During the COVID-19 pandemic, employee recognition has emerged as a critical component of the employee experience in keeping employees engaged and tied to business culture, and it’s easy to see why. Recognition for contributions has long been one of our most basic workplace expectations, and it has been linked to a variety of desirable outcomes such as fewer absenteeism, lower voluntary turnover, and more productive working hours.
The word “employee experience” refers to all aspects of a person’s work life. As you might expect, having a successful employee experience plan can have a significant impact on employee engagement. It’s critical, though, to distinguish the two.
Employee engagement is the level of a person’s attachment and commitment to their role and colleagues, as well as the organization and its goals, while experience comprises everything you deal with in and around your workplace.
Recognition – Shaping the Future of Employee Experience
Employees have made clear sacrifices in the previous year, and as a result, recognition programs have become more crucial than ever in articulating the emotional connection that underpins the employee experience. In the next months, there will be five major ways that recognition will be used to define the 2021 employee experience:
Peer-to-Peer Support: SaaS-based recognition programs also provide significant means for employees to reach out to their peers to express gratitude or simply stay in touch across long distances, a factor that will assist eliminate team discord and preserve a supportive and unified mindset. Peer-to-peer recognition programs are already being expanded and retooled as a critical channel for preventing employees from feeling alienated.
Virtual Gatherings: With the rise of virtual festivities, sales conferences, and tradeshows, physical goods kits are increasingly being used to enrich the proceedings, create a more tactile experience, and increase a sense of community. Care packages, wellness support, and home office modifications have all enlarged the role of items to express a far broader variety of sentiment.
Access-Anywhere Programs: For years, centralized recognition platforms have made it easier for firms with dispersed workforces to stay in touch, but in 2021, they will be critical in establishing company-wide recognition systems that keep messages consistent across all remote sites. Universally accessible programs will be crucial for preserving emotional relationships and cultivating a culture among remote employees.
Employee Feedback Loops: In 2021, it will be critical to express gratitude and transmit the proper motivational signals to employees, and the positive feedback loops that recognition systems provide will be critical to maintaining a steady stream of awareness between management and employees. With so many external factors influencing an employee’s job satisfaction, recognition provides a safe environment in which any connected difficulties can be handled.
Incentivizing Empathy: Perhaps the most essential benefit of employee recognition in 2021 is how it gives administrators the option to promote particular cultural attributes like compassion, health awareness, and, last but not least, empathy – for better or ill. In 2021, HR executives are already emphasizing the significance of compassionate leadership, and employee recognition is the tool for the job.
Recognizing Your Potential
Without a doubt, the future employment experience will be unlike any other. In the next months, things may become a little more difficult to forecast, but recognition and awards have always played a key role in maintaining work cultures robust in the face of adversity and change, with the capacity to set the tone for the whole employee experience from day one to retirement.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: ADVANTAGE CLUB
Advantage Club is a global provider of employee benefits. The platform serves to digitize all employee demands under one canopy through numerous employee engagement programs such as incentives, rewards & recognition, flexible and tax-saving modules. It now serves over 300 organizations in 70 countries and has over 10,000 brand partnerships.
