Technology is an amazing thing. There was a time when the only way to recognize people was through letters and face-to-face. It had to be an in-person interaction. Today, changes in technology enable us to do so much more.
With digital conferencing technology like Zoom or platforms like slack that allows us to constantly be in communication, it’s easier than ever to communicate recognition to your teams. A compliment, recognition for a job well done, or digital reward can be quite meaningful to employees—whether they’re under your supervision or just part of the team. Using technology to recognize your staff is a great way to improve engagement and boost morale at the office. Here is a quick guide to get you started.
The Importance of Recognition At Work
With the way the world of work is evolving right now, you may wonder why employee recognition is such a hot topic. Part of it comes down to some of the mass migration of workers from current jobs to new jobs in what has come to be known as the great resignation. But it’s much more nuanced than that. For a team to achieve great work-life balance, high productivity, and meaningful work, they need to be engaged. To be engaged, employees need to be recognized for their efforts.
Any work-related achievement should receive recognition, praise, or some kind of acknowledgement. This ends up building a positive workplace called culture, encourages better team building, and can act as a catalyst for positive change in the organization. The recent covid-19 pandemic had a major impact on workplaces across the globe, disrupting normal patterns of communication and interaction. With that in mind, the importance of recognition has only grown in the past few years. To maintain morale and productivity, it’s vital to ensure employee contributions don’t go unnoticed at your company.
Employee Recognition Platforms
The best way to improve employee recognition at your organization is to use a software solution, preferably a cloud-based platform. There are many different kinds of platforms out there that can suit your needs. What It ultimately comes down to is finding one that’s going to be easy to use, work with your systems, and integrate well with your staff. Recognition should be timely it happened frequently to be useful, so any platform that allows you to send instant messages, recognize milestones or help encourage each other is going to be a good one. At the end of the day, choosing your platform can be a challenge but you’ll find one easily by assessing your company’s needs and what you hope to accomplish with employee recognition as your company.
Social Media Recognition
Using social media for recognition is a useful endeavour, to say the least. There are many platforms for social media recognition of employee achievement. Some popular ones—like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook—can certainly get results. LinkedIn might be one of the better social media platforms for recognizing employee accomplishments simply because it has a work-related atmosphere and can be conducive to helping with professional growth.
Of course, these three are far from the only social media outlets one can use. Finding a platform that is suitable for your organization is ultimately up to you. When recognizing employee achievement through social media, consider what type of recognition you want to give (should it be public or private?), what type of content you want to use, and how to ensure the relevance and timeliness of each post. Social media also works well to send an employee anniversary recognition message and highlight the importance of celebrating anniversaries at any organization. By leveraging social media in this manner, you can help build a culture of recognition and facilitate goodwill across your entire company.
Video Recognition
Whether you’re celebrating an anniversary or a milestone, a video can speak volumes when it comes to recognizing your staff. They’re used every single day for training, motivation, onboarding, and many other tasks. So it makes sense to pivot to using them as a chance to recognize staff.
Videos are ideal for recognizing everything from anniversaries to product launches. Think of it as using any other type of employee recognition. If it’s frequent, timely, and specific, it can help boost morale. Since everyone has a video camera and editing tools pretty much built into their phones these days, it’s quite easy to make an employee recognition video. A slick presentation can show you care while providing the employee ample opportunity to reflect and feel good about continuing their career with your organization.
Email Recognition
Email recognition is a great way to show your employees that you value them. It’s simple, elegant, and gets the point across in a very short message. The best way to use email for recognition is to include a personalized message. Make sure it has their name, is addressed to them correctly, and includes the reason you’re recognizing them. You might say something like “thank you for being such an important part of our team!” or “we appreciate everything you do every day.” it can be a little bit more involved than including images or animations.
Make it fun and festive for the employee. Allow them to see that you truly care and that their work is valuable to the company. Don’t forget to use a special subject line (so they know it’s not spam or other junk mail), add a personal touch, or use a cool idea to get the ball rolling. Consider using a cool font and some fun visual elements to make it sizzle. Utilizing email is more than just a communication device for business matters can be effective for improving morale and recognizing employees on a broad scale.