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.

Last year I was quoted in an article on getting the praise you need. One of my recommendations was that you praise your supervisor every once in awhile. The idea behind the recommendation being that:

1) Supervisors need recognition too, and

2) The more recognition supervisors receive the more willing they are to give it.

Of course you have to mean it. Don’t give praise just to get praise. That would be manipulative. Give your supervisor praise because your he or she does something well. You may be surprised the effect your praise can have.

Every week I send out thousands of weekly employee recognition tips and almost every week I hear from someone who has received a written note of praise from a supervisor that he or she found particularly meaningful. Usually, the reader has kept the note  for ages and refers to it from time to time (proving the lasting value of putting your praise in writing).

Today, I received another email about putting praise in writing, but this one was a little different:

“I don’t have any [notes] that I’ve kept from my managers, but I do have several thank-you letters from the person I manage. I give her lots of positive reinforcement, and she gives it back. I find it very encouraging!”

Nice huh? Wouldn’t you like to work for a supervisor like this? You can, just give some sincere praise.

When you don’t get any recognition for your work it can be difficult to give it. Think of recognition like food. You are starving (for recognition) and, if you are a manager, you are still  expected to “feed” others. When this happens you are likely to say something along the lines of what I recently heard come out of the mouth of a supervisor:

“Your design is really excellent! In fact, it looks a lot like one I sketched up over the weekend.”

I could almost see this “starving” supervisor reaching out, ready to hand a chunk of warm, crusty, butter-slathered bread to the employee. Then, at the last minute, she snatches it back  and shoves it into her own mouth.

While I understand the desire to feed yourself first, there are a couple of problems with this:

1) A stolen recognition “meal” isn’t all that satisfying. While recognizing yourself in front of others has a place, this isn’t it, and this supervisor isn’t going to feel any more valued.

2) The employee who was recognized by his supervisor for excellent work heard only that he wasn’t original. To top it off, his respect for his supervisor just went down a couple (more) notches.

So, what is the answer? That depends on who you are.

Managers & Supervisors

For managers and supervisors the answer is:

Give recognition freely. Give staff credit for great work, ignoring the part you played. Thank people for doing their jobs (no, a paycheck is not enough). Don’t expect an instant return.

Expect a long-term return on your efforts. Give credit and people will respect you more, cooperate more, take more initiative, and yes - occasionally recognize you as well.

Maintain the appropriate supervisor mindset. Know that, as a supervisor, your job is to supervise your people. Inherent in that fact is that when your employees’ work is good, you are doing good work. For you to acknowledge the part you played is redundant. Remember, the more they shine, the better it reflects on you.

Everyone Else

Do you know that middle managers and supervisors are the most under-recognized group out there? Give them a little praise and appreciation. You will be amazed at how much more likely they are to give provide you with more recognition when they aren’t starved themselves. Recognize your supervisor and  managers in other departments or groups. Privately give them the praise and appreciation they deserve. Everyone will be the beneficiary.

Copyright 2010 Cindy Ventrice

An article in the Wall Street Journal online offers three ways to motivate recession-weary staff: ask for input, offer cross-training, and assist with family matters. These are all good ways to communicate staff value, but when you are talking about motivating the weary, there is an important ingredient missing, and that is FUN.

People need to laugh, or at least smile, at work. It reduces stress and increases cooperation. It is good for business.

How can you lighten up?

1) Give out a silly award. Get something cheap: an eight-ball, a wrench, a jar of peanut butter. Endow it with meaning: looking ahead, mistake of the week, smooth handling of a sticky situation. Keep it light-hearted. If you go with something like the mistake of the week, give yourself the first award.

2) Have a crazy contest: office miniature golf tournament, who can build the biggest house of cards in 5 minutes, or the ugliest pet contest.

3) Have a competition that relates to work and make the prizes fun: customer service contest between departments or branches with toy giraffes for the winners (sticking your neck out for great service), or a competition with previous results (production rate, error rate, safety record, increase in sales) and celebrate any win with a pizza party.

4) Add a touch of fun to your meetings: put a bit of humor in your PowerPoint, take a moment to play “something no one here knows about me is,” put toys on the table for people to fiddle with throughout the meeting.

When your routine is beginning to wear on your team, break with routine. Do something out of the ordinary. If your are afraid that people won’t like it, remember, even groans build energy.  Put some squishy stress balls on the table. Tell people that if they don’t like your humor, they can throw the ball at you. You will be surprised by the number of smiles you can generate in just a few minutes.

Now it is your turn. Tell us how you lighten up at work!

Copyright 2010 Cindy Ventrice

Focusing on your employees’ strengths engages them, while focusing on their weaknesses disengages them. Are you surprised? Probably not, but now it is confirmed by Gallup, which says managers who focus on:

• Strengths - have 61 percent engagement among employees and 1 percent disengagement.

• Weaknesses - have 45 percent engagement and 22 percent  disengagement.

Even more amazing, managers who ignore their employees have only 2 percent engagement and 40 percent disengagement!  I know managers are busy, but imagine how much more time they would have if an additional 39 percent of employees were engaged.

For more on focusing on strengths see this post and for more on criticism this post.

My question to you is, if focusing on the positive produces the best results, why don’t more managers do this?

I was recently quoted in Inc. Magazine for a story about College Hunks Hauling Junk. The company holds regular, successful competitions (contests) between both franchises and employees. Since I have been quoted previously on the potential damage that competitions can cause, I was asked to comment.

Read the article and the comments that follow. Tell me what you think. What has been your experience with competitions or contests at work?

This old Reebok commercial offers one way of engaging your team…

Video: Motivate Your Team

It’s entertaining, but for better ways to motivate, check out these previous posts:

Seven Resolutions

Webinar on the Principles of Great Recognition

And you might want to check out this post:

What Exactly Is Engagement?

Watson Wyatt recently released a study regarding internal communication that held a big surprise for me. One of the areas of study was Goals of Communication Regarding the Economic Downturn. Easing stress, improving engagement, and managing change were the most frequent considerations. Retention, trust, and productivity rated lower as company communication goals, but by far the lowest rated goal was communicating the effect of the economy on benefits!

The study found that only 10 percent of employers worldwide were attempting to educate workers about the effect of the downturn on benefits. This figure breaks down as 9 percent U.S., 8 percent Europe, 4 percent Canada,  0 percent Australia, and 23 percent Middle East!

I am completed baffled. How do employers expect to reduce stress, while improving retention and trust if employees don’t understand the rationale behind changes to their benefits? What is the thinking behind this lack of communication?

Connect the dots and you can manage expectations and maintain trust and morale. Reduce benefits without a complete explanation and you destroy trust and morale. Seems pretty obvious, so why isn’t the necessary communication happening?

Do you have insights on this? I would like to hear from you.

In my interview yesterday with Wayne Hurlbert of BlogTalkRadio we talked about the Make Their Day philosophy of recognition. The hour was packed with information about the benefits of recognition for both managers and organizations, research into employee preferences, how to make recognition fair and individual, and what we need to do to maintain morale in the current economy.

The recording of this interview is available online:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/WayneHurlbert/2009/07/29/Cindy-Ventrice-Make-Their-Day

You can read Wayne’s review of the second edition of Make Their Day here:

http://blogbusinessworld.blogspot.com/2009/07/make-their-day-second-edition-by-cindy.html

Wayne Hurlbert of Blog Talk Radio will be interviewing me, Cindy Ventrice, today at 5:00pm Pacific time and 8:00pm Eastern. We will talk about Make Their Day and all things employee recognition. Hope you can join us!

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/WayneHurlbert

If you miss the program, catch the recording later.

All the best,
Cindy Ventrice