appreciation Archives – KCC Positive Business Psychology

’Tis the Season for Employee Recognition and Appreciation

’Tis the Season for Employee Recognition and Appreciation As we near the year's end, we reflect on its many highs and lows. The year may have brought unexpected hardships and losses along with successes and victories to celebrate. As we process and reflect, it’s important to remember the team who navigated the ups and downs of life this year and share with them the meaningful ways they contributed to helping us maneuver around setbacks and achieve our goals this year and to take a few moments to offer employee recognition and appreciation. The fact is, in our post-pandemic world, a little encouragement can go a long way. Forbes recently published an article detailing how employee recognition elevates employee loyalty (which, incidentally, has a significant impact on creating customer loyalty and business growth). It also creates a sense of purpose and belonging—knowing our work matters makes us feel like an essential part of a team. Here are 4 tips for recognition to keep in mind. 1. Acknowledge Challenges This may have been a challenging year, from economic changes to staffing issues, but your team has navigated these waters together. It’s okay to acknowledge that there were rough patches and thank them for staying the course and leaning in to help the team reach the other side. No matter what your team faced this year, you met it together, and now you stand on the other side, looking back at the year together. Acknowledging that you asked team members to go above and beyond or saw them handle unexpected challenges shows that those contributions matter and serve an essential purpose. 2. Recognize Individual Contributions Take some time (put it on your calendar if need be) to think over your team’s performance this past year. Are there instances when a team member’s new idea increased efficacy or workflow? Who went above and beyond when deadlines loomed? Is there someone who stepped up when challenges arose? Offering team members a Christmas bonus or raise is a wonderful way to show appreciation, but if you don’t have the resources to do this, offering employee recognition and appreciation is another powerful way to let your team know you appreciate them. You might write and hand out individual holiday cards or make a point to speak to your team, sharing with them examples of how their contribution to the team positively impacted the company and met a need you had. Make sure your feedback is specific and inclusive. 3. Celebrate Successes Take advantage of the holiday season to create a celebration of your own. Take time to celebrate your team’s successes this year. This doesn’t have to be a huge event, just something celebratory and above the ordinary. It can be as simple as calling a team meeting and providing donuts and coffee for everyone. At the same time, you take the opportunity to recap the team’s high notes and successes or as fancy as a catered lunch or party at a lovely venue. Any of these [...]

5 Easy Tips for Giving Employee Feedback

5 Easy Tips for Giving Employee Feedback Giving employee feedback is one of the key ways we train, reinforce, and communicate with our team members. Effective feedback motivates employees and increases their confidence in their job performance. It’s actually something team members consistently ask for on surveys about work satisfaction. Knowing how you’re doing, what you’re doing right, and what you can improve helps us feel connected to the job we do. It helps us understand how our contributions matter. And it helps build trust with our managers. Here are 5 easy tips for giving employee feedback to boost your team’s success. 1. Feedback Matters Focused feedback helps employees. Not only does it direct them to continue doing tasks in ways that are effective and beneficial, it also bolsters their confidence about the job they’re doing. A team member who has confidence about his role in the company is a happier employee. Happy employees work harder and stay with an employer longer. I know this may sound cheesy, but I still believe that “feedback is the breakfast of champions” because you can’t improve, if you don’t know what you could improve. 2. Frequency Matters It’s tempting to focus our efforts giving feedback on annual reviews, and those may be important tools. There are hundreds of workdays between those annual reviews, though. Employees will experience more consistent growth, more energy on the job, and more motivation when they receive feedback on a much more frequent basis. The new trend is more about frequent, on-the-spot, micro feedbacks. Ideally, more positive than negative if possible. Remember the chapter in The One-Minute Manager: “Catch Them Doing Something Right”! 3. Timing Matters Giving consistent employee feedback may take some time to get used to. We tend to get focused on tasks and deadlines more easily than on the people making those deadlines successful. To build a habit of offering regular feedback, identify some key moments where feedback doesn’t interrupt workflow or embarrass a team member. For example, one great opportunity for feedback is following a team meeting. If the feedback is relevant to the whole team, add it to the meeting agenda. If it’s specific to one team member or a small contingent of the group, ask those individuals to remain behind as the meeting closes. 4. Celebrate, Don’t Manipulate In his book, Nonviolent Communication, author and psychologist Marshall B. Rosenberg discusses his approach to expressing appreciation. His concern with some forms of positive feedback is that employees can lose their motivation if they feel that a manager or leader complimented them in order to manipulate them. Instead, he recommends expressing appreciation with three specific components. First, express what specific action the team member completed that made a positive difference. Next, explain how you felt in reaction to those actions. Last, this is how those actions met a need. The order is less important than ensuring the components of the appreciation are present. Remember authentic recognition creates a powerful boost to people’s morale. 5. Critical [...]