. If you know someone who has lost their job this first resolution is for you:

1) Stay connected. For those who have been out of work for awhile, it is easy to fall into a funk and withdraw. Help them out. Send an occasional email, take them to lunch, make a LinkedIn introduction, anything that let’s them know you are thinking about them.

For those who are employed, employment generally means a greater workload, less resources, less compensation and/or benefits. In some workplaces the atmosphere has become oppressive while in others, people have come together with a strong ‘can do’ spirit.  The atmosphere all depends on the attitudes and actions of absolutely every person who works there.

We all want to work in a great place. If you don’t, be the catalyst for positive change. Here are two simple workplace resolutions that will help turn your organization around:

1) Say thank you. These two simple words tell your colleagues that you appreciate them. You will soon see how appreciative they are as well.

2) Acknowledge your coworkers. Few of us work in a vacuum. Acknowledge the support and encouragement that others provide. Praise their contributions. Share the credit.

Two workplace resolutions (that work equally as well at home): praise and appreciation. Neither takes much time. You can keep it as simple as you like. Offer both and you will see smiles. People will be more cooperative and positive. Your workplace will be more enjoyable (and probably more productive as well!)

These are resolutions you can keep and you will make someone’s day over and over again. What would you add to the list?

Copyright 2009 Cindy Ventrice

In response to the weekly tip Put It In Writing, reader Pam Olson writes:

“I have saved and re-read many notes like [those mentioned in the tip].  The ones that I especially like are the ones where someone thanks you or tells you of their appreciation of the small things you do - often very small things that are just taken for granted by most people.”

Pam makes a good point. Written notes aren’t just for the big wins. When you notice the small details you recognize something that maybe the recipient hasn’t even recognized in themselves.

I remember when I was interviewing employees for Make Their Day. I was asking what makes a great manager. One trait I heard many times was, “My manager sees things in me that I didn’t even see myself.” Often, the were talking about the “small things” that Pam mentions.

Focusing on the small things obviously has the potential to be a very powerful form of recognition. But couldn’t it also seem like the manager is focused on trivia? What do you think? Do you want to be recognized for the small things? Do you have a story to share? Tell us what you think!

A new survey by CareerBuilder, released yesterday, has found that 23 percent of employers believe that morale in their organizations is low.  No surprise here.

Workers stated that low morale was due to heavier workloads and longer hours. Again, no surprise.

The study also found that more employers are turning to employee recognition to help the situation. This could be good news. Great employee recognition can help give a boost to morale, particularly if employers can demonstrate that they really do value employees. Long term though, recognition is built on respect, so when the economic reality changes, if work conditions don’t change with it, recognition programs will no longer work.

There were another part of the study that I found interesting. Thirty-eight percent of workers felt there was favoritism at work. When asked what that favoritism looked like they identified many factors. Here I will focus on just a few.

They believed that favored workers/departments receive:

• More recognition by senior leaders (P/A)
• More flexibility (R)
• Greater career advancement opportunities (O)
• More training and leadership development opportunities (O)

For those that are familiar with PORT and the four elements of recognition, I have attached the corresponding letter to each of these complaints. For those that are unfamiliar, PORT stands for Praise, Opportunity, Respect, and Thanks or appreciation. You can learn a bit more here. PORT — the elements of meaningful recognition that are laid it in detail in Make Their Day! Employee Recognition That Works and Recognition Strategies That Work. I have attached an R to flexibility because it equates with trust. Many of the items I left off the list would also have an R assigned. In fact fairness, would be tagged with an R. Lack of fairness, overall, is seen as disrespect. And disrespect is the greatest driver of poor morale.

The best way to improve morale is to focus on creating a respectful environment: honest, fair, and concerned with employee well-being. What do you think? Are these impossible goals given the economy?

As Thanksgiving in the U.S. approaches I can think of no better time to reflect on the value of telling employees that they are valued.

Readers of Make Their Day! Employee Recognition That Works are aware that there are  four elements of meaningful recognition.  The acronym PORT stands for Praise, Opportunity, Respect, and Thanks or Appreciation.

Many of us say “Thank you” all the time. It is as much a habit as “Hi. How are you?” But habitual thanks aren’t the kind of appreciation I am thinking about. I am thinking about - the kind that is firmly grounded in gratitude.

Try this exercise:

Make a list of ten people you work with, for, or report to you. For each person on your list write down what it is about him or her that you rely on. Is it a certain skill set? An attitude? A behavior? How do these traits make your life better/easier? Got it? Then you’ve got gratitude. You can turn this into meaningful appreciation by communicating it. Put it in a note card, on a bulletin board, in an email - the medium isn’t critical, but the message is!

Today we relaunched the Make Their Day website with a fresh new look. You will still find the same solid content and resources, but hopefully you will find it easier to navigate.

Click on the Make Their Day tab (above and left) and take a few minutes to check out what’s new.

Tell us what works and what could be better.

All the best,

Cindy Ventrice

Whether I am being asked to speak or consult on employee recognition a comment that I often hear is, “I don’t know if the Make Their Day philosophy of recognition will work here. Our organization is unique.”

No one else has exactly the same challenges. No one has the same difficult people to cope with as your organization. Maybe your organization is really small or maybe it is behemoth. So yes, it is different… and yet for every way in which it is unique there are several more ways in which it is very much the same as every other.

Let’s look at a few “unique” organizational characteristics:

• Our managers are too busy to give recognition. It amazes me that anyone believes that this is unique. Yes, managers are busy, but they are busy everywhere. And yet, there are managers who manage to recognize very effectively anyway.
• We have a unique mission/mandate. Great! Leverage that, but don’t let it be any excuse to not take action. Employees still need recognition.
• We have a union. Or maybe restrictions have been put in place by the government or some other agency. Restrictions can affect the form recognition takes, but never does it eliminate the ability to give the most meaningful, basic forms of recognition.
• We are going through some big changes right now. Everyone is going through big changes and probably will be for a long time to come. There are few better reasons to give recognition than the ability to see people tough times.
• All our people care about are raises and promotions. If this were true, your organization would truly be unique. You see, employees often say that money is what they want. For one thing, they have been trained to think that way. But recognition is something different and employees everywhere want it - no exceptions!
• We don’t have the budget. Very few organizations do right now. It is getting a bit easier to find a few dollars, but overall recognition needs to be free right now. And frankly that is just fine, because you don’t have to spend anything.

There are probably dozens more reasons why an organization might be an exception. What other reasons have you heard for why recognition won’t work?

I’ve been digging through some old posts that many readers of this employee recognition blog have never seen. Some are important enough that I want to draw them to your attention, especially when they offer low-cost ways to improve morale. This is one I hope you’ll read:

The Respect Filter

Are you familiar with the concept of the respect filter? The idea is that employees view what you do through a lense that is shaded according to the kind of relationship that you share. When the relationship is good they wear rose-colored glasses, and that is a good thing!

Yesterday, CareerBuilder.com posted the results of a recent survey.

They reported that those who were laid off in the past twelve months showed a strong preference for working for a small business. After job growth potential, the reasons given  included:

• A family-like work environment (56%),

• More employee recognition (49%),

• A sense that you can make a difference (48%), and

• An absence of corporate red tape (46%).

What I find interesting  isn’t that employee recognition appears on the list, but how all the listed reasons relate to the kind of employee recognition that I write about in Make Their Day! The key message of the book being that everything that contributes to an employee’s sense of visibility and value adds to their feeling of being recognized.

Let’s look at each of their reasons for preferring a small company in a bit more detail:

A family-like work environment. No one expects to feel invisible in a family or a small company. The expectation is that in a small company everybody knows and supports each other. People believe they will be more than a cog in a big machine. The assumption is that in a small company people are valued for who they are as much as what they do.

More employee recognition. When potential employees expect more recognition from a small company they certainly aren’t expecting more big incentives and awards. They anticipate being “seen” for what they accomplish in a much more meaningful way. I honestly don’t know why this is the case. I haven’t found that supervisors in small companies are any more accomplished at providing recognition. I have to think it goes back to the inherent forms of recognition found in the other three reasons for the small company preference.

A sense that you can make a difference. Throw a pebble in a pond and you see the ripples. Throw it in the ocean and, well… nothing much seems to happen. It is the same with big company versus small. Unless a manager takes on the responsibility for connecting the dots from an employee’s actions to corporate goals, employees in a big company tend to feel inconsequential and not very valuable.

An absence of corporate red tape. Bureaucracy sends a powerful message. That message is  “we have to regulate everything because we don’t trust you.” Being trusted and respected is a key component of feeling valued and recognized.

This careerbuilder.com survey tells us a great deal about the work environment that people find most motivating and luckily for the large company, it can be replicated by great managers and organizations of all sizes.

Cindy Ventrice