No one can argue that recognising and rewarding staff is a good thing. A culture of recognising can deliver a major benefit to your business. However, as middle managers and supervisors what’s often not so clear is how the giver does a great job in “giving”.
Spontaneous reactions and well deserved rewards are relatively easy, but how do you build your professional capacity to deliver something more structured? Many organisations have an unconscious resistance to “rewards” or sometimes have a formal policy to allocate the responsibility only to CEO’s or other senior Managers.
Regardless of the presiding rules (both formal & informal) and the prevailing culture of the business, professional managers and savvy supervisors can build recognition and reward into their professional practice.
Not so easy of course if the business is neutral or unkind. However, we know that a great deal can be achieved professionally by taking responsibility to build your own capability.
The first, and possibly the most important quality is to recognise that this element of organisational life is about the quality of relationship and trust that enables those who can use their authority to build a sense of appreciation – from an emotionally intelligent space.
So, inherently it’s personal. When we publicly express our sense of value about the acts or contributions of another we are not only validating their worth and contribution to the business, we are also building trust. Recognition and reward without the foundations of trust are very often viewed with a sense of caution or distrust.
In our experience as engagement, recognition and reward specialists we are often presented with the circumstances where a prospect is very keen to build the technical and administrative capacity to address “poor morale”. In order to do so, the organisation needs to build the emotional infrastructure that will enable both the functional and emotional elements to run in sync.
Over the course of several articles we will tackle the often taken for granted or totally overlooked aspect of “acknowledgement”.
Our next article will explore the opportunity of self-assessment – “How good am I?” – and how you can identify the strengths and opportunities for you to develop your abilities in this area.
Brownie Points will also be presenting a series of Recognition & Reward Workshops later in the year and we will be including this professional development opportunity in these sessions.
To register your interest in the workshops, or to learn more about Brownie Points call us on 03 9909 7411 or email us at info@browniepoints.com.au
