Feeling valued is the best motivation

Perks and pay incentives cannot beat feeling needed

Introduction
Employees who work hard, produce results and provide excellent customer service are just what every employer wants. But what motivates employees to treat their jobs as more than just a daily grind that pays the rent and buys the groceries? If employers could only answer that question accurately they would be well on the way to creating the condent, committed workforce that is every HR ofcers dream.

Bonuses: do they work?

One suggestion might be to pay employees more for excellent results. City bankers depend on their big bonuses to fuel their work hard, play hard lifestyles, but whether much smaller bonuses are just as effective for the average employee is a debatable question. Sammer resurrects the old urban myth about the reman who turned to arson when the re department started paying bonuses for every emergency call-out. Whether or not there is any truth in this tale, some employers have worries that bonuses may lead to inappropriate behavior rather than improved working practices. For instance, a rm paying a at rate per completed job to service technicians might nd the technicians rushing through their work in order to complete the largest number of repairs in the least amount of time. Shoddy work, rather than the goal of good time management, could be the result. In other situations, bonuses paid for completed tasks might actually serve to reduce the creativity required to maintain a competitive edge in todays rapidly changing world of commerce. Employees focusing solely on their pay rewards could consider completing existing orders more important than taking time out for the thinking time that does not show immediate results.

Perks and incentives

If money is not the answer perhaps perks and incentives can do the job of motivating the workforce. Many rms now offer perks ranging from on-site gyms and private health insurance to extra time away from work. This can range from the odd duvet day to accommodate that just cant get out of bed feeling to paid or unpaid sabbaticals enabling employees to take a once in a lifetime trip or to engage in volunteer work. Other companies offer childcare, telecommuting or exible start and nish times. If the companies ranked tops in Fortune Magazines annual poll of the best companies to work for provided some of these perks for their employees, that would be evidence of a clear link between employers perks and employees job satisfaction, right? Wrong! Unfortunately, it is not that simple. Two of the top ve companies to work for, Whole Foods and Gentech, do not provide employee perks (with the exception of telecommuting which Gentech employees are able to do). However,

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DOI 10.1108/09670730810869547

 If money is not the answer perhaps perks and incentives can do the job of motivating the workforce. Many rms now offer perks ranging from on-site gyms and private health insurance to extra time away from work.

the rm ranked number 12, David Weekly Homes, does provide benets which serve to increase employees perception of achieving a good work-life balance. Because some of the rms ranked most highly in terms of employee satisfaction provide lots of perks, while some offer few, if any, incentives, it is not possible to construct a clear link between job satisfaction and employer incentives. It may just be the case that some rms that are rated highly by employees, also offer non-pecuniary benets to their staff. It is interesting to note, however, that Gentech (number two in Fortunes list) offers telecommuting as their only extra benet. The opportunity to work some of the time from home has been shown to be the most important perk in terms of employee satisfaction. BT, one of the pioneers of home working (the organization began offering it in 1986), has found that home workers are more efcient, take less time off sick and show excellent return rates from maternity leave. In addition, they are happier.

Valuing employees by listening to them

The best incentive for employee motivation however, is not a perk at all. It is simply listening to employees, valuing their contributions and at the same time, valuing them as individuals with unique strengths and needs. MGM for example, realized that one casino was much like another for Las Vegas visitors and began emphasizing the fact that it was the employees who represented the MGM brand to the casinos guests. Showing how much they valued their employees has, says MGM increased their prots signicantly. However, some industry observers counter that it is impossible to show a direct link between increased prots and the policy of valuing employees. Nevertheless, there are other indicators that the work culture can provide measurable indications of success. In the UK the most successful companies demonstrate how they value their employees by listening to them and incorporating their suggestions into company policy. This offers employees true engagement at all levels and helps them to feel that it is their company, not just a place to work. In fact employees who work in environments where everyones suggestions and contributions are sought, employees feel up to ten times more valued than in companies where all ideas are generated from the top. An example from the UK is supermarket giant Sainsburys. Three years ago it had taken some real blows from rival grocers and protability was down. Sainsburys engaged a motivation agency to help increase staff engagement. The agency, Grass Roots, created a web-based program that encouraged employees to contribute their own ideas on regeneration and offered rewards for employees who demonstrated behaviors congruent with the revitalization drive. Sainsburys does not hesitate to credit such employee engagement with the rms regeneration, although once again it may be difcult to provide empirical evidence which proves cause and effect.

A global perspective
Valuing employees may be the best form of motivation in the USA and Europe but can it be employed on a global scale? Global brands strive to present a unied face to their multi-national marketplace but recent research indicates that employees from different national locations view their jobs very differently. Some of the problems in developing strategies to motivate international employees result from short term planning. Huff (2007) quotes Bruce Bolger from the Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement as saying that companies reject strategies to develop and motivate staff

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because these are seen as long-term commitments. Companies prefer to implement short-term xes that show prots rapidly. This is conrmed by Genia Spencer from Randstad USA who suggests that rms ignore people-developing in favor of people-nding. In other words, when companies expect a high turn over, they direct their resources toward staff replacement. This policy, however does not seem to be rooted in common sense which should tell HR departments that if they spent more time making their existing employees happy, they would not have to look for new ones so often! Reuters addressed the issue of uneven employee satisfaction in different countries where it operates by rolling out an international recognition strategy. The Living FAST Recognition Program seeks to inculcate the company values of Fast, Accountable, Service and Team-focused (FAST) behaviors in all employees, regardless of location. Global programs like this allow companies to initiate inclusive strategies that still leave room for local variants. For instance, cash incentives or rewards may vary according to local cost-of-living and salary structures. Local sensitivities must also be respected. Employees in some locations could be insulted by a nancial incentive, interpreting it as a bribe and therefore in such cultures, employers must nd other methods of rewarding motivation and effort.

The ubiquitous youth culture

One additional difculty that many employers face is the changing expectations of todays young graduates. Where once young employees expected to spend years in an apprenticeship role, learning from more experienced staff, todays young educated workforce expects rapid advancement and the salary and perks that go with this. If these are not forthcoming from their initial employers, young workers do not shy away from frequent job changes, often for remunerative increases of as little as 5 percent. Another issue seems to be that young people no longer expect criticism, constructive or otherwise in the workplace. While a healthy dose of assertiveness is a good thing, and no-one would want to return to a workplace ethic of bullying, constructive advice from experienced mentors is a necessary part of staff development.

Conclusion
Finding and keeping the best employees will always be an issue for employers, particularly in times of economic growth. It would seem however that showing employees they are valued by affording workers a real voice in the decision-making processes of a company is the best starting point in motivation and retention of staff. Staff incentives must be carefully considered but it seems that in terms of perks, the freedom to work at home, at least part of the time, helps to create employees who are healthy, happy and motivated. Global rms must treat all employees equally in terms of making them feel valued and listened to, but incentives may need to be varied according to cultural expectations. Young employees also need to feel valued and must be provided with a clear route to success. This might help to avoid feelings of not being valued which precipitate their frequent job changes. At the same time, structured mentoring can help to provide the guidance young employees need without invoking the feeling of being constantly criticized.

One additional difculty that many employers face is the changing expectations of todays young graduates. Where once young employees expected to spend years in an apprenticeship role, learning from more experienced staff, todays young educated workforce expects rapid advancement and the salary and perks that go with this.

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Comment
Keywords: Motivation (psychology), Employee involvement This review was written incorporating information from the articles cited in the reference list. All of these were worth reading for the information presented on issues of employee motivation and interesting discussions on how different companies reward success.

References
Crush, P. (2007), Perk power (benets), Human Resources, August, pp. 41-4. Huff, C. (2007), Special report: rewards and incentives, Workforce Management, Vol. 86 No. 16, pp. 25-31. Sammer, J. (2007), Weighing pay incentives, HR Magazine, Vol. 52 No. 6, pp. 65-9. Whiteling, I. (2007), A message from the frontline (promotions and incentives), Marketing Week, 19 July, p. 35.

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