As a business owner, attracting top talent, increasing retention, and motivating your employees to remain productive and efficient are likely among your top priorities, and for good reason. This can help to improve loyalty and devotion, boost employee happiness and morale, and result in an increased output of your company. Motivation and encouragement are vital to the success of a business, and there’s no better way to achieve this than by rewarding your employees for a job well done. With that in mind, here is how you can encourage and reward strong employee performance:
Align awards with goals
Aligning rewards with important company goals and recognizing strong performers is a great way to demonstrate to employees how their efficiency and productivity help the business. If you need to reach specific sales targets, for example, a rewards program can be created to incentivize workers according to how they meet or surpass these targets. The rewards programs can include salary increments, bonuses, reimbursements, stock options, remote work opportunities, etc. Digital HR tools can also be leveraged for monitoring employee performance, enabling you to track the metrics needed for determining who has earned the rewards.
Reward all achievements
While celebrating great accomplishments and successful projects and goals is imperative, it may also be helpful to recognize even the smaller milestones that have led employees to those important achievements. This can motivate employees and encourage them to stay focused on reaching all the necessary objectives. To achieve this, you can celebrate employees whenever they get promoted within the company, or even offer gifts and special recognition for work anniversaries and milestones such as completing five, ten, or more years at work.
Recognize teamwork
Recognizing and awarding teamwork is another great way to inspire employees to improve communication and collaboration, which can boost the overall productivity and innovation in the company as a result. Since this tends to be a more skilled, elaborate, and time-consuming process, rewards for teams should be a bit more substantial than rewards for individuals, while still managing to honor the whole team. For example, you could plan a special outing for the team or even arrange a fine dining experience once the team has managed to reach a major milestone for your business.
Offer unique rewards
Along with conventional incentives, there are a number of unique rewards you can offer your employees based on your company culture. For instance, you can pay an affordable annual fee for a David Jones American Express platinum card and provide your employees with exclusive perks such as reward points, deferred payment options, and free delivery when shopping. You can also surprise them with some additional time off, a personal lunch with the CEO, tickets to a live performance event, a sponsored getaway, or any other interesting reward that agrees with your budget and overall culture.
Provide specific recognition
When employees complete some major individual achievements, it may be best to offer more specific and personalized recognition. This can make your employees feel valued and appreciated, as it highlights the impact of their individual contributions to the business. It will also help to demonstrate that you truly care about your staff. To provide personal recognition, you could feature employee interviews in your internal communications platform, present certificates of achievement, provide recognition notes from the CEO, create an “Employee of the Day” program, provide enhanced office equipment, and use other similar tactics.
Focus on development
Another method that could be quite advantageous to the company includes providing personal and professional development opportunities to employees. Not only is investing in the future of employees a great incentive for them to remain with your company, but highly skilled workers can also bring more value to the business overall. To invest in the development of your employees, you can reimburse fees and tuitions for different educational programs, sponsor seminars held by motivational speakers, pay for masterclasses and hobby classes, arrange mentoring sessions, provide gym and library memberships, and utilize similar solutions that promote personal and professional improvement.
Try some fun surprises
In addition to more common and traditional rewards, employees could also be encouraged to reward one another. For instance, peers and managers can treat each other for their milestones and support in fun ways that boost morale and strengthen employee relationships. This could include sending care packages and gift baskets, giving gift cards and vouchers, giving decorative plants, ordering takeout and reimbursing the bill, gifting charming memorabilia that remind employees of the company, and any other small token of appreciation to increase employee happiness and satisfaction.
Evidently, encouraging and rewarding your employees for their performance can have a number of benefits for the overall growth and success of your business. Use the tips mentioned above to find ideas for rewards that are bound to satisfy and motivate your staff.
