Page 14 - Experiential Magazine - Vol 5

WHAT HAS THE RESEARCH PROVEN?
Organizations that use properly designed incentive, recogni-
tion and loyalty programs do better than their competitors.
Those that reward people who would have performed anyway
have no impact on the people who can make a difference – or
worse yet, do damage in terms of fostering bad behaviors.
Rewards and recognition generate the best results when
they’re selected and presented in a highly personal way to
maximize the experience and buzz among the organizational
community and significant others.
WHY IS THE SCIENCE RELEVANT NOW?
As one of the leading national fulfillment companies in the re-
wards space, Hinda is in a position to know that many organi-
zations still don’t recognize the critical importance of effective
program design or how to maximize the reward experience. Be-
cause this field isn’t taught in schools or even barely covered in •
the business media (except when poor program design creates
bad behavior – e.g., Wells Fargo), business management can
be forgiven for overlooking critical research that demonstrates
how it can achieve far greater results and return on investment
through better design and implementation.
With more organizations benefiting from analytics demon-
strating the return on investment of engagement comes the
opportunity to apply more scientific processes to incentive,
recognition and loyalty programs as well.
WHAT ARE THE KEY FINDINGS ON
PROGRAM DESIGN?
• Success requires more than quick fix, “do this, get that”
campaigns. People are more complex than that, and car-
rots alone can encourage unsustainable or bad behaviors.
• It is critical to engage the middle 60% of performers by
combining an open-ended approach that encourages
everyone to improve, as well as the top 20% who generally
perform anyway.
• Performance measures should include both outcomes (i.e.,
the desired result) and the behaviors that contribute to
those results, so that people focus on the actions which, if
performed more frequently or better, will yield the desired
results. Focusing only on results can foster bad behaviors.
• Carrots are not enough to foster sustainable performance.
People need to be informed about how they can contribute
to success and have the skills to do what is asked of them.
• Whatever is learned from the results of an engagement
process needs to be fed back to the front-line people who
HERE ARE SOME SOURCES OF RESEARCH ON INCENTIVES, REWARDS, RECOGNITION AND LOYALTY:
Rewards Recognition Network - http://rewardsrecognitionnetwork.com/#
The Incentive Research Foundation - http://theirf.org
The Incentive Federation - http://www.incentivefederation.org
World at Work - https://www.worldatwork.org/home/html/home.jsp
The Incentive Marketing Association - http://www.incentivemarketing.org
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can use that information to improve performance in the
future.
• What is the return on investment? What was the value of
the enhanced performance to the organization, and which
elements of the process fostered the most participation?
WHAT ARE THE KEY FINDINGS ON REWARDS
SELECTION AND PRESENTATION?
• The key opportunity is to address both intrinsic and
extrinsic motivation – in other words, to appeal both to
non-material and material needs that foster both inspira-
tion and material satisfaction.
• Selection of rewards that demonstrate a personal under-
standing of the individual or team in the same way as
would an important gift to a loved one.
Presentation of rewards consistent with the accomplish-
ment, the recipient’s comfort level with public recognition,
and in a way that expresses appreciation commensurate
with the accomplishment.
• Delivery of rewards in a way that maximizes the expe-
rience either in the home, the office, or at an event in a
way that creates excitement with significant others and
colleagues alike.
WHAT IS THE RETURN ON INVESTMENT?
Properly designed programs look at both the results, the
actions promoted in the process and, if possible, put a dollar
value to behaviors. What is it worth to an organization to have
employees fully aware of what’s expected of them as demon-
strated in tests or surveys? What is it worth to an organization
to have employees focusing on those actions deemed neces-
sary for success, or making useful suggestions or collaborat-
ing better with colleagues? If an organization can determine
a value of points to assign to an action or result, there must
be a way to determine the value of that action or result to the
organization as well.
Now that organizations have begun to wake up to the econom-
ics of engagement and the benefit of applying more formal
processes, the understanding and respect for the role of re-
wards and recognition will grow accordingly. It’s important for
everyone in the field to take advantage of this research to ed-
ucate organizations on the creativity and complexity involved
with engaging people to perform.
Mike Donnelly is President of Hinda Incentives and before that
the President of Maritz Motivation. Bruce Bolger is President of
the Enterprise Engagement Alliance