Recognition – Top 5 considerations for implementing a new scheme : Innecto Reward Consulting

Posted by Justine Woolf on 17 February 2023

Recognition – Top 5 considerations for implementing a new scheme

In the current climate recognition is a really good way to keep employees motivated and engaged. If companies cannot afford ad hoc pay increases – and many cannot – a sound recognition strategy can reward staff in a way that encourages positive behaviours and reflects the company’s culture. Here are five key considerations when looking to implement a recognition scheme.

Create excitement and buy-in

We worked with a client recently to create a peer-to-peer ‘Thank You’ recognition scheme, activated through the HAPI App. As part of the planning and excitement-building phase, the HR team went out to the entire staff for suggestions of what the scheme should be called. It sounds simple but it was a good way to tell all the staff it was coming, gain early buy-in, grow interest and build some excitement around it.

Build a dedicated Recognition calendar

Many organisations we work with assume that recognition is happening, when it may not be. To work properly, recognition needs dedicated time, thought and intervention, and calendar of events and communication throughout the year. In the best examples, we've mapped out recognition across the year, incorporating or even creating key dates such as Employee Appreciation Day, and using them as hooks and opportunities to remind staff to say thank you or recognise each other. With good planning, you can then align these opportunities with other internal communications such as newsletters, weekly staff emails or management meetings.

Even in the best companies, these prompts throughout the year are crucial to remind employees and managers to follow through with recognition. In addition, we often see the best schemes led and managed by one person. It does not need to be their full-time job, but it is often part of their role, and their objectives, to make sure recognition happens.

Fairness is key

Key to the longevity of any scheme is a fair approach to how recognition can be made, and how awards are allocated. If even a perception of unfairness creeps in, often whole sections of a workforce can switch off and disengage.

Sometimes companies can also invest too much time in the mechanic of recognition, and not enough in how the scheme will work in practice. In short, never lose sight of the fact that everyone should have the opportunity to nominate, allocate and access rewards, across every division, department or level.

Some managers and teams are very good at embracing a recognition scheme and use the budgets available to them. Others don't, and that inconsistency can also lead to people becoming demotivated, particularly if they see the same team or same staff members being continually recognised. Building a degree of HR monitoring can also help to achieve fairness by reality-checking whether people are simply nominating their friends for a £10 prize.

Some managers need help with Recognition

Any business is made up of different characters and personalities, and recognition or saying ‘Thank you’ does not come naturally to everyone. To create consistency, leaders need to lead from the front. Sometimes that might mean reminding them of a time in the past when they recognised someone or were recognised themselves, and how that made them feel and impacted their career. That kind of reminder often triggers the emotional relevance and power of recognition and encourages managers to carry the scheme forward. That kind of advocation for recognition often comes right from the top, and then permeates right down through the organisation.

In best practice situations we've also created Manager Toolkits to help with how to ask staff ways in which they might be recognised, and with implementation so that it's done in an appropriate way.

Access is everything

Recognition works best when it's done ‘live’, there and then, and in these days of hybrid and remote working, staff and managers can find it increasingly difficult to find the time and the means. Using a smartphone app like HAPI puts a recognition scheme in the palm of your hand, giving you access 24/7, and – just as important – gives everybody access.

HAPI allows a care home manager based in the Outer Hebrides to tap on their mobile and hit a couple of buttons: no computer, no form, no convoluted process, just a quick Thank You.