There are estimates that around 75% of organizations have an employee recognition program in effect. If this is something that your organisation does not have, then it is something that you may wish to consider starting. The Virgin Group boss Richard Branson says “if you take care of your employees, they will take care of your business”, and many businesses whether they are small or large, feel the same.
Increasing Productivity
Research shows that a reward program does not have to be expensive and that any outlay needed to start the program can soon be more than covered by an increase in employee productivity and efficiency. When workers are happy, they work harder; and if they are incentivized, they will work even harder! Figures also show that if an employee feels unrecognized in the hard work and effort they have given then a company will run the risk of losing that employee as they will seek employment with a company that rewards their efforts.
What Makes Them Tick?
Before you start employee incentive programs, it is a good idea to speak to your employees to find out what reward they feel would incentivize them to work harder. You can do this through one on one meetings with the management, or you can even offer an anonymous suggestion box where employees can suggest different types of rewards. It is important to realize that you cannot please everyone, so you will need to go with the most popular ideas as this will have the biggest effect on your workforce. When you have a list of ideas of what people want as rewards, you can then start to put together your reward program.
Affordable Solutions
As mentioned previously, rewards do not have to cost a lot of money, and often simple ideas which are relatively cheap can be well received by your employees. There are many different ways in which you can reward the hard work that is carried out by all your members of staff.
- Food & Drinks: Any easy way to make people happy is to give them food and drinks. Once a month, if targets are hit, you can reward hard work by offering food and drinks for members of staff to enjoy in the office before they go home.
- Days Out: A team day out is also a great reward that is well received and will also go a long way in developing team bonding.
- Gift Vouchers: Gift vouchers for major high-street shops is also something which employees appreciate. Offering them a choice of shops they can use the gift cards in will mean that almost everyone will be happy in receiving them.
- An Early Finish: If a team or employee hits a set target, you can also offer them a half day off at the end of the month as a reward that does not come out of their holiday entitlement. Many companies already offer employees a bonus days’ holiday on their birthdays.
Conclusion
The gains that can be had from implementing an employee incentive program can far outweigh the costs. If it is not something that your organisation currently does, and you want to increase the performance of your members of staff, then you should consider a reward program that shows your employees how much you appreciate their efforts. After all, without them, your business will suffer!
I hope you enjoyed this article about increasing your employee productivity using incentives to improve efficiency.
Interested in reading more articles about business efficiency?
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