Beyond the Holiday Party: Gestures of Employee Appreciation This Holiday Season

The gesture of a holiday party is usually the primary way employers show appreciation and thanks to employees around this time of year, but recent studies, including one conducted by ERC (09 Holidays & Festivities Survey) show that some employers are scaling back on the traditional holiday party or simply not having one at all.  Needless to say, most are still trying to have some function for their employees.

Great employers don’t lose sight of showing their thanks to employees during the holiday season, even in the smallest of ways.  Whether a holiday party is feasible this year or not, it’s important to try to make a concerted effort to bring employees together, show them appreciation, and boost morale.  We all know employees whom we owe appreciation and thanks to for their efforts this holiday season, particularly after many of the challenges our businesses have experienced throughout the year. If your organization can’t provide a holiday party this year for economical reasons, consider other ways that you can show appreciation to your employees.

This holiday season, appreciation doesn’t need to be expensive to be meaningful. It can be a note, a call, a small gift, a luncheon, potluck dinner, or other small event.  Whatever the form, saying thank you for the hard work and dedication of your employees, and particularly top performers, during the holidays is an important part of being a great workplace. In ERC’s research on what engages employees, top performers consistently cite that the efforts their workplaces take to ensure they having fun, enjoying one another, and being appreciated are reasons why they stay with their organizations (09 NorthCoast 99 Winners Report). Top performers recognize the efforts of their workplaces in creating an enjoyable and appreciative culture.

This year, ERC has learned of numerous ways through our research and NorthCoast 99 program, that workplaces are stepping up to the challenges of recognizing employees in low-cost, but meaningful ways. From CEOs funding the entire holiday function out of their own pockets to line-managers sacrificing either time or money to show some appreciation to their direct reports, many workplaces are finding creative, alternative ways to show their thanks. Here are some other suggestions:

• Encourage managers, or ideally your CEO, to write notes to employees or top performers thanking them for their contributions. Old-fashioned words of kindness never lose meaning.
• Leave all employees or top performers a personalized telephone call of thanks.
• Be as generous as you can. Employees recognize when their organizations are going out of their way to be generous, even when times are difficult.  
• Provide employees or top performers with small gifts of appreciation.
• Release staff early on Christmas Eve so they can spend it with their families.
• Organize a potluck luncheon or dinner for your staff. Some organizations even have their management teams make a meal for the staff.
• Conduct an inexpensive pre-holiday activity at work.

So while celebrating the holiday season in extravagant ways may not be in the cards for your organization this year, or appropriate given your unique circumstances, employee appreciation and an element of fun and enjoyment always holds a place in the workplace.

The Unexpected Lessons of H1N1 on Our Businesses

An article published by BusinessWeek (2009) this past week suggests that the recent H1N1 flu outbreak may teach us more than one thing about our businesses and may even improve our workplaces. It’s an intriguing concept – H1N1 can help organizations become a better workplace?

Gene Marks, the author of the article, suggests that this flu may (and should) prompt a more thorough “business check-up” for many businesses and “test our management skills and tell us a lot about our company and people” (Marks, 2009). This check-up includes asking questions such as…

• Have we defined key or important employees?
• Are our health benefits providing adequate coverage for employees?
• Is our workplace equipped with the appropriate infection control procedures?
• Can we fill the gaps if our employees are out of the office?
• Do we have appropriate remote working options?
• Are we providing a sufficient amount of paid time off that helps employees meet their work/life needs?

These are just a few of the many questions employers could ask themselves to better equip their organizations in handling the H1N1 virus. But these questions are not just relevant to workplaces dealing with the pandemic; rather they are enhancements that all workplaces should consider to retain and engage their current talent.

Marks (2009) also suggests that H1N1 will probably provide a number of insights regarding those employees that truly care about their work and those that don’t.  In other words, the pandemic may provide valuable information on how engaged your employees are at your organization.

The lessons of H1N1 can help many organizations achieve a healthier, safer, and more employee-friendly workplace if they are willing to conduct a “check up” Certainly, this pandemic has been a test for all of our organizations, but offers an opportunity to learn from the challenges it has posed to us and put practices into place to better our workplaces.

Source:
Marks, G. (2009). Guess What – Swine Flu Could Be Good For A Small Business. BusinessWeek.

Can’t Find the Right Fit? How Using Employee Testimonials May Help

A new study released by the American Psychological Association this fall shows that job applicants are more attracted to organizations when their websites include employee testimonials.  The study appears to suggest that employee testimonials may be an important method of attracting top talent (Walker, Field, Giles, Armenakis & Bernerth, 2009). Other research also seems to support the use of employee testimonials.  For instance, it has been found that others’ experiences in organizations influence job seekers due to their interpersonal nature (Van Hoye & Lievens, 2007) and that job incumbents are perceived as credible sources of information, as they are closer to the work situation (Fisher, Ilgen, & Hoyer, 1979).  In fact, more general forms of recruitment advertisements have been found to be perceived as less favorable, attractive, and credible.

In addition, the study also revealed that the type of media used to display employee testimonials also influences applicant reactions.  In the study, employee testimonials delivered via audio or video were perceived as more attractive and credible than those delivered via picture or text (Walker, et al., 2009).  The results suggest that richer media (audio, video, and multimedia) may be worthwhile when using employee testimonials to attract applicants into the organization.  Richer media tends to be more interesting and engaging to job applicants because it has the ability to better communicate affect and provides more information through tone, facial expression, and other nonverbal cues (Walker, et al., 2009).

Ideally, employee testimonials can serve as one way that organizations can convey the culture and types of individuals within their organization. One of the most common problems organizations face in their recruitment efforts is finding individuals that fit within their organization, yet job seekers readily use testimonial information to see how they fit with the culture and coworkers in an organization (Cober, Brown, Blumental, Doverspike, & Levy, 2004).  In doing so, organizations may find that using testimonials diminishes extra and possibly more expensive efforts, to assess cultural fit.

So whether your organization is swarmed with resumes of all sorts of job seekers or preparing to boost recruitment efforts in the coming months, it’s clear that employee testimonials may be a worthwhile part of any organization’s recruitment efforts as they positively affect job applicant reactions and are also relatively inexpensive to employ at the most basic level. Here are a few tips to help your organization get started:

• Pick employees that are representative of the organizational culture, are exceptional communicators, and have honest and positive things to say about the organization.  Possible aspects of the workplace they could discuss or testify to include:
  • “Day in the life” summary of job duties
  • Reasons they chose to work at the organization
  • How they would describe the work environment or culture
  • On-the-job challenges and development opportunities
  • Performance and/or job expectations
  • Perks and benefits
• At the very least, use text testimonials.  If you can, however, invest in some relatively inexpensive technology to help deliver testimonials via audio or video. Keep in mind that this technology can be used for many other purposes – on-boarding, training, communication, and other employee activities. 
• Evaluate how they are working…are the testimonials contributing to fewer applicants that are not the right fit? Are they helping to yield applicants that fit with the culture?

Sources:

Walker, H. J., Feild, H. S., Giles, W. F., Armenakis, A. A., and Bernerth, J. B. (2009). Displaying employee testimonials on recruitment web sites: effects of communication media, employee race, and job seeker race on organizational attraction and information credibility. The Journal of Applied Psychology. 94, 1354–1364.

Cober, R. T., Brown, D. J., Keeping, L. M., & Levy, P. E. (2004). Recruitment on the net: How do organizational Web site characteristics influence applicant attraction? Journal of Management, 30, 623–646.

Fisher, C. D., Ilgen, D. R., & Hoyer, W. D. (1979). Source credibility, information favorability, and job offer acceptance. Academy of Management Journal, 22, 94–103.

Van Hoye, G., & Lievens, F. (2007). Investigating Web-based recruitment sources: Employee testimonials vs. word-of-mouse. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 15, 372–382.

5 Energy Boosters for the Holiday Season

1. Don’t cheat on sleep. If you routinely deprive yourself of sleep, you’ll pay for it with fatigue. Adults need 7 to 9 hours a day; even an extra hour of sleep can dramatically improve energy.
   Tip: The best way to improve sleep is to maintain a firm time for going to bed and awakening.
2. Get physical. Research indicates exercise is one of the best ways to increase energy. Avoid strenuous workouts that might overly tire you. Moderate activities such as a daily walk or swim are ideal.
3. Fuel up. Several servings of fruits and vegetables a day should provide a noticeable increase in energy. Plus these foods have far fewer calories than heavy, high calorie snacks and most fast food.
4. Drink to your health. Dehydration is another energy thief – it reduces blood flow to your organs, including your brain. Don’t wait until you’re thirsty. When you exercise or perspire heavily, drink plenty of water.
   Tip: Alcohol also contributes to dehydration and reduces your mental and physical response.
5. Reduce stress. Rushing to cross everything off your list can be exhausting. Slow down and set priorities so you only do essential things. Set aside time each day to relax. On-the-go techniques such as deep breathing or progressive muscle relaxation can revive you.
   Tip: Remember to have fun rather than waste energy trying to make everything perfect.

Source: Smart Health November 2009

I.T. Solutions for HR Professionals

John C. Rowland, Manager of Managed Services for Thinsolutions, talks about how using a managed service provider can help your organization.

Determining Employees’ Value to Your Organization

Measuring performance may be a challenge for organizations this year.  Some employers could find themselves using a performance measurement system that may not accurately measure what top performance looks like during a challenging economic year, particularly if performance and value of contributions has historically been determined by financial impact or the meeting of organizational, team and individual financial and budgetary goals.  It’s possible that this may be the year that organizations will need to look beyond this scope and re-identify how employees’ value is defined.

Measuring top performance by revenue generation, while certainly important, may not be the only way that your organization can measure the performance of your employees, regardless of how your organization financially performed this year.  In fact, the true value of what your employees have accomplished this year may be manifested in other ways, according to the Forum for People Performance Management & Measurement (2009), such as:

• Referrals of new customers
• Identification of cost savings
• Initiating and/or suggesting new efficiencies
• Interpersonal relationships inside and outside the organization (with coworkers and customers)
• Making the organization look attractive to potential customers
• Organizational citizenship behaviors

In these ways, you can probably identify employees that may not have generated a record amount of revenue this year, but have indeed contributed a great deal of value.  Performance measurement, in its best form, should accurately measure this value and differentiate between levels of performance – however your organization determines it, whether it be demonstrating organizational values, displaying value-adding behaviors, or delivering valuable results.  Only your organization can uniquely define what those may be and an important starting place is to determine the characteristics of those employees that carry the most value or the least value (Forum for People Performance Management & Measurement, 2009). Here are a few questions to guide you:

• What are your organization’s core values? Are all employees expected to exemplify these?
• What are the top 10 most value-adding behaviors at your organization?
• How does your organization define valuable results?
• Does your performance measurement tool capture all of the above?

Employers of choice typically establish this value proposition – determining what they perceive to be value-adding and measuring performance based on this. This way your organization ensures that it is measuring the behaviors, attitudes, and results that matter most to your organization.

Source:
Forum for People Performance Management & Measurement (2009). Employee Lifetime Value: “The People Impact” on Financial Success. www.performanceforum.org.

Want to Reward Your Employees? Change Their Job Title…

Looking for a way to reward your valued employees? Consider changing their job title.

A new study by Pearl Meyer & Partners shows that employers can use job titles to retain and reward high performing employees. The study suggests that many employers title jobs with great flexibility and allow for alternative job names. For instance, many employers assign titles of Manager, Director, and Vice President to not just employees with supervisory responsibilities – but also those that have significant responsibilities in the organization and are individual contributors. In this way, employers can reward non-supervisory or non-managerial employees. For examples of job titles, visit

• http://www.jobtitles.org
• http://online.onetcenter.org/find/
• http://www.wave.net/upg/immigration/dot_index.html

Why are job titles important in rewarding and motivating employees? They hold significant value for several reasons. First, they define a job and an employee’s area of responsibility. In the survey, almost three-quarters of organizations found job titles to be important and believed that they conveyed authority and responsibility.  Second, they establish the company ladder.  Being labeled as someone of a higher level in the company is distinguishing, allowing for greater access and recognition. In addition, job titles have emotions and expectations attached as individuals have a need to feel intelligent, influential, and important. Finally, they can empower employees to expand their responsibilities in the organization, and may even prompt positive behaviors such as taking more initiative or displaying greater leadership. For all of these reasons, enhancing job titles can be extremely motivating to employees.

An important additional reward component of enhancing job titles is the way in which the change is communicated. Creating a formal announcement organization-wide or within a specific department allows for public recognition of the employee. Other ways organizations could communicate this change is on their website or within a newsletter.

Source:

• Pearl Meyer & Partners. (2009). 2009 Report on Job Titling Practices.
• Business Knowledge Source. (2009). Job titles: How can I use them to motivate employees and communicate to customers?

200 Sample Social Media Policies and Ideas

Social Media is still a relatively new and cloudy area in regards to employee and employer privacy and security. The lines of what is appropriate and what is inappropriate are still quite gray, however several companies are ammending their existing policies to include guidelines for social media use in the workplace. We found 200 policies, tips, and ideas for coming up with your own social media policy – just remember, not all policies are created equal. Make sure you create guidelines that fit the culture of your workplace…there certainly are no “one-size-fits-all” policies out there.

Sample Policies

• 91 Social Media Policies from Leading Organizations
  from Social Media Governance
• 30+ Social Media Policy Examples
  from 123 Social Media
• 29 Sample Social Media Policies
  from the Altimeter Wiki
• “My Two-Line Social Media Policy”
  from socialmediatoday

Tips for Building Your Policy

• 10 Must-Haves for Your Social Media Policy
  from Mashable
• Corporate Social Media Policy: Top 10 Guidelines
  from PR-Squared
• Social Media Policies and Procedures (8 Tips for Sample Social Networking Policies)
  from Daniel Hoang’s blog

Etiquette and Rules

• The Ultimate Social Media Handbook (Covers 9 Social Media Platforms)
  from Techipedia
• The 11 Rules of Social Media Etiquette
  from Digital Labz

Don’t forget to visit the ERC Media Center for more examples of how ERC is using social media to connect people and share information…

The Keys to Creating an Innovative Organization

Innovation. It’s an important characteristic of our NorthCoast 99 winning workplaces, helping them create a leading edge in their workplaces and products or services.  These winning workplaces have mastered creating cultures that facilitate employee creativity and idea generation.  Numerous studies suggest that innovation not only increases employee engagement and intrinsic job satisfaction, but is a strong predictor of organizational success. But what organizational factors truly contribute most to innovation? What does it take to create a truly innovative organization? 

Research seems to suggest that there are two “entry-ways” towards innovation. Both opportunity and necessity/limited resources stimulate creativity.  In fact, in addition to new opportunities that present themselves (such as new technology), pressing problems, necessities and distress with the status quo can cause organizations to become more innovative.  Perhaps even in the face of a difficult recession, organizations, more than ever before, have a reason to innovate and think differently about how they are conducting business (Bledow, Frese, Anderson, Eres, & Farr, 2009).

Insights

A newly published study (Bledow, Frese, Anderson, Eres, & Farr, 2009) analyzing over 150 research studies on innovation suggests that several factors can contribute to the degree of innovation in organizations.  Their insights include:

• Ask employees for new ideas regarding an area of the organization in which development is needed.  Focus on creative idea generation, as this is the root of all innovation.
• Empower all employees to engage in some exploration activities.  By exploration, we mean search, variation, risk-taking, experimentation, flexibility, and discovery. Offer the right balance of exploration (free-thinking, unstructured activation) with exploitation (structured activity focused on refinement, efficiency, productivity, implementation, and execution). Allow time for individual projects unregulated by managers.
• Encourage incremental innovation, rather than radical innovation – start with small improvements to everyday processes, procedures, products, and services. By using a well-defined customer base as the main source of innovation, focus on solving problems for that particular customer pool. Organizations with a strong customer focus have shown to be more innovative and successful.
• Individual characteristics and styles matter. Hire individuals that are conscientious, open to new experiences, curious, and intuitive. They will need to be able to tolerate and embrace ambiguity and adapt accordingly – particularly those in leadership and management roles.
• Acknowledge the creative process. The creative process makes setting deadlines and providing performance feedback more difficult. It’s important to acknowledge that performance management will need to be more flexible as a result.
• Make creativity and innovation an organizational value and performance objective.  Set goals for creativity and innovation for each employee.  Make it part of other performance criteria on which the employees are assessed.
• Support innovation in all facets of the organization and not just one department, such as research and development. Provide resources for innovation to all departments.
• Eliminate barriers to creativity and innovation.  These could be strict and restrictive rules, guidelines, policies, or norms that contradict the goals of creativity.  It could also include unsupportive managers and supervisors. The organizations that innovate best have managers and leaders who provide unconditional support for creativity.
• Provide moderate levels of employee autonomy, which allow for optimal creativity.   Large levels of autonomy do not necessarily lead to optimal creativity as most employees need some form of structure to implement ideas. Too little autonomy and micromanagement, however, stifle creativity and lead to other adverse effects.
• Reward new and successful ideas. Rewards do not have to be large, or even monetary, but they should be meaningful. Do not provide rewards that impede creativity as this communicates a contradictory message.
• Stick to a vision. Ensure that all creative efforts and ideas are focused on a shared, common vision. Efforts and ideas should not stray away from the core mission and purpose of the organization.
• Use diversity. Create diverse teams in terms of education, knowledge, and demographics. Diversity of thought leads to greater innovation.
• There may be positions within organizations that do not require innovation.  Regardless, organizations can employ the use of a simple method called proactive creativity – a method in which a worker identifies a work-related problem and identifies ways and strategies to solve it. This has been shown to be a successful practice among production workers at manufacturers and nurses in healthcare.  All employees can be engaged in solving work-related problems creatively and with the customer’s interest in mind, even if their jobs do not require a creative mindset.

Perhaps your organization’s unique demands and problems could actually be the “entry-way” to a transformation in how your organization conducts its business. Try some creativity yourself, exploring how employee innovation and ideas can change the way your organization operates and meets customer needs. The results could not only impact your bottom line, but may improve your employees’ engagement and morale as well.

For some innovative workplace ideas, check out this year’s NorthCoast 99 Innovation Award Winner, Intuit Real Estate Solutions.

More Great Workplace Tips on Twitter

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter, where we’ll be tweeting one great workplace tip each workday until the 2010 NorthCoast 99 application opening. Follow us now! – twitter.com/NorthCoast99

Sources:

Bledow, R., Frese, M., Anderson, N., Miriam, E., and Farr, J. (2009). A dialectic perspective on innovation: Conflicting demands, multiple pathways, and ambidexterity. Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice. 2:3. Wiley & Sons.

Location, Location, Location

“Start Where You Are” is the title of the second book written by our 2009 NorthCoast 99 Awards Dinner keynote presenter, Chris Gardner. Gardner is probably best known for his rise to success from homelessness, as portrayed by Will Smith in the Hollywood adaptation of his first book, “The Pursuit of Happyness”. His new book offers an inspirational guide to people embarking on their own personal journeys toward success and fulfillment.

There are many ways to apply this simple, yet profound, statement, especially in the context of how to best attract and retain top talent. This is highly evident in the ways in which our 2009 NorthCoast 99 winners are promoting our region as a great place to live and work.

Where are you?

Organizations that excel at attracting and retaining great people understand that their missions and cultures are not confined to the physical buildings in which they conduct business. The things that make their organizations great extend far beyond bricks and mortar and are connected to the communities, cities, and regions in which their people live and work.

NorthCoast 99 Winners recognize the importance of proudly professing “where they are” to anyone who will listen; especially highly talented people who currently (and may someday) work for their organizations.

Reflecting on how NorthCoast 99 Winners apply this concept, here are three easy things you could do today to improve how your organization promotes Northeast Ohio (or wherever you do business) as a great place to live and work:

1. Educate your employees

It’s amazing what you can learn about a place, even if you’ve lived there your entire life. Helping your employees better understand their communities and how your organization is connected to those communities can help build a stronger sense of camaraderie and purpose in your workplace.

NorthCoast 99 winners do this by providing employees access to local publications and organizations (i.e. Cleveland Magazine, Positively Cleveland, ClevelandPlus, CoolCleveland.com, etc.) and posting information about upcoming events and activities. This could include something as simple as a flyer on a bulletin board, a posting on a company intranet, or a mention in a staff newsletter.

2. Encourage your employees

Don’t just educate employees. Encourage them to learn more and provide ways for them to engage in their communities. Here are a few ideas from NorthCoast 99 Winners:

• Reward employees with tickets to local events and attractions
• Provide gift certificates to local restaurants and shops
• Give employees maps that highlight the stores, restaurants, and parks in and around the areas in which they work
• Coordinate “Service Days” and other community activities in which employees may participate
• Buy local!
• Encourage employees to participate in other activities that promote their region. For example, you could encourage your employees to spread the word or submit an entry to be a contestant on Cleveland’s first reality web-TV Show, Got City Game Cleveland (www.gotcitygame.tv)

3. Brag to future employees

Show all those talented future contributors to your organization that the communities in which they live and work are important to your business:

• Link to sites such as www.neoisgreat.com or http://www.neoisgreat.com in your online career centers and electronic job ads
• Post info on your website about your community activities and discuss those opportunities during the interview process
• Let candidates know about ties you have with local colleges, professional associations, and other community organizations
• Give candidates and/or new hires a checklist of things to do in your community once they begin employment

For more ideas and examples from NorthCoast 99 Winners, visit www.northcoast99.org or follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/NorthCoast99.