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30 Ways to Thank Your Employees for Their Hard Work

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By Kayla Matthews

Running a company or department is no small task, but making time for employees is always essential. The mark of a good leader is one who encourages and inspires — aim to do this for your colleagues.

Your workers perform at their greatest when they feel appreciated and acknowledged, which leads to overall improvements within the organization. You have a world of options on how to thank your employees, so go with ones that function best for boosting company morale.

1. Listen to Their Suggestions

If you don’t already have an established rewards policy, create one by getting your employees’ input. Listening to their suggestions can extend to regular business operations as well — no one wants to feel ignored at their job.

2. Send Emails

Send emails expressing your appreciation for exemplary work on a project or new business venture. Personalizing them for each person involved shows the extent of your gratitude.

3. Acknowledge Them During Company Events

Company events bring together colleagues, friends and family. Recognize your employees in front of their loved ones to show your appreciation.

4. Allow Flexibility

Eighty percent of U.S. workers prefer a flexible schedule, whether it be at-home work or a coworking space. Implement remote work within your rewards program if possible.

5. Write an Article

If you want to disseminate information, write an article. You’ll get eyes on your company while promoting your best and brightest.

6. Give Awards

Being acknowledged makes anyone feel proud, but giving employees awards goes the extra mile. Awarding commemorative gifts to hard-working employees can help emphasize their achievements.

7. Provide Free Food

Most people adore free food, and your employees are no different. Provide snacks around the office or set up a food and beverage station.

8. Give Bonuses

Everyone loves extra money in their pockets. Give bonuses to workers who’ve been performing at their peak.

9. Host a Celebration

Holiday parties are the norm, but you don’t have to wait until then to celebrate. Host an event after a major team accomplishment.

10. Allow Extra Time Off

Close the office the day before a holiday or let everyone out early one Friday a month.

11. Offer Paid Family Leave

Family planning can be difficult with a lack of workable options — 89% of civilians make do with unpaid leave — but you can give your employees a break by offering paid family leave.

12. Pay for Lunch

Take colleagues out to lunch on the company’s dime or have food brought to the office.

13. Write Notes

A handwritten note feels even more personal than an email or article, and your employees will know you put in thought into it.

14. Acknowledge Birthdays

Have a celebration for them during the lunch break or provide small gifts.

15. Plan a Company Trip

A trip to the movies or a hiking trail encourages team bonding and lifts everyone’s spirits.

16. Involve Other Coworkers

If you’re congratulating one employee, have the department sign a card to show everyone’s appreciation.

17. Have a Pizza Party

Pizza is a fun treat you can adapt to fit anyone’s taste. Put in some orders and serve it during a lunch break.

18. Share Accomplishments on Social Media

Honor your employees on a wide scale by sharing their achievements on social media.

19. Get to Know Them

Every individual has dreams, likes and dislikes. Get to know more about your employees so your gifts will be personal and genuine.

20. Send an Edible Arrangement

Gift an employee with an Edible Arrangement filled with their favorite fruits and chocolates.

21. Offer Support

If someone is having a baby, have the team chip in with monetary gifts and baby shower presents.

22. Establish Employee of the Month Awards

Commend someone each month for their dedication and hard work. Offer additional perks such as a reserved parking space.

23. Have a Casual Dress Day

Wearing heels and slacks around the clock can get tiring for some, so allow your team some respite by letting them dress casually one day each week.

24. Do a Giveaway

People love free goodies — host a giveaway of prizes your employees would love to win.

25. Film a Video

Film a quick video expressing your gratitude and recognizing your employees’ achievements. This tip works well if you have remote workers who don’t live nearby.

26. Donate to Their Favorite Charities

Give a corporate contribution to an organization your team picks, or let the whole company decide on a charity.

27. Surprise Them With Gifts

Stick a pair of movie tickets or a gift card in their desk drawer as a token of your gratitude.

28. Grant Wishes

If you notice your employees make offhand comments about things they desire, accommodate a few of these requests each week. They can be fairly small wishes, such as someone wanting their favorite brand of coffee or an office fan.

29. Supply Drinks

Bring your employees champagne or wine to enjoy in their after-work hours. Offer non-alcoholic options for those who don’t partake.

30. Send Them to a Conference

Provide opportunities for your employees to attend conferences that suit their tastes as well as the company’s interests.

Appreciate Your Colleagues

You employees put in a tremendous amount of work to sustain and nurture your company. Pay them back for the good deeds they do and the talents they display. Your gratitude won’t go unnoticed — it’ll make for a better atmosphere all around.

 

About the Author: Kayla Matthews writes about communication and workplace productivity on her blog, Productivity Theory. Her work has also appeared on Talent Culture, MakeUseOf, The Muse and Fast Company.

Photo by Hanny Naibaho on Unsplash

5 Ways to start a mutiny!

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by Patty Azzarello

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People want their work to matter

I was preparing to write this blog about how to make work more meaningful for people, when I heard a piece of an interview with Dan Ariely about his new book, The Upside of Irrationality.

I didn’t hear the whole interview, but he talked about a test he did to measure how important meaning was in one’s work. The test was to complete a task repeatedly, until you wanted to stop.

The task was to build a Lego robot.

When you completed it, you got asked if you would like to build another robot.

In one case the robot you built was placed to the side so you could admire it while you built the next one.

In the other case if you said you’d like to build another, they dis-assembled the one you just built right in front of you,  gave you back the pieces and said, OK build another one.

How to drain all meaning out of someone’s work

I’m sure I am doing a dis-service to Dan Ariely’s work by taking this out of context, but that is one of the best metaphors I have heard for taking the meaning out of someone’s work!

It got me to thinking, what are all the ways we drain meaning from our employees work, dis-assemble their robots right before their eyes, mabye even without recognizing we are doing it?  And how can we build up the meaning instead?

1. Changing your mind all the time

Someone completes something you said was really important, but you changed your mind since you first assigned the task.  Now instead of accepting the work and thanking them, you gloss over it and ask them to do something else instead.   Then later you change your mind again, maybe even back to the first thing.

Robot parts are flying at this point!

Let people finish things.  Don’t keep switching the task before people can complete things.  Consider the full cost of changing your mind.  If you really have to change your mind, don’t skip the closure.

Thank people for the work, and communicate a reason why THEIR work still counts,  even though YOU have changed your mind.

2. Not accepting something different than you do it

Be careful here, just because it isn’t like you would do it, doesn’t mean that it’s not good enough, or maybe even better.

Build the robot again, but this time use the blue legos for the feet and the red ones for the arms because that is how I do it.

You are far more likely to create meaning if you accept good work, than if you tweak it to death just to make it exactly like you would do it.

3. Skipping the closure

The urgent customer issue or demand has disappeared because you either won the deal or lost the deal. The team has been working frantically to produce or defend something.

When you no longer feel the urgency, you either forget to call off the team, so they keep working round the clock — oops!   Or you just never go back to collect the work, because it no longer matters to you.

Just because it no longer has meaning for you and you have moved on to other things, doesn’t mean you should take the meaning away from the people that did the work.

Save the robot as a resource

If the work is no longer necessary, close out the project, thank them, and have a quick brainstorming about how we can use this important work for another customer or to solve a general issue.

It’s so much easier to just move on to your next urgent thing, but you are sacrificing your team’s motivation an ongoing performance and support if you skip this step.

4. Not being clear about the strategy

This is probably the biggest and most common hazard I have seen.

Companies are fuzzy about what their strategy is.  But they demand lots of hard work from people, and it is utterly impossible to understand if the work matters to the strategy or not.

Unclear strategy causes lots of wasted time and energy working on the wrong things, or waiting for decisions to be made, but it is really de-motivating for people to deliver work into a strategic black hole.

That is like throwing their robots directly into the trash can.

Make the strategy clear.  It’s what creates meaning for the work.

5. Not connecting the dots for people

Even if the strategy is clear to you, don’t expect your staff to automatically see how their work fits into supporting the big picture.

You need to spell it out and show them why their work matters. If you never connect the dots about how their work specifically supports the over-all strategy, there is no meaning in it for them.

Otherwise, they are just putting their robots on a conveyor belt to be used for unknown purposes.

Ensuring that all your employees understand how the business works, and how their work helps move it forward, motivates and enables them make better decisions and add more value.

With our without financial rewards your employees will do better work, faster, if they can personally see why it matters.

How do you create meaning for your employees?

This is a topic where concrete examples are so valuable. What’s worked for you? Please share your ideas in the comment box.

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Patty Azzarello works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. She has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at The Azzarello Group Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello

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Four Free Ways to Motivate People … When Money Isn’t Free

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by Patty Azzarello

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Motivation is Personal

Money is the easiest and least personal way to motivate people (if you have money). If you don’t, you need to get down to the real business of making people actually care about what they are working on.

In any economy, it’s important to focus on the non-financial motivators for three key reasons.

  1. Those are always within your control
  2. They work better than money – people work for meaning, not money
  3. Money doesn’t buy loyalty, it only rents effort

Free motivators that work wonders

1. Remove Uncertainty about the work. The biggest de-motivator you can have is when people don’t know exactly what to work on or why it matters. Make sure you keep people engaged in meaningful work, and always connect the dots of why it matters. Just because you are waiting for answers from above, don’t keep your team waiting. Never pass uncertainty downward.

2. Communicate a lot, on a regular cadence. Clear consistent communication from above is a magical motivator that so many leaders miss. You get huge points for leadership and credibility when you communicate well. People are always more motivated to work for people they know and respect, than invisible, or checked out leaders. Even if you are not checked out, if you fail to communicate regularly, you will appear to be checked out.

3. Don’t guess what people care about, ask them! Personally ask each person that works for you. You’ll be amazed at the answers, and how many things you can do without money that will make a material difference to them.

4. Say Thank You. Create a habit in your organization to recognize contributions. Don’t over complicate it with processes, nominations, reviews, and spreadsheets. Just make it clear to your staff that you want to know when anyone in your organization does something remarkable, and then have one of the executives say, “thank you”.

Want to know more?

I’ll talk more about each of these and share some great stories about what really works (and what really pisses people off) in my free webinar: Motivating Without Money, Wednesday, Aug 25.

Sign up now to learn more great motivation techniques.

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Patty Azzarello works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. She has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at The Azzarello Group Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello