When implementing a rewards and recognition program is it better to implement rewards and recognition based on individual or team performance or a combination of the two?

7 Comments

1. AnonymousDecember 10,2023 at 1:31PM UTC

   I say it depends.

   if your team together accomplishes something, reward the team.

   if you have a superstar that is just killing it, reward them. It should put a fire under the others to want to do more.

   It doesn’t always have to be a monetary reward. Make sure your people know they are appreciated.

   I have a superstar that is going above and beyond. I nominated him for our associate of the month. He works two jobs to provide a good Christmas for his son. Last week I sent him home 4 hours early with pay to let him rest before his next job. At that time, I couldn’t have given him anything that meant more to him.

   you will find the balance.

2. AnonymousDecember 10,2023 at 1:33PM UTC

   Please look at the studies/articles showing that employee recognition programs actually decrease productivity, breed resentment in designing whatever program you end up with. Harvard did a famous study on this.

3. AnonymousDecember 10,2023 at 7:52PM UTC

   I don't have a direct answer for you, but I do have an experience you can draw upon.

   I worked for a company that would have quarterly awards ceremonies where "The Best of the Best Award" was given. Though I know that the award was bought at an award and trophy shop, I still desired that tear drop glass award namely because I was conditioned to do so. I grew up in religious schools where good conduct awards were doled out, so I naturally coveted "The Best of the Best Award."

   Those afternoon award ceremonies would put me in a foul mood for days (literally from Thursday afternoon to Monday morning) because it seemed that no matter how hard I had worked, I would never be recognized for the work that I did. I was the only person in the company who did what I did, and I had done much to improve my department.

   Toward my last year with the company, I started to notice that other department members stopped going to the awards ceremonies, which gave me permission to stop attending them as well. Not having to participate in those ceremonies did much to improve my mood.

   Later on, I left the company and got a contract job where my team members would flagrantly goof off. Watching them gold brick got me thinking about those dreaded award ceremonies and wondering whether I should have treated myself more gently through the years. I now ask myself why I didn't just take a few hours off on those days and enjoy my afternoons.

   I no longer covet "The Best of the Best Award," for our new CEO got cheap and exchanged those glorious glass awards with paper certificates, and let's be honest, who wants an award that came out of a Xerox machine not ten minutes before it was given?

4. AnonymousDecember 10,2023 at 8:12PM UTC

   Most of these programs end up backfiring and causing hard feelings for those who "don't win." In a former job, they had an "employee of the month" that rolled up to the "quarter" and then "year." In my third month with the company, I won "Employee of the Month" and ended up with "Employee of the Quarter." The only thing this brought me was the backlash from my co-workers, one of whom told me directly that he was "trying to figure out who I was sleeping with, but didn't have any evidence it was happening." The one word he left out was "yet, " which was blatantly assumed.

   On the other hand, the only place where these work well is when there are identifiable and irrefutable criteria on how the "awards" are determined. When I worked in a car dealership group, each brand gave special recognition and bonuses to the employees with the most units sold monthly, quarterly, and yearly. Even this, without having non-overlapping clientele, can lead to toxic competition for clients.

5. AnonymousDecember 11,2023 at 4:07PM UTC

   My husband’s company has awards that are given for various reasons. You can get a letter of recognition. That looks good at review time and can make the difference in your next raise. You can get a small monetary award - $30 Amazon card. It goes over very well. Nobody gets hot and bothered if they don’t get one. It’s $30 not $3,000.

   The company also has another tier of awards that are given for going well above and beyond - mind you they also believe in all the unpaid overtime you need to work to get your regular job done. These awards are usually given out for work on specific projects that require odd hours, long long days and nights, and work that gets done because the client needed something not within the original scope of work. Again, nobody seems to get hot and bothered if people get these. They are happy for their fellow employees. It may be the culture of his place of employment - nobody wants a participation trophy. They seem to prefer to be rewarded for a specific task well done.

6. AnonymousDecember 11,2023 at 7:44PM UTC

   Or people who are “hot and bothered” just don’t say anything, which is more likely the case. You don’t even work there - how would you know!?

7. Christel M JonesDecember 12,2023 at 4:44AM UTC

   My favorite experience with recognition/rewards has been a points-based system where everyone in the company would get an allotment of points to give out each quarter as we see fit to other colleagues. Our management also had an allotment to uee for team recognition. You could give them to whomever you choose and got to include a personal note. Then recipients could use points on a wide variety of purchases like gift cards, office items, items on Amazon, etc. I really like this method as it helps build gratitude and relationships within the company and it feels good to recognize colleagues with something of value.