Did you know that the first Friday of every March is national Employee Appreciation Day? This means that Employee Appreciation Day 2021 is on Friday 5th March.
Most employers we work with here at ViewHR want to show their employees that they appreciate them all year round, and so we thought we would dedicate this week’s blog to tips on how to show your employees that you truly appreciate them on a regular basis.
Give tailored thanks
Thanking employees for their efforts is a key starting point to helping employees feel appreciated. But whilst generic thanks (e.g. “thanks for the report, that’s fab”) is definitely a good start, it can also be helpful to tailor this, so the employee knows what you were impressed by, e.g.
“The graphs in the report really set out the trends clearly, thank you”
“That slide deck looks really engaging, good use of graphics, thanks for putting it together”
“You spoke to that customer in a really reassuring manner, thank you for dealing with their request”
You may not have time to give feedback like this straight away or all the time, however, specifics like this show the employee you recognise the strengths of their work, the effort they have made, and also encourages them to do the same good things again in the future.
Listen and acknowledge challenges
We all know that the past year has been a challenging time for many, even if we have managed to stay well. Employees may have had to deal with working from home, home schooling, working in PPE, etc., on top of the usual challenges that life brings. Through regular communication, you can better understand employees are facing, and explore the support they need as appropriate.
When an employee delivers an important piece of work despite difficulties, it may be good to acknowledge this too, so the employee knows you know what they went through and appreciate their extra efforts, e.g.
“I know you stayed up late to do this after the kids went to bed – thank you”
“Well done for getting the data from the Purchasing team, I know it was a bit of a battle”
Paint the bigger picture
Do employees know how the work they are undertaking fits in with the bigger picture? For example, do they know that a new contract was secured by them working extra hours to fulfil an order, or that the report they compiled helped to make an important decision to save costs?
These sorts of things can seem obvious from the position of a manager or company owner, but are not necessarily so to the rest of the team. As such, it can be helpful to make sure it is explained to employees why their work is important within the wider organisational context from time-to-time, as well as giving thanks.
There are also various companies that offer gift boxes, vouchers, pamper packs, etc. to show appreciation to employees (our recent blog on Christmas gifts sets out considerations for employers giving gifts to employees). Gifts like this can be really appreciated with employees if your budget allows, however, it is also important to get the basics right too, otherwise a physical gift can seem like a bit of a token gesture.
On the topic of appreciation, the ViewHR team also appreciates our blog readers, so thank you for checking in, we hope you find our content useful. Why not have a look at our website to see if there are any that you have missed?
