Every company competes to get the best industrial talents and retain them for the company's progress. But what companies don't pay attention to is that they think more about selecting the best talent than about getting existing employees to show their best performance with recognition in the workplace. We know that employee recognition is crucial, but how we recognize employee performance is a challenge. This article will discuss employee recognition examples and how you can implement them in your company.
What is employee recognition?
Employee recognition is an act of acknowledgment and appreciation for employees for any accomplishments and contributions to the business that links to the company's mission, purpose, and values. The form of acknowledgment can be formal or informal, individual or team.
What are the 4 types of recognition?
Recognition is a vast and complex world of responsibilities. Before we get into employee recognition examples, let's learn about the 4 key types of recognition.
- Public recognition
When an employee gets an achievement, the manager or supervisor announces it in front of others and celebrates it. You can announce it immediately during a meeting, a few minutes before work hours start, or be featured in a company newsletter.
- Private recognition
Tis is one-on-one recognition. Coworkers don't know when you convey recognition to the honoree. This includes direct messaging, email, and thank you notes.
Private recognition can be more meaningful for certain employees, because sometimes there are people who don't want their achievements to be shared with coworkers. Talking one-on-one will make a special impression in the hearts of employees, because you can convey gratitude and recognition personally.
- Promotion
A promotion is next level recognition by giving new responsibilities to individuals, giving new positions, or new projects. Giving a promotional reward will give individuals the opportunity to continue to develop and trust their team to take on more.
- Monetary reward
Anything related to giving money to employees who excel. Bonuses, pay raises, company trips, or anything with fiscal offerings or compensation.
10 Employee Recognition Examples to Implement at Your Business
Recognition and appreciation are two crucial things that must exist in every organization. If you want to get employees with maximum potential, let's dive into several employee recognition examples below.
- Create customized award
You can make employee awards as unique as possible, because there are no limits. Customized rewards are your opportunity to provide creativity in your employee recognition and provide rewards in accordance with the company's core values.
14 Proven Morale Boosters Ideas for Employees and Staff
Maybe you can provide special nameplates on employees' work desks, a unique parking space in the office for employees who excel, or special clothes that say employee of the year. Customized awards can be encouraging for employees and raise loyalty levels.
- Give employee a day off
Giving employees days off on weekends is commonplace. But it can be great if you give a day off on weekdays to decompress and celebrate employee's accomplishments. Sometimes heavy projects and difficult milestones will exhaust employees. Give one or two days off to employees as a form of gratitude because employees have tried their best and made improvements. Employees will thank you because they can regain their focus and enthusiasm after several days of hard work to achieve an accomplishment.
- Dinner on the company
Invite your team to dinner with the company that pays for everything. This is one kind of employee recognition, because it brings the team to eat the best food in town while discussing how well they have performed recently. Dinner on the company will show employees that their hard work is always noticed, and can be a fun discussion at dinner with office officials.
- Employee care package
A care package is a sign that someone is thinking about you. Care packages can be the right choice for employee recognition gifts, because employees will give positive feedback and feel lucky to get self-care products. You can fill in bath soap, shampoo, scented candles, handbody, lotion, or anything that can care for everything from the face to the feet.
- Meetup with remote teams
With many offices starting to use remote work after Covid, it might be difficult to build strong work relationships due to distance limitations. You can create an event to meet with remote workers at a cafe, restaurant or coworking space to spend some good quality meetings together. The power of face-to-face interaction can be impactful for teamwork in the future.
- Send employees on an adventure
Difficult projects have been passed, every employee has demonstrated their skills for the progress of the office. It's time for the office to give recognition gifts in the form of gifts of experience. Invite employees to go on an adventure to explore the beauty of nature such as hiking, kayaking, picnicking on a wide hill, or exploring the lake.
This gift will be more meaningful and memorable because it can be a means to get closer to coworkers and have fun outside the office. Seeing the beauty of nature will be a powerful stress relief for employees.
- Spread words of affirmation
Some projects or weeks can feel harder than before. Words of affirmation can make your employees feel recharged and appreciated. Give a few words of praise and recognition to increase employee morale. A simple 'good job' and 'thank you' can bring many positive things in the future. Employees will feel pumped to maintain their best performance, understanding that each of their work will be meaningful for the office.
- Career based rewards
Offering career-based rewards can be perfect for employees and benefit your company. Send employees to take courses, seminars, leadership training, or let employees choose the online classes they want to take. Sometimes employees don't have to take several classes that are related to the current job, but it can be an investment for their career. The benefit of this reward is that it shows employees that their manager cares about the team's self-development.
- Invest in employees’ health and well-being
Showing appreciation can be shown through how you genuinely care about employees' health and well-being. Hire a yoga instructor to lead a yoga class in the office, or give a gym membership to each employee and do the gym together. If employees have a particular hobby in sports, you can provide facilities such as playing futsal together, playing badminton, tennis or swimming.
- Encourage continuing education
Self-development can be done by helping employees to pay for their next education. Show you appreciate them that you want employees to continue to grow in their career. Every employee will want to improve themselves in terms of career and knowledge. By providing opportunities to continue their education, employees will be more enthusiastic about achieving and showing their best skills according to their work.
Every employee has tried their best for the progress of the company and also improvement for themselves. A good company will recognize employee's hard work and understand how to show gratitude to them. SMEBrother has prepared many articles on how you can advance your business by showing appreciation and recognition to employees. Check out the SMEBrother website for tips and education on how to advance your business, from thinking about employee wellness, to licensing, finance, leadership, and much more.
