Encouraging new ways of looking at old issues also leads to a more involved and connected employee base and makes work more enjoyable.

According to Debra Kaye author of Red Thread Thinking Weaving Together Connections for Brilliant Ideas and Profitable Innovation, more than 1500 CEOs from 60 countries and 33 industries have all said that “innovative thinking” more than anything else their company does or supports  is the key to keeping their businesses ahead of the existing competitors and emerging rivals. On the flip side of the equation, CBS Market Watch says encouraging creativity across the ranks is one of the ways companies can actually make work more fun.

Employees who are encouraged to share their ideas like their jobs better and they flourish in workplaces that openly reward and recognize them for trying new approaches. Studies say that these workers are 250% more likely to develop new ideas on a regular basis.

Rewards can also play a role in mitigating the fear of failure. Employees at businesses who overtly acknowledge and celebrate new ideas are not at all concerned about an idea not working out as planned.  They know that the only bad idea is the one not shared.

If you want to capture better ways to doing business—while also making the workplace fun again—start by making your employee environment more rewarding.

As a senior scientist at Gallup, Lopez has had his share of examining workplace satisfaction issues. He surveyed over 8,000 people and asked them what they liked about their work and their employers.

Here is part of what he found: Workers who are the most “turned on” at work feel they are an important part of the organization’s future. They are surrounded by colleagues and managers who appreciate their work, care about their well-being and are enthusiastic about the contributions they make. These workers love what they do, are confident that they will get to use their skills every day and are excited about their future with the company because their leaders see them as being a big part of the organization’s mission.

Employers love employees who love what they do because they are more productive, more innovative, more customer focused and more profitable.

Companies who have workers that are emotionally and intellectually attached to what they do have also earned higher returns in the equity markets over the last five years. They produce the kinds of numbers and long term success that “turns on” shareholders as well.

Want some quick stats on the economic value of employee engagement? I compiled some stats courtesy of Gallup, Hewitt AON, Blessing White and a few others,

• When employees are highly engaged, their companies enjoy 26% higher employee productivity, have lower turnover risk and are twice more likely to attract top talent.
• Their companies have also earned 13% greater total returns to shareholders over the last five years.
• Highly engaged employees are four times more likely as their less engaged peers to be top performers.
• Engaged employees miss 20% fewer days of work and three-quarters of them exceed expectations in their performance reviews.
• Engaged employees are almost 3 times as likely to please customers and exceed their expectations.
• Additionally, highly engaged workers tend to be more supportive of organizational change initiatives.

Want results like this? Of course you do. That’s why you need to install an employee recognition portal that will help you create the type of cultural conditions that drive engagement.
You will want a system that allows managers to motivate and encourage employees. And you will want the type of real-time access to data that allows you to see how all of that recognition activity is improving the emotional and intellectual commitment your people have with the company.
Engaged employees are the difference between organizations that thrive and those that are just getting by. They are worth big bucks to the firms that have them. These numbers are but a small window into how important engaged employees are to a company. If you want an even better view build a recognition portal.

As employees—especially top performers—take on more responsibility and continue to labor in an environment that demands more for less—have their attitudes toward their employers changed?

Employees are more productive than ever; they are certainly engaged in their work. But as they continue to go “above and beyond” the question worth asking is: Are they committed more to what they are doing than who they are doing it for? Has the engagement dynamic between employees and employers changed?

I think it has and companies that utilize the new rewards of work—salary, benefits and recognition—will come out ahead in the talent battle. Comp and Benefits are not sufficient or agile enough to provide clarity and focus on what is important. Recognition helps to round out the connection.

HR leaders should be tapping into a better blend of intrinsic and extrinsic motivators—pay, material awards and recognition—to properly leverage an employee’s desire to contribute, learn and grow. In fact, you could argue that recognition is the most important reward ingredient. Companies should be ramping up both the volume and the velocity of appreciation an employee receives from managers and coworkers alike as the way to reaffirm the worker’s value to everyone at the firm.

Your employees have done well to contribute at higher levels for quite some time now. They know they can do it and chances are they will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. But if you don’t tell them that you appreciate those efforts now they may just take that new level of engagement to what they do and apply it somewhere else.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013
3:00-4:00 PM EDT

Even though unemployment remains stubbornly high, businesses have struggled to attract and retain employees with the right skills sets and leadership potential they need to grow the enterprise over time. In fact, a narrowing of the leadership pipeline (defined as a global shortage of workers who possess both the abilities and attitudes of a potential leader) is putting a squeeze on the long-term goals of most businesses.

Why is this happening? And, more importantly, what can HR do right now to ensure that their companies come out ahead in the race to secure long-term leadership from their existing employee ranks. Where will the leaders of tomorrow going to come from? And what role can your employee recognition programs play right now to help identify and encourage top talent?

This webinar will make the case for the “Total Recognition” solution—a more balanced and complete implementation philosophy that from day one will afford a comprehensive answer to enterprise recognition.

This webinar will examine:

1. The impact employee demographics and work styles play in shaping the leadership divide.
2. The transition employees take from workers to managers to leaders .
3. The role of employee and organizational alignment plays in shaping vision adoption.
4. How existing leaders influence potential ones.
5. How the right employee engagement systems help HR nurture the leadership pipeline

Register

In survey after survey, executives are expressing concern that the competition for the limited supply of exceptional individuals—who can guide and nurture the organization along with the people that support it—is already curtailing growth. Even though unemployment remains stubbornly high, businesses have struggled to attract, retain and nurture employees with the right skills sets and leadership potential they need to grow the enterprise over time.

So why is this happening? And, more importantly, what can HR do about it?

Join Madison’s Mike Ryan live on Wednesday, June 5th at 3PM EST when he explains how HR can: Address Tomorrow’s Leadership Shortage Today with Employee Recognition.

In less than 60 minutes he will examine;

1. The impact employee demographics and work styles play in shaping the leadership divide
2. The transition employees take from workers to managers to leaders
3. The role of employee and organizational alignment plays in shaping vision adoption
4. How existing leaders influence potential ones
5. And how the right employee engagement systems help HR nurture the leadership pipeline

The insight and information he plans to present is designed to help you pre-position your firm to win the emerging battle for tomorrow’s leaders, today.

Developing the leaders of tomorrow is among the top issues confronting HR professionals right now. The lack of potential leaders is the most pressing human capital problem of our time. You owe it to yourself—and your company—to join Mike as he breaks down the issue and presents the solution.

If you can’t make the broadcast live you can also sign up for one of the five global replays.

Either way we hope you can join him.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013
3:00-4:00 PM EDT

Even though unemployment remains stubbornly high, businesses have struggled to attract and retain employees with the right skills sets and leadership potential they need to grow the enterprise over time. In fact, a narrowing of the leadership pipeline (defined as a global shortage of workers who possess both the abilities and attitudes of a potential leader) is putting a squeeze on the long-term goals of most businesses.

Why is this happening? And, more importantly, what can HR do right now to ensure that their companies come out ahead in the race to secure long-term leadership from their existing employee ranks. Where will the leaders of tomorrow going to come from? And what role can your employee recognition programs play right now to help identify and encourage top talent?

This webinar will make the case for the “Total Recognition” solution—a more balanced and complete implementation philosophy that from day one will afford a comprehensive answer to enterprise recognition.

This webinar will examine:

• The impact employee demographics and work styles play in shaping the leadership divide.
• The transition employees take from workers to managers to leaders .
• The role of employee and organizational alignment plays in shaping vision adoption.
• How existing leaders influence potential ones.
• How the right employee engagement systems help HR nurture the leadership pipeline

Register

So if you are and HR professional and you are tempted to cite an employee engagement/market valuation connection for your firm, you may want to steer clear of that spin. Instead you might want to focus on the “sustainability” of the biggest factor that has helped the Dow and the S&P climb to all-time highs—the historically unmatched productivity of today’s workers.

That’s right I used a word that’s normally researched for green initiatives—sustainability. But in the quest for continued productivity, business leaders need to understand that the fear and anxiety employees had about losing their jobs is fading way and that companies who don’t use positive reinforcement techniques now to keep employees focused and motivated will not only see a drop off in output, they will probably lose their top contributors to competitors—rivals who will be the ones recognizing them.

So don’t be afraid to use that word—sustainable—in the context of continued growth. CEOs and CFOs will quickly make the connection and they will see that without frequent and timely recognition the contribution of top talent will not go on forever. And by extension, neither will the long-term productivity and profitability of your organization. In fact, the continued prosperity for any organization in our talent-dependent economy is not terribly bright without human capital practices that develop and “sustain” optimal employee/ employer relationships over the long hall.

First of all they have a higher dollar-for-dollar impact than payroll, bonuses or stock options because they can be promoted publically. That gives companies the ability to make the connection between an employee’s efforts and the desired organizational outcomes more effectively.

Second, when you reward an employee’s actions (or for that matter aptitude) you stroke their intrinsic desires to bond and learn.

As more and more CEOs become increasingly concerned about their ability to attract and retain top talent in the most cost efficient manner possible, non-cash rewards (and by that I mean catalogue merchandise, gift and debit cards, and individual travel) are becoming a bigger part of the total rewards formula. Why? Because they do more than cash alone can.

Compelling arguments and points that should be made in your business case; but even with this rational you can expect pushback. And it will probably come in the form of a business leader saying something like, “interesting but I have other issues that are more important.”

That’s why the best business cases do three things; anticipate and address objections, frame the benefit in the language of finance and position the proposed solution—in this case the role of recognition—as a tool that will help the business accomplish key objectives.

Want to know how to translate these benefits into tangible financial outcomes? More importantly do you want to see exactly how it works within a recognition portal? Give us a call and well show you how to build a better business case for recognition.

Just like coaches who care adept at breaking down “game tape” and using that process to point out areas that need practice, a good manager relies on observation and reinforcement to point out various skills and habits that could become strengths for the individual worker (and the company) with some extra attention and effort.

Like any good coach the best managers have a keen eye for how a slight tweak in a process or an approach can help each employee on their team perform better.

And employees respond to that attention. Earlier this year Blessing White updated its Employee Engagement Report and reiterated that there is a sharp correlation between a manager’s frequent interaction and the employee’s attitude toward their job’s purpose. These employees are more productive and, as such, more profitable.

Employees are more likely to be engaged when they feel their manager understands what they do well, encourages them to use those skills as much as possible, and recognizes and rewards their achievements when they do. Here a good manager—like a good coach—use a combination of interaction and reinforcement to get more out of their “players”.

Businesses need employees who are both prepared and motivated to meet the challenges and opportunities that they face in the real world. And managers need recognition tools that can help them coach employees along. The best systems make the process easy; fully automating all the mechanics of goal setting, communication and rewarding. So if you want your managers to become better coaches start your game plan by making sure they have the best recognition system available.