Simple and meaningful ways to recognize your team members (that go beyond saying thank you)

Making sure we understand what is someone’s appreciation language? Is it gifts? Is it time? Is it money? And we need to understand that for the other person because if we appreciate and recognize someone in our language, and it’s not their language, it doesn’t land, it falls flat. And then there’s a real disconnect because you, as the manager, feels like, Hey, I recognize them. I gave them all this stuff, and the person on the receiving end says, they didn’t really recognize me.

It didn’t really, didn’t really feel it. Welcome to the Managing Made Simple podcast. Where I bring a decade of experience working in some of the most influential companies in tech to help you navigate the ins and outs of being a people manager from conflicts to feedback to delegating and more, we will leave no stone unturned when it comes to what makes us love managing, kind of hate it and everything in between. Doesn’t matter if you’re a new manager looking for some tip.

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Today we’re gonna talk about one of our most powerful and impactful manager super skills recognition. Now, recognition is always important, but it is important more now than ever because of things like the great resignation, quiet, quitting people really needing to feel a sense of purpose in their work. And a lack of recognition is a one-way ticket to burnout out disengagement and attrition. Okay? So we don’t want that. We want to plug the leaky bucket, fix the broken rung on the ladder, and help people see that their work matters.

And it’s, it’s easy to do it. So first I wanna talk about why this is a problem. Now, you know, in, in the research around quiet, quitting, and disengagement, one of the number one reasons. Is people feeling a lack of recognition, feeling like they’re doing all this work and it’s not getting noticed. More is just getting piled on. They’re starting to feel burned out and, and there’s no way to either step back or again, they’re not being rewarded and appreciated for the work they’re putting in.

So what do they do? Well, they say, okay, I’m gonna take a step back. I’m not gonna go above and beyond because nobody seems to care. It doesn’t matter. Or I just get burned out. Or when I go above and beyond, more stuff gets piled on and nobody even says thank you. That’s not the environment that we wanna create for our teams. Obviously that’s going to be a, you know, a quick ride to burn out. But yet when we have to get in this mindset of doing more with less, we kind of forget.

We say thank you, we send a quick email and we just go, go, go. And we forget that people on the other end are, Hey, I don’t know if I wanna do this anymore. And so recognition is not only something that we need to do to fuel engagement motivation, it is a risk management strategy because when people aren’t recognized, they are job searching and they might leave even with nothing lined up. I think that’s one of the interesting things around the great resignation, as we saw millions of people leave the workforce without something lined up.

And a lot of people, even with layoffs, are leaving and saying, Hey, do I even wanna do. I think we’re not seeing, you know, the same amount of number of people laid off as looking for jobs right now because people are having a moment where they’re reevaluating. And so another piece of data, I wanna share that in the McKinsey and Lean and Woman in the Workplace Report, one of the biggest reasons cited for women leaving the corporate world is a lack of recognition and visibility is feeling again, like, Hey, I’m doing all this work.

I feel like I have to work twice as hard to get half as far, and it’s not being. It’s not being amplified, it’s not being elevated, it’s not leading to career opportunities. And so we are also, not only did we lose a huge amount of women in the workforce because of the pandemic and caretaker responsibilities and all the stuff that was going on, then we are losing more people actively by choice, saying, no, I’m done with this.

Entering the entrepreneurial space, which is awesome. But also we don’t want them leaving because of lack of recognition. We want them leaving empowered. And so there’s so much that we can do to recognize our employees. And so today I wanna share three. We can recognize our employees, whether we are working in a corporate job office, bigger situation, or we’re an entrepreneur small business, we can always recognize our employees, and it doesn’t have to do with paying them more.

Paying them more is a great way to recognize people, but it’s not the only way. Well, how do we go about recognizing people? We need to understand their appreciation. And there’s a great book called The Five Languages of Appreciation. I’ll put it in the show notes that talks about, it’s actually just the five love Languages applied to Work. So it’s the same framework if you’ve heard of it, but making sure we understand what is someone’s appreciation language.

Is it gifts? Is it time, is it money? And we need to understand that for the other person because if we appreciate and recognize someone in our language and it’s not their, It doesn’t land, it falls flat. And then there’s a real disconnect because you, as the manager feels like, Hey, I recognize them. I gave them all this stuff, and the person on the receiving end says, they didn’t really recognize me. It didn’t really, didn’t really feel it.

And so when there’s that disconnect, it can cause even, I don’t know if it took a worse problem than if you didn’t do anything, but it doesn’t give them that, that gift of feeling seen that we really were trying to do. So it’s very easy to get this right and when we get it right by asking them, saying, you know, having a conversation with a team member saying, Hey, I wanna make sure to recognize you in the right way.

Like what works for. Do you want the reply all where the whole team member chimes in, or you want the one thank you from the vp? What works for you? I really wanna make sure to get it right. That is a two minute conversation that you can have with someone. Literally even an email you can send so that you understand what works for each team member. And then I would start a document where you have each person on your team’s name.

And you say appreciation language and you put, okay, this person likes that reply. All this person wants the one-to-one. This person wants like to go to lunch with the boss, whatever it is. And you understand. And now one thing I wanna share with appreciation language is I get it that you can’t always grant that. So let’s say the person says, the only way I wanna be appreciated is more money. That’s really what does it for me.

That’s what I’m here for. It’s a job. I wanna get paid more. Then we can say, when we’re appreciating them, say, Hey, I know that the best way to appreciate you right now and recognize your work is more money. I don’t have access to budget right now. I’m acknowledging that, that it is ideal, and so I’m doing this to get closer to that. So you can always drop the line that you heard them, you remembered it, it was meaningful to you, and you car.

And then appreciate them in a slightly different way or something on path. So that’s the beauty of it, that once we understand, we can be empathetic about it. So that’s how we appreciate. We wanna do it in the right language. And then I wanna share a few examples of ways to recognize people that often hits on a number of these. And the first one is, Amplifying their ideas in meetings. Okay? And so first, if someone’s, the appreciation language is they want that one-on-one, you know, recognition, maybe not from a group first, I would ask them and say, Hey, I wanna bring more visibility to work.

Are you good with me? You know, asking you to share in a meeting. So you first wanna establish that safety and they say yes. Then in a meeting coming up saying something like, Hey, Lia and I were talking about this great idea she had in our last one-on-one. Lia, would you share more about that with the group right here? So you are inviting that person in the conversation. You are already endorsing that. Their idea was great, kind of setting the tone there, and then you’re letting them speak for their work.

This is a fantastic way to recognize their work, to bring visibility to their work, to again, set the stage that there is celebration around their work and to have them be heard. So this is a really easy thing that you can do. Again, first thing is, Make sure that person’s okay with sort of being addressed called fourth in the meeting. Sometimes someone may be newer, may be a little bit uncomfortable with that, so I would talk to ’em about, Hey, how do I get you into this conversation?

Is this okay? And then do it as many times as you can. I think as a leader you want to be having your teams speak up in meetings. If you are talking way more than your team members in meetings, you’re in, you’re doing something wrong because you’re not letting them get visibility. So it’s a really important thing to shift and think about, am I bringing forth my team members to share the ideas or am I speaking on their behalf?

And if it’s because a team member’s not comfortable speaking up, then that’s an opportunity to a little bit of coaching with that person so that they feel comfortable speaking up in meetings. The second thing we can do to recognize our team members is to ask them to lead projects. Okay? There nothing shows more that we think value someone’s work than asking them to take more on, but this doesn’t mean taking more things on and then burning them out.

This means asking them to take on a meaningful project, looking at their priorities, making space for it, and really showing that, Hey, I’m asking you to take this on because you really nailed it in this previous thing, and I want you to be a leader here, and then let’s figure out how to make space. So asking them to take it on isn’t done in a, Hey, we need someone to cover this project who’s on board. It’s part of a recognition conversation.

And this, again, this addresses a number of those appreciation languages because you are recognizing that someone has done something and it might lead to more money, it might lead to more visibility, it might lead to more, you know, group recognition. So I think it’s a really nice one because it covers off on a lot of those appreciation languages. But again, it’s not to be done and to kind of, you get punished or penalized for doing a killer.

It’s about creating space for them to lead. So this conversation does have to come with, you know, looking at their statu rank priorities and moving some stuff off the list. The third one is career advancement and opportunities. This, a lot of times does mean paying that person more. If someone is doing more work consistently, then why are they not being paid more? This is a question that they’re asking. They are wondering it whether they’ve said it’s you or not.

And so I think it’s a really important thing to do. Especially in a smaller company, especially when you have more control over the budgets and the pay to think about, you know, how can I really recognize and reward my star players? Because there’s a moment right now where people are talking about this loyalty tax, this penalty of staying a long time in a company that when you job hop. You can get a way higher salary and why would you stay somewhere long term?

We don’t want that to be the situation, and especially not if we have control over the pay bands. So a way to recognize someone is say, Hey, you have been doing awesome work. Here is a bonus. Here is some a way that we wanna compensate you for that. We wanna keep you. We don’t want you to go looking for something else. We want you right here. And again, money is not at everyone’s appreciation language. So money should come with a conversation on This is why that we’re giving this to you.

We want you to know that collectively, our whole leadership team had a conversation about, you are such an important, valued person on this team, and we want you to know that. And here’s one way we’re showing you that we’re also doing this and that and the other. Maybe it’s more close to their appreciation language. So again, money doesn’t need to come just with, Hey, check your debit, check your direct deposit. You got some cash? No, it’s to talk.

Symbol of it. So again, those are the three ways that we recognize people is to amplify their ideas in meetings, you know, bring them forth to, to share about their work, to ask them to lead and to give them career opportunities and, and to pay them more for, for, for more work. That is what we do. And when we do those things, We start to see higher engagement, people staying longer, you know, lower attrition, higher retention, and better work overall because people are more motivated.

We need to be recognized in order to do great work. This is a must, and it is something that even if you’re doing a really good job of it now, you can always turn it up and do more. This is one of the things that I love to dive in with teams in my workshops and programs because I think it’s something that people see such immediate results around the moment. They start recognizing people the moment they start to see shifts, and it’s just incredible.

So I encourage you to try these three things and to see what happens. That’s all I have for today. Thank you so much for tuning in to the Managing Made Simple Podcast where my goal is to demystify the job of people management so that together we can make the workplace somewhere everyone can thrive. I always love to hear from you, so please reach out at liagarvin.com or message me on LinkedIn. See you next time.