The holidays are a time for expressing employee appreciation. We commonly labor over selecting the appropriate gift for our kid’s teacher, neighbors, even our mail carrier.

Likewise, company leaders and managers struggle to find the right words or gift that adequately expresses employee appreciation for a year of hard work and effort. Now more than ever, expressing employee appreciation is important to employee morale and retention.

Due to challenging economic conditions and employee layoffs, employee morale has greatly suffered. Most employees have taken on additional responsibilities to help make up for fewer people in the workplaces. On top of that, companies have had to tighten their belts and cut out employee recognition programs. The result is a workforce that has received very little employee appreciation for most of a year.

To keep employees from switching companies when the economy turns around, sincere employee appreciation is needed at the end of the year. Carefully consider how you will express employee appreciation to your staff this year.

• Employee Event. Corporate holiday parties are a common expression of employee appreciation. Events don’t have to be grand; rather, a team lunch and a few extra hours off can be meaningful when the employee appreciation is sincere.

 



• New Employee Recognition Program. Let your staff know the employee recognition programs aren’t gone for good by introducing a new program at the end of the year. When you first introduce your program, you’ll experience a surge of interest and enthusiasm. Use the high levels of participation to involve every team member in the act of employee appreciation.

 



• A Gift of Appreciation. Employees will remember your appreciation for their efforts when it’s given with a tangible gift. Employee appreciation gifts given during the holidays are a sincere gesture that let employees know you noticed all the hard work they put in during the year.

 



• Introduce Fun Team Awards. To help boost employee morale, introduce some levity into your employee appreciation efforts this year. Have managers give individual awards to each member of their team. Certificates or affordable trophies make great awards and employee appreciation events. Sample award titles could be “Faithful Filler of Copy Paper” or “Coffee Maker Extraordinaire.” You can also have more serious awards such as the “Team Player Award” or “Master Multi-Tasker.”