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Reprint from Occupational Health
& Safety Magazine–
The Art
of Meaningful Recognition
by Ed Robbins
Good programs often promote both individual and
group behaviors.
That which gets measured often gets done, which helps explain why
safety programs have become such a part of American business. Most
companies can identify how much they pay for insurance and lose
to injuries, damaged equipment, and downtime — not to mention
the unmeasurable psychological effects on morale caused by a serious
accident. Safety programs offer a clear return-on-investment not
always achievable in other types of employee initiatives.
One major challenge: Many of the people in charge of safety programs
are operations managers who may or may not have had experience developing
safety initiatives based on sound research on what works and doesn't
work.
This article includes the practical steps for building more effective
programs based on extensive research on incentive programs entitled
“Incentives, Motivation, & Workplace Performance,” published by
the International Society for Performance Improvement. The paper
reported on dozens of years of research on incentive and motivation
programs, and also surveys conducted at hundreds of U.S. corporations.
Researchers found properly structured programs could improve performance
by as much as 44% in teams and 25% in individuals, but with
a major caveat: Do it wrong, and the program will fail.
Here are some of the key findings related to building more effective
safety programs.
Create a campaign.
As explained below, research suggests people change behavior as
a result of many factors. Addressing safety as an internal marketing
issue, much as marketers use campaigns to address external audiences,
helps make sure your program addresses issues you can control and
is structured so you can measure it and change it to address new
situations or objectives. The campaign should include a marketing
plan with objectives, tactics, budget, roles and responsibilities,
timelines, and return-on-investment measures.
Set clear goals.
Your organization will have a better way to gauge results, and your
employees will have a clearer mission, if you precisely identify
what you want to accomplish in numeric terms. Make sure the goals
are set high enough for people to reach, but not so high that they
give up.
Get buy-in.
People engage when they believe in the mission; one way to foster
beliefs is to involve employees in setting the goal and identifying
the steps necessary for success. Professionally facilitated employee
focus groups can help identify potential problems management isn’t
aware of. Consider having each employee enroll in your safety program
so that they feel more engaged.
Consider a team approach.
Safety frequently involves cooperation; if so, you may want to add
a team element to your program. People working side by side can
provide another set of eyes to help prevent problems and should
be encouraged to work cooperatively. Good programs often promote
both individual and group behaviors.
Communicate.
People can’t change their behavior if they don’t know which behaviors
to emphasize. Your program should include vigorous multi-touch communications,
potentially including meetings, e-mail newsletters, and print newsletters,
to make sure people know the goals, what they have to do, and how
well they and the organization are proceeding toward its safety
goals.
Take into account task value.
People pay less attention when they see little purpose to an activity.
Making people feel engaged in their roles and giving them latitude
to find better ways to do their jobs will increase the chance that
people will pay attention. Task value also can be enhanced by making
people feel appreciated for their contributions.
Consider the role of emotion.
Employees who are bored and disgruntled are less likely to focus
their attention on safe practices. Include in your program fun ways
to get attention and break the monotony, such as impromptu parties,
atta-boy recognition, or other creative ways to generate laughs
and positive buzz. Your newsletters and meetings provide a great
avenue for shaking things up.
Understand the need for support.
Research and common sense compellingly point to the innate need
for appreciation; employees lose interest if their best efforts
go unnoticed. Make sure your program includes meaningful recognition
for accomplishment that is clearly distinguished from compensation.
You want your people to focus on safety because it’s good for them,
their colleagues, and the organization, not because they stand to
pocket a bonus. Many companies use recognition and non-cash rewards
— often these are chosen based on the demographic of the employees
— to demonstrate their appreciation for success and generate
buzz.
Make it fair.
Rewards and recognition backfire when they become expected, trivialized,
or deemed arbitrary or unfair. Research clearly shows that tournament
programs, those that reward only a select, pre-determined number
of people, underperform so-called open-ended programs that provide
recognition to everyone who achieves a goal. Consider using a program
that combines both, but always provide something for everyone who
achieves a goal.
Carefully consider your rewards and recognition.
What you offer as recognition makes a powerful statement about you
and your company; recognition that shows a personal understanding
of each recipient, much like a gift to a friend, powerfully communicates
and reinforces a bond. The goal of rewards and recognition is not
necessarily to motivate people should have an intrinsic desire
to work safely — but to draw attention to key goals and critical
actions, foster feelings of support, introduce fun into the workplace
to break up monotony, and help make sure people actually read communications
and training information you send them.
Measure the right things.
Your goal is to lower the number of accidents and injuries, not
to give employees an incentive to under-report incidents. Safety
programs should have up to three performance criteria: one that
focuses on the goal (e.g., staying below a certain level of accidents
or injuries) and maybe two others that measure compliance with safety
procedures. By promoting safe behaviors and measuring compliance,
you focus employees on how they will achieve the goal, not just
the goal itself. This improves the chances they will adjust their
behavior, rather than try to cheat by under-reporting.
Monitor the campaign.
Watch both for quantitative and qualitative signs that your campaign
is on track. If you are measuring three different performance measures,
do the results correlate (e.g., has compliance increased and number
of accidents decreased)? If the results don’t synchronize with the
behaviors, you’ve got a problem that perhaps could be addressed
sooner rather than later.
Analyze the results.
By having three sets of program measures, your company has significant
data related to return on investment. Beyond being able to identify
cost savings in terms of lost employee time, down-time, damaged
equipment, and insurance costs, you also can watch the correlation
between compliance and results to learn more about the types of
training, communication, or rewards and recognition needed to achieve
the desired results over time.
Present with passion.
Sincerity and recognition go a long way toward making people feel
appreciated for their effort and for making others mindful that
management cares.
Ask about the tax benefits.
Lawmakers apparently saw enough advantages in the use of safety
programs that the tax laws create benefits for companies using qualified
programs. These rules enable companies to give certain employees
higher awards on a tax-free basis, if the programs obey certain
rules.
Safety is a way of life. Utilizing targeted internal campaigns that
address the key elements of human behavior will go a long way toward
achieving goals in measurable ways that make sense to management.
Ed Robbins is General Manager of JCPenny Incentive
Sales and Director of Marketing and Client Development for Marketing
Innovators in Rosemont, Ill. Robbins has more than 26 years’ experience
designing incentive and recognition programs. He can be reached
at 800-543-7373 or erobbins@jcpennyincentives.com.
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