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All too often, rewards and recognition in the workplace are based on tangible outcomes of activities. Hitting sales quotas, lowering the time it takes to answer support tickets, closing a big account – these are all examples of when employees expect to be rewarded, and rightfully so.
But if you think about it, those things are all part of the job. It’s why they were hired in the first place.
It’s not why they show up to work every single day, ready to go at it hard and get it done.
If you ask someone what they like about their jobs, the first thing they will usually say is: I really like the people I work with. The opposite is also usually true. When people hate their jobs, it’s because the environment they work in is toxic. Or at least it feels that way when you are forced to simply tolerate the people in your workplace.
So undeniably, a big part of why a person succeeds at their job is because they enjoy the experience of working with their colleagues.
It takes a team to build culture.
Every single person in the company is responsible for creating and curating the culture. And at any given time, you might just be one new hire away from destroying those carefully cultivated team dynamics.
And yet, most of us expend very little thought to recognizing and rewarding the countless little ways that employees contribute to creating and maintaining that culture – even when we are fully aware of how important it is.
These may include behaviours that align with the company’s core values. But for the most part, they are simply human behaviours that you would appreciate in any person that you like hanging out with and those that make the company an epic place to work at.
Here are six employee behaviours that should be recognized and rewarded:
These are the six behaviours that we have noticed and appreciated in our own employees here at Wagepoint.
Willingness to learn
Our jobs as employers and colleagues is to help someone be the best version of themselves at the workplace.
But what’s truly special is when an employee works on improving themselves – even when there is nothing in it for them, like a promotion or a raise. They do it simply for the sake of learning and bettering themselves. It could be in the form of taking courses or simply asking insightful questions before jumping into their work. You can never go wrong by rewarding this behaviour.
Admitting one’s own mistake
The humility it takes to admit one’s own mistake is reason enough to forgive someone for pretty much anything.
The workplace becomes a very strange place indeed when things happen by magic but since most mistakes are usually attributed to human error, it is a refreshing change when someone owns up to it and takes accountability for making it right.
Adaptability
If you work in a startup or a small business, adaptability is the name of the game. But of course, it is not typical of many people who have worked at large companies to understand the dynamic ‘many-hat-wearing’ reality of a startup or a small business. Employees who display true adaptiveness to the speed of changes, especially without muttering curses under their breath, now there is a trait that simply has to be rewarded.
Reasonableness
Ever work with someone that could be swayed in a discussion by reason and logic? Wasn’t that simply the best!
Though it sounds like a gimme, most of the workforce is made up of people that will dig their heels in and say things like ‘this is the way we have always done it’. That tends to frustrate people who simply want to fix a problem that they see, hoping that a clear explanation of the reason that a change was needed, would suffice.
So, when you spot someone being reasonable at the workplace, take the time to recognize and reward it.
Collaboration
As an employer, one of the things that gives you the ‘warm and fuzzies’ is when you see everyone working together, extending a helping hand to the person that needs it, just to be helpful and without the expectation of any reward.
Indeed, it is unusual for someone to list out all the ways that they helped their team during the course of the year in their performance review because it is part of the human condition to try to be helpful – so it often goes unnoticed.
As a result, this behaviour is rewarded far less than it should be.
Being Cheerleaders
Employees who cheer on and recognize each other are diamonds in the rough. They are not overly competitive to the point where they are worried about making their colleague look too good and jeopardizing their own chances at being the superstar. They have the makings of leaders and should be recognized as such.
That’s it for our list of employee behaviours that should be recognized and rewarded. Do you have any traits that you value and reward in your workforce? Share in the comments.
