News alert: Recognition unwanted!
By Annie Waite, Editor of the Internal Comms Hub (North America), Melcrum
All last week I was keenly monitoring the votes coming through in response to our weekly quick poll (the green box to the right of this page) and was quite shocked at the results.
Last week's poll question was inspired by a query posed by a delegate at our Strategic Communication Summit in Chicago.
"Is recognition like heroin, where you need more and more to get the same effect?" he asked.
Your answers?
- 24% - it might be to generation Y, and maybe X, but baby boomers and co. can live without it
- 30% - I think our employees are mature enough to get through each day without a "hit" of praise
- 38% - Yes, and I'm glad to encourage keeping employees "hooked" if it benefits the company
- 8% - Definitely. Gimme more!
ONLY 8% want more recognition themselves? Blimey!
Being myself on the cusp of gen Y and gen X, depending on whose definition you choose, I veer strongly towards the final option, and find it a little alarming that so many respondents chose the second option – that your employees are mature enough to get through each day without a "hit" of praise.
This suggests that some communications professionals out there might not be taking seriously the notion (and proven theory) that recognition drives engagement. Are much of the case studies, research results and employee feedback floating around on this subject falling on deaf (baby boomer only?) ears?
G’day from Sydney Annie,
Yes, recognition has been shown to be one of the drivers of employee engagement, so your poll results certainly are interesting.
I’m a baby Boomer (upper end) I have to confess that I do like recognition ONLY IF it is private and personal – please don’t call me out front and make a public fuss!
Recognition is a basic human need, and my observation across 40 years of working life is that there are generational preferences AND individual preferences within generations regarding HOW recognition is received – public or private, verbal or written, email or letter, formal or informal, encouraging words or a gift/monetary token and so on …
One word of caution about giving recognition – it has to be sincere and deserved. Fake praise has been shown to be more damaging to employee engagement than no recognition at all.
If you think of recognition simply as an encouraging expression of appreciation for a job well done, why would you NOT give recognition where it’s due? After all, research shows that GIVING recognition when it is deserved boosts the production of “feel good” chemicals for the GIVER as well as the RECEIVER!
Value your life, live your values …
Your ValuesCoach, Karyn Clarke
Posted by: Karyn Clarke | October 04, 2008 at 09:02 AM
Hi Karyn, thanks for your message. I definitely agree with your comments about there being generational preferences AND individual preferences within generations regarding HOW recognition is received.
One tool you might have heard of, and a way managers can better identify the recognition preferences of their employees, is the predictive index method (http://www.piworldwide.com/). It can help produce guidelines for supervisors to recognise their employees in ways that are likely to resonate most with that particular individual - identified from analysing the results of a quick personality survey.
Posted by: Annie Waite | October 07, 2008 at 05:30 PM