Adrian Gostick

When Michael Gerlach at Tennessee Orthopedic Alliance (TOA) in Nashville, TN, was wondering how to improve employee morale at his organization, he decided to throw his workers a bone—literally.

Says Michael, “I thought you might enjoy hearing how The Carrot Principle has made a difference at our office. I work for a large orthopedic group and we have implemented a Spirit Bone award (think a big plastic femur bone from a local costume store) to increase office morale and departmental interaction. The office was suffering from divisions among the different departments. Our management team started the award with three goals in mind: bridge the gap between departments, allow employees to show appreciation for co-workers, and to give visibility to those employees who were contributing to increased productivity.
Michael describes the process for awarding the Spirit Bone: “Each week the employee who receives the Spirit Bone keeps it on his/her desk. At the end of the week, he/she must hand it off to a co-worker in a different department. The Bone is escorted by office supervisor to its new destination. Each employee is encouraged to “leave” their mark on the bone before they hand it off. After a few weeks, it looks pretty crazy as each employee gets pretty creative. We also implemented an employee-driven initiative, an Employee Focus Group that awards an Employee of the Month award. These ideas came to me after reading your book. Morale is slowly on the upswing and we plan on great results from these changes!“

Five years ago when we held our first Carrot Culture Summit in New York, we weren’t sure if anyone would show up. We were thrilled to have more than 100 executives attend that first event, even though it was little more than positive affirmation of the idea that the ideas in the Carrot Principle could work. Last week, business leaders from around the world met in Boston for the fifth annual Summit. And this year, it was all about results—real business results that organizations are seeing from living the Carrot Principle.

We’ll outline more findings from the Summit in our monthly ezine in October, but here’s one highlight. Ned Lidvall, CEO of Friendly’s Ice Cream Corporation, and Cheryl Hutchinson, Friendly’s senior human resources officer, kicked off the meeting with details on how this 500-restaurant, 13,000-employee chain differentiates in their very crowded market.
Said Ned, “Every restaurant has a chicken Caesar salad. What’s the difference? The culture of the company you are eating in. The way to win in a sea of sameness is to execute better and that’s not easy to do. You have to capture the hearts and heads of your people. You can’t pay people to be creative and passionate. You must create a culture that inspires behaviors through recognition.” Wouldn’t you love to work for a CEO like that?

Cheryl Hutchinson does. She said that her organization turned to recognition after an eye-opening employee survey in 2004, which showed a majority of workers did not understand the big picture, did not feel thanked for their efforts, and did not feel their manager cared about them. “It was an aha moment for us. As great as our product and service training was, we forgot to say thank you.”

The executive team agreed a change was in order, but thought cash rewards would work best. Cheryl put her foot down. “They thought cash was king. They said, ‘Just give them cash or a $10 gift certificate.’ I asked them if still had a box of trophies in the attic from high school? Yep, everyone did. The items in those boxes tell a story. That’s what recognition is. We want to have something that helps us remember our achievements.”
Cheryl then developed a recognition solution that connected to real business results—such as guest recovery and teamwork. And the results have been outstanding, including a 40 point upswing in Trust levels on their employee surveys, not to mention stronger sales, higher guest counts, less guest complaints, lower employee turnover … and on and on.
“The cost savings from reduced turnover alone funds recognition at Friendly’s,” said Cheryl. “How can you afford not to have a recognition program? It accelerates business results.”

Last month, we explored some of the most common workplace behaviors and what our bosses think of those behaviors (if you missed it, click here). This month, we’re taking a look at the other side of the ledger—what employees think of their boss’s behaviors. Y-Ouch? Check out an excerpt of what your employees may be thinking about you: (Read the full article here.)

What do my employees think when I sit at their lunch table? Or even take them out for lunch?

Smart managers eat often with their teams to get feedback, build trust or just enjoy the company. When we’ve asked employees what they think of this, the most common responses are…(drum roll please)... “He actually likes us,“ and “We’re all in this together.“

When leaders talk about the people who work with them rather than people who work for them, they’re cultivating a true team mentality. You’re not above them or below them. You’re all in the game together, and you’re all willing to pitch in.

What impression do I give my employees when I treat them differently if upper management is around?

Simple answer: You’re employees think: “Phony.“

Yep, toss up a big red flag on this one. This type of behavior eliminates trust, diminishes engagement, and reduces productivity—because your team is now chatting in the corner about how you’re a two-faced fake.

One of the attributes of the really great leaders we’ve studied is that they treat everyone the same, whether it’s an entry level employee or the CEO. If you do find yourself acting differently when you want to impress the higher-ups, use these opportunities with superiors as a way to build up your team members, which will help everyone in the long run.

Read the full article here.

While I’ve lived in the States for two decades now, I must admit that I’m still a red-passport-carrying British citizen. That early English upbringing leads me to a strange affinity to Bubble and Squeak, to believe To Sir, With Love is vastly superior to Dead Poets Society, and to have a unique understanding of the typical British approach to recognition: If you don’t mess up, we won’t recognize you.

At a speech I gave in the English midlands, it was interesting to note a very unscientific generational gap with the idea of praise and rewards. Many of the company leaders I spoke with carried an assumption that recognition was largely an American phenomenon, and English employees would not take well to celebrations or public praise. Yet a drove of younger employees pulled me aside with such comments as, “we need this, but our leaders are terrible at it,” and “would it kill them to say a simple ‘thank you?’”


This week, the U.K. paperback version of The Carrot Principle hit shelves in Britain. In that edition, we publish further results from our worldwide global study (including findings from 1,000 respondents in England) and dispatch the theory that recognition does not drive results with European workers. Get this: Employees in the U.K. actually list recognition as a greater need in driving their engagement than do employees in America.
 

In other words, where recognition is rare, it is appreciated even more. Which means it’s time for us Limeys to spread the love.