Derek Irvine's Blog – March 2012 Archive (20)

Recognize This! – Your star performers can’t shine without the daily efforts of your middle tier.

Who gets recognized in your organization? Just the superstars – the top 10% high performers? Or do you acknowledge those who grind out the work day after day – the middle 80% who make it possible for your stars to shine?

Too often, I hear the argument, “My superstars deserve extra recognition and rewards. The rest? I pay them to do their job. That’s reward…

Recognize This! — Strategic recognition is a powerful tool to align employees with your goals and take appropriate action after your engagement survey is done.

Like 80% of the people on our “My Engagement Survey Is Done, Now What?” webinar yesterday (recasts available here), do you conduct an employee engagement survey? Though we didn’t ask who was guilty, do you commit these common…

Recognize This! – Lack of employee engagement costs you 35% of your payroll, or up to $17.5 Million annually in a 1,000 person organization.

Like organization culture, employee engagement is a frequent topic of mine. Indeed, creating a culture of recognition is a foundational element to creating an environment in which employees choose to engage. Hallmarks of just such an engaging culture are…

Recognize This! –Proactive culture change and management is strategy.

Company culture is much in the news these days, a development I am very excited to see as it shows more and more buy-in to the importance of culture as something that can be created and, yes, proactively managed.

A round-up of articles that have appeared during the last few days teach three important lessons on organizational culture:

Lesson 1 – In the Battle of…

Recognize This! – Incentives and recognition play important but distinct roles in Total Rewards. Don’t confuse the two.

As a contributor to the Compensation Café community blog (which was just named No. 4 on Fistful of Talent’s Top 25 Talent Management blogs, by the way), I get to work with…

Recognize This! – Surveys without action cause more harm than good. Join our webinar to learn how to take appropriate action on survey findings.

I’m pleased to once again be joining Mary Ann Masarech, Employee Engagement Practice Leader at BlessingWhite, in a…

Recognize This! – You can’t get the new results you need unless you change the underlying behaviors and actions that make up your culture.

Recognize This! – Psychologists, neurologists and management experts all agree: recognition works.

On a daily basis, I track several dozen news and online sources for employee recognition, engagement, motivation and the like. I’ve read more dry and boring reports and stories than I care to admit. But…

Recognize This! – Your company culture can withstand a multitude of shocks – but should it?

I’m guessing most people in the world of HR, management or leadership have read Greg Smith’s resignation letter from Goldman Sachs – which appeared in the New York Times.

Personally, I was more interested in the reaction from management,…

Recognize This! – Sometimes the opportunity cost for relationship building across functions is worth it.

Do you encourage competition in the office? Typically, I advocate against direct competition among team members as too often unintended consequences occur along the lines of the good of the…

Recognize This! – Years of detailed study prove managers have tremendous influence over employee productivity and engagement, simply by impeding progress.

Are you killing your employees’ desire to work? I don’t mean, are you giving them too much work? Often, that’s a challenge employees can rise to. No, I mean are you actively killing their desire – no, strike that – their ability – to do the work you need them to do?

Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer…

Recognize This! – Giving people a reason to believe is far more effective than telling them what to do or how to think.

It’s seems lately I’ve written about the weekly New York Times “Corner Office” column, well, weekly. The featured chief officers have lately been truly inspirational leaders with sound advice.

As it turns out, I’m…

Recognize This! – Life’s too short to work hard and not know if what you do all day is meaningful or appreciated by others.

Bob Sutton, professor of management science and engineering at Stanford University and author of Good Boss, Bad Boss and The No Asshole Rule (among…

Recognize This! – Good managers know their team members well enough to know their communication style. Great managers take the extra time to adapt their own delivery style to how their employees can receive important feedback.

It’s annual performance review time for a lot of organizations right now. This is a frequent topic of conversation within Globoforce as we strongly believe the annual review presents only…

Recognize This! – Encouraging innovation requires creating a culture that recognizes and rewards both the big and the small ideas – and everything in between.

I had the pleasure this week of presenting at HCI Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona, with my colleague from Intuit, Senior Compensation Business Partner Jennifer Lepird. Our presentation was “Spotlighting Recognition: How Intuit Has Reinforced a Culture of Innovation and Elevated…

Recognize This! – Companies succeed or fail based on the efforts, contributions and values of their people.

Setting aside the current battle in the US over the legal ramifications of “corporate personhood,” fundamentally, companies are people. I liked how Shawn Parr spoke to this in a recent…

Recognize This! – All who contribute to success should have the opportunity to be appreciated for their efforts.

Once again, I’ve learned from the chief officer featured in the New York Times “Corner Office” column – this time Susan Credle, chief creative officer of Leo Burnett USA, a deservedly famous…

Recognize This! – Research is a poor indicator of your employees’ intentions to stay or go. Rather, look to your culture and expectations of cultures as a better indicator.

I recently published a blog post discussing Accenture research showing nearly 2/3 of employees (even those highly…

Recognize This! – Dissatisfied workers, regardless of intent to stay, are not engaged with your organization, your culture or your priorities.

Are employees jumping ship or staying put? The research and reports swing both ways. Just a couple weeks ago, I wrote about the war for talent still being…

Recognize This! – Company culture is a combination of what you believe, what you say, and what you actually do. Be sure the three stay in alignment.

I’ve written a good bit on corporate culture, first on building a magnetic culture, then on…