the do’s and don’ts of employee recognition

You can’t do anything in your business without your team of dedicated employees. Whether you have two people working for you or you’re managing a multinational department with hundreds of employees, recognition should be an essential part of your management style.

Not sure if recognition programs are worth your while? These do’s and don’ts will help you do recognition right.

Do recognize employees promptly

Don’t wait to tell your employee that they’re doing a good job once a year. That hit of dopamine that comes with being told you’re doing a good job isn’t going to last for 12 months. It’s important to praise employees regularly and in a timely manner.

It also doesn’t do much good to recognize your employee for something they did two months ago because you remembered it just now. Ideally, you should acknowledge your employee the same day (or week) of their achievement.

Don’t forget to personalize it

No one wants a super generic, meaningless reward for their hard work. Personalized gifts make a world of difference for your employees. Get to know your employees so you can personalize any gifts of recognition you create for them. For example, you could give a laser-etched bookmark to someone who loves to read or a company-branded dog leash to an animal lover.

Whatever you do, make sure you get the employee’s name right. There’s nothing more embarrassing than giving a personalized water bottle that says “Mara” to Sara.

Do get specific

Telling someone “Good job!” just doesn’t have the same effect as “I appreciate how you kept a level head and treated this difficult client with respect.” Recognition is all about enforcing positive behavior; if you want employees to repeat a particular behavior, you need to spell it out specifically.

Don’t play favorites

How often are you praising one employee? Do you recognize entire teams for their hard work or just individuals? It can be easy to overlook certain teams or employees, but that can cause a lot of hard feelings if you aren’t mindful.

You have to recognize employees in a fair, well-balanced way. That means:

Recognizing teamwork: Collaboration isn’t easy. If something was a team effort, don’t single out just one person for the reward.

Matching the reward with the achievement: Would you give a pencil to celebrate an employee’s 10 years of service at your company?

Hopefully not. The more significant the milestone or the achievement, the nicer your recognition rewards should be. Coinbase developed achievement boxes that celebrate work anniversaries and allows longer-tenured employees their choice of gift.

Making all employees eligible: FOMO is a big deal in the workplace. Never exclude a single employee, team, or group from your recognition program unless you want to breed serious hard feelings.

Do create a system

Only 14% of companies give their leaders the tools to properly recognize employees. Work with your leadership team to create a system to recognize employees, equipping managers with the tools and training to do it right.

Boundless can help you set up a reward portal for employees to choose their own gifts. You might also let employees gift each other kudos that they exchange for gift cards. The sky’s the limit! Just make sure you have a system in place that makes it easy for your leaders to dole out recognition consistently.