Reviving Employee Morale with Rewards

There are a lot of factors that affect an employee’s morale. However different the situation may be, the results are often one and the same in nature – a dive in business revenue. What employers sometimes fail to understand is the need to practice giving out employee rewards, just to boost a little bit of morale inside the workplace.

According to the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, individuals are always innately seeking for approval. This begins at childhood, and continues until the person eventually achieves the self-fulfilment stage. Self-fulfilment may be attained either at home, from peers, and at work. This is the psychological view that employers need to plan and understand carefully.

Common Cause of Low Employee Morale

Unfortunately, not everybody is lucky enough to land a job that they have always dreamed of. Most of the time, people settle for the immediate opportunities at hand, rather than continuously seeking out what they really want in the first place. Sometimes, employees lose their work morale due to lack of opportunities, while other times it’s just because of personal reasons. As a result, employees are not motivated to produce the best results. Hence, a far less productive employee can terribly affect business revenue.

How can you Motivate Employees? How can you Increase their Work Morale?

The answer to this is simple- rewards. When employees are rewarded for hitting their targets, they will be motivated to work together and harder, thus increasing the company’s stocks and profit.

There are other options in boosting morale aside from increasing an employee’s salary. It is most understandable, of course, that money as a form of employee rewards does motivate people. However, there are other things that can definitely capture an employee’s attention:

1.     Convenience Credit Cards- companies can better instigate responsibility and eagerness among their employees by awarding outstanding employees with a prepaid convenience credit card. This can hold money from $100 to $1000, depending on the company’s budget. The star employee of the month may be much privileged with this card, and he or she can decide where and when to shop. 

2.     In-Season Gadgets- of course, iPads, iPhone, netbooks, digital cameras or an LED TV may be too expensive as a form of reward. However, it can motivate your employees to strive harder, and achieve even impossible company targets. Since these items may not be as cheap as your average rewards, these rewards may be given as a year-end bonus to top performing workers. It can also be given as a reward for hitting a major company milestone.

3.     Restaurant Gift Cards- there is nothing more wonderful than eating at a fine dining restaurant without worrying about your bill! This reward will give your hard working employees a taste of luxury, without hurting their budgets. This gift card will let your employees taste the rewards of their hard work, and enjoy the company of their loved ones at dinner.

4.   A Wellness Program- these wellness programs can be structured and developed in a number of ways. They can be in a form of a free gym membership, nutrition counselling, alcohol and smoking cessation program, and weight loss packages. Healthy employees indeed perform better. Therefore, a company is doing both itself and the employee a favour by having a wellness program at hand.

A little creativity, and a good selection of rewards can dramatically increase your employee’s performance, and of course, your company’s revenue. This selection of rewards can help you do just that.

Photo credit to: RobinsonsMay

The Importance of Employee Rewards in a Tough Economy

 

 

Just because the economy is bad, it doesn’t mean that you should cut off giving employee rewards. Providing rewards to employees is an important tool that all companies and organizations should utilize. Giving incentives to your employees pay off greatly by keeping performance and productivity levels high. This is even more important in a tough economy.

Benefits of Giving Employee Rewards in an Economic Crisis

Employee morale is expected to be on an all time low during an economic crisis. When things are going bad everywhere, it’s inevitable that your employees will be affected. Offering rewards to your employees is a great way to keep the work atmosphere pleasant and productive. Even if the crisis can be demoralizing to many, it is your job to make sure it doesn’t affect your company. Here are a number of benefits you can get out of giving employee rewards in a bad economy.

•  Keeps Employees Motivated–employees without any motivation left in them won’t be able to work     their best. The rising price of goods and the news of people losing their jobs are very disheartening. You can help your employees to feel better, and more secured about their work by offering rewards for good performance.
• Makes Employees Feel Appreciated– making sure your employees know how much you appreciate them is important. When employees feel valued, they will work even harder to please you. A happy employee will do what they can to make sure that the company they work for succeeds. 
• Encourages High Performance & Productivity– When employees are happy, it encourages them to work harder and perform better. This is why giving rewards works both ways. With a little expense, you can get so much more with increased productivity and less attrition. Rewards should be thought of as an investment and not an expense.

Employee rewards don’t have to be costly. During tough economic times, rewards are often one of the first things that are removed from the budget, but that does not have to be the case. There are ways to keep your employees happy by rewarding without having to spend a fortune. In a tough economy, you need to play it smart. Little things like rewarding the highest performing employee a digital gift or giving tickets to a sports game or a popular show won’t cost so much, but will certainly encourage them to aim higher. Team dinners will also help your employees bond, and unwind after a hard day at work.

Benefits of Using Rewards to Communicate Well with Employees

Proper communication with employees is important. Employees are the backbone of any organization; every business owner knows well that clear and proper communication will help boost employee performance. Remember, employees are the face of your company, so if you don’t communicate your instructions and expectations well, they won’t be able to represent you well to your customers.

There are many ways you can establish a stable and transparent communication line with your employees. Here are a few methods:

•        Give them clear instructions
•        Send them constant reminders
•       Give them ample training
•        Be there to assist them every-time
•                   Schedule frequent employee coaching sessions
  
  
  All the aforementioned techniques work, but they’re not always effective. And why is that, you ask? Those methods don’t give your employees much incentive to obey you! Therefore, the key to communicating and getting things done as you expected, is rewarding your employees. Reward them for a job well done, and they’ll be more likely to listen and communicate with you.
  
  
   Benefits of an Employee Reward System
  
  
  There are many reasons why an employee reward system is used in a business. It enables the organization to keep valued employees, stay competitive, and minimize turnover.
  
  
  •  Pushes employees to keep on learning – Using employee rewards effectively will inspire    employees to obtain certain skills that will help them do their job better. If you want your team to learn new sales techniques or new software, you can easily motivate them by offering a small incentive for those who will excel in the training program.
    
  • Boosts employee desire to stay in the company – When employees lose interest in their job, they start to perform poorly. This is why it is important to keep employees motivated by coaching them and gaining their trust through a rewards system. Aside from growth opportunities, the possibility of getting a reward for their hard work will keep them loyal.
  • Helps with recruiting new employees – Happy employees will share the exciting news about your company to the world. Word of mouth will promote your company to potential employees, and even investors. When people hear good things about your company, they will be more likely to do business with you.
  • Encourages healthy competition and teamwork – Of course, not everyone can be given a reward. These are special incentives that are meant for the best worker during a certain period. The fact that not  everyone will be handed a reward will lead to healthy competition amongst employees. No matter which of your employees win, it will be a win-win situation for everyone involved, because those who didn’t win will have developed their skills, and you will reap the rewards of increased employee performance.
  
  
  You can offer different forms of employee rewards. There are direct monetary rewards that include base salary increase, merit pay, and bonuses. Monetary rewards are often already expected by employees and are usually a standard prize given in most companies today. Special incentives can be offered in replacement of typical monetary rewards, such as travel privileges, gift cards, gadgets, lunch vouchers, and more. The trick is offering a reward that your employees need.