Bonuses have been a long-time, standard procedure in business. At times, they were even taken for granted as an end-of-year motivation to build staff morale.

Traditionally, the awareness of a cash or non-cash bonus by staff was thought to drive performance, but is this really the case?
 
The Pros & Cons
A demonstration of employee appreciation can be critical for staff morale, showcasing your commitment as an employer to invest in your staff.

Bonuses benefit businesses as it is a simple, quick-fire approach to reward staff. Management can show their appreciation for great performance, loyalty and commitment by providing an end-of-year award – let’s face it, come Christmas time, cold, hard cash will always be welcome.

But, the bonus can often begin to be taken for granted – as a result, employees often begin to seek more meaningful feedback or rewards, as a token of appreciation.

When taken away, bonuses can quickly come back to haunt your business, as employees view them as a standard year-end procedure, an entitlement as part of their job, rather than a reward.

The onset of the 2008 financial crash catalysed negative sentiment toward bonus incentive schemes, placing them uncomfortably in the spotlight. They quickly became a marker of the Celtic Tiger era, the “suits” culture that was now recognised as a direct cause of the crash, and the growing gap between the organisation and their senior executives.
 
What Alternatives Are on Offer?
With these concerns in mind, it’s time to reimagine the bonus, and get inventive:
 

• Giving Power Back to Your Employees

Demonstrate your appreciation for your staff by giving them a voice. Giving employees the freedom to make their own choices during work, even if it’s a small matter, can boost their morale and motivate them within their roles.

Creating an opportunity in the workplace and providing variance to an employee’s daily routine, giving staff more autonomy will demonstrate your value and trust in them, enhance creativity and sharing of ideas, boosting performance as a result.
 

• Short-Term Accolades

Providing more frequent rewards will showcase more meaningful appreciation of a staff member’s performance. Not only will this demonstrate to them your commitment to investing in their career, but it will provide valuable feedback for them to improve and boost their performance.

Gratification through short-term accolades will provide a mental link for staff to their recent positive actions, driving up more regular performance, rather than the bonus as a catalyst for improvement at the year’s end.

Regular quality performance will become the norm, boosting your reputation as a business amongst customers and stakeholders alike.
 
A Fresh Approach
By moving away from the ‘do this and you’ll get that’ rational of the bonus, managers can overcome the counter-intuitive nature of traditional incentives and creatively reinvent employee recognition.

​Demonstrate your commitment to staff investment – go beyond the traditional bonus and reinvent employee appreciation for your business.  

No matter your lifestyle, a person’s job takes up much of their time. With people spending on average 13 years of their life in work over a 50 year period, it’s crucial that they feel valued, needed and wanted.

No longer is a ‘job for life’. Studies have shown that people will change jobs on average 12 times during their careers, while the cost for replacing one employee in Ireland now stands at €13,100. Active staff investment is vital for talent retention in the current job market.

In the past, appraisals were the ‘go-to’ annual review for companies and their employees. But, in 2015, Deloitte revamped their review process, after spending nearly 2 million hours on reviews and appraisals.

Industry leaders are thinking up alternatives – are you?
 
Appraisals: Pros and Cons
Appraisals benefit businesses by providing the opportunity to review staff and company performance, initiate needed improvements, and offer praise to top staff and departments.

Despite well-meaning intentions, appraisals have become dreaded by managerial departments worldwide.

Eating up large amounts of time, annual reviews are monotonous, as managers attempt to complete them as quickly as possible. As a result, companies can often struggle to gain meaningful insight into the performance of their staff and company, while all colleagues lose out on valuable time.
 
Taking a Different Approach
So, the pros and cons are clear then. But is there an alternative approach that would suit your business better?
 

• Look Beyond the Form

Don’t let your appraisals fall into the trap of a ‘tick box’ exercise. A simple formality to fill a form out, put someone up for promotion and increase a few salaries.

Looking beyond the form could provide an effective alternative, one that ensures feedback is meaningful rather than part of a process.

These meetings should be focused heavily on the employee, where they are in terms of progress, and how they see themselves and their role.

Only by providing constructive feedback that goes beyond filled-out boxes will performance improve and will effective impact be made.
 

• ‘Stay’ Interviews vs Annual Reviews

Often, employee issues and dissatisfaction can come out of the woodwork when it’s too late; when their resignations have been handed in, their desks have been cleared and their exit interviews have been completed.

But appraisals, when used correctly, give insight, not only in staff performance, but their job satisfaction, work-life balance and ambitions for the future.

‘Pointless’ annual reviews become meaningful ‘stay’ interviews for staff, giving managers the opportunity to provide useful feedback to staff, and to act on information given to them by individuals.
 
What Are the Alternatives?
Maybe taking a different approach isn’t enough. Maybe you want to give your business a complete alternative to the annual appraisal. What can be done?
 

• Little and Often

Appraisals are often annual, making them both time-consuming and at times, unfairly based on the last few months of that working year. This can be due to memory and recent impressions of their performance.

Regular feedback can resolve this, making review workloads more manageable, and providing staff with useful, relevant and fairer feedback.

Managers could host monthly or bi-monthly miniature reviews with staff members. Not only will feedback quality improve, but managers can utilise the opportunity to foster openness, and give staff the space to bring up issues.
 

• Peer Reviews

Another appraisal alternative is the peer review. Reducing managerial time spent on annual appraisals, these provide a fresh perspective on an individual’s work performance, from the viewpoint of those that work alongside them and are directly impacted by their performance.

While this has its advantages, managers should tread carefully. In any workplace, not all employees may get on or like each-other. These tensions could have the capacity to spill out into peer reviews.

​When receiving these peer reviews, managers should watch out for overly-biased opinions, and ensure they receive reviews from multiple peers to breakdown any bias that may occur. 

Running a business can be tough. Balancing time restraints alongside company targets and shareholder expectations can be a challenge for any boss. But ensuring your workplace promotes a healthy environment can bring a multitude of benefits.

The recession is no longer in Ireland. The country is experiencing an all-time-low post-crash unemployment rate of 5.3%. A talent war is underway – talent attraction and retention now relies not only on the job itself, but on what your workplace can offer staff.

During our “Fighting Fit” series, employee wellness has been explored, and how you, as an employer, can best support colleagues.

Now it’s time to ask yourself this question: Am I putting workplace health first?
 
Why So Important?
Depending on sector, workplaces can be busy minefields of deadlines, KPIs and office politics. While these are part and parcel of the daily running of a business, the health of the working environment can suffer if these things become a burden.
​

• Performance

Whether your business is a coffee shop, a marketing agency or joinery team, performance is key. An unhealthy work environment can affect the performance of your business; unwell colleagues may take time off, effectively causing a loss of ‘hands’, and working hours.

Staff will grow unsatisfied with their roles when pressured by a negative workplace. Quality and motivation will deteriorate, and so too will your performance as whole.

• Reputation

A business often relies on its reputation as a key influence on sales, talent retention and attraction. As workplace health suffers, so too can your reputation. Staff may begin to resent you as an employer or organisation. Their family and friends will hear their negative views, causing a change in perspective towards your company.

If your performance suffers a result of an unhealthy working environment, your reputation amongst customers and future clients may also breakdown. Unable to attract great talent or great customers, your ability to grow successfully may be hindered.
 
How to Put Your Workplace Health First?
In this series of articles, the best approach to encouraging physical and mental health awareness amongst staff has been explored. Clearly employee wellbeing is key for your business, that’s no secret.

But this can be easier said than done. It’s time to put words into actions.
 

• Employee Wellbeing as Culture

Take a strategic approach to workplace health. While organising lunch time walking clubs and a charity marathon is great, these one-off initiatives will not produce long-term impact on your company culture.

A full employee wellbeing programme placed at the heart of your growth strategy has the potential to transform your business. Providing regular physical and mental health initiatives, such as those discussed in the previous articles, will revolutionise your company culture, get colleagues paying attention, and demonstrate your investment in the health and environment of your workplace.
 

• Employee Involvement in their Wellbeing

As you create this strategic approach, involve your colleagues from the beginning. Whether you lead a 5 person or 50 person team, all employees should have a voice on their own wellbeing.

Including your team will help identify key areas they want to focus on, including how they would like to improve their physical and mental health.

Having staff involved from the beginning will provide them with confidence to voice their concerns and ambitions, and foster a culture of openness towards the health of their working environment.

In Ireland alone, 22% of workers report being stressed either “always” or “most of the time”. In 2018, the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) found that in just five years, work-related stress had doubled from 8% to 17%, despite Irish salaries rising. 

No matter the sector, any business can significantly suffer from stressed-out staff.
Are your staff feeling the pinch of stress? We explore workplace stress and how your business can effectively address it.
 
Workplace Stress and its Causes
Individuals can experience stress during different periods and in different realms of their personal lives. But stress originating from work-related issues is the most common.

Here’s why:
 

1. Overworking

Overworking can be in the form of longer working hours, harder tasks and less breaks. Stress as a result of an individual overworking isn’t surprising, nor is it uncommon. While some jobs call for longer periods of work at times, this shouldn’t be the norm.

Staff working longer hours can become stressed, not only about their performance but the time lost in their personal lives.

Productivity can be a key component here. A lack of productivity from an individual may mean they have to stay past 5pm to get a task finished. But more often than not, employees are given too many tasks for their working hours.

1. Mismanagement
Unfair distribution of work to some staff over others, work being given to untrained staff, or workloads not being distributed in a timely fashion are the result of mismanagement.

While staff may want to be productive, this can only take place when workplace structures are flexible and expectations are clear.

Mismanagement of staff in any of the above ways can stress out colleagues, leading job dissatisfaction and possibly a loss of talent for your business.  
 
2. Unrealistic Expectations
Having high expectations of your staff and business as a whole is positive – it shows a desire for growth and progress.

However, expectations can quickly become unrealistic if you are not careful. Productivity is important for any business, but if staff are stressed, this can hamper your ability to perform.

Expecting staff to complete heavy workloads in an unrealistic time can cause stress and hinder productivity. If staff lack critical training, and the working hours to complete those tasks, quality will suffer and so too will their mental health.
 
3. Poor Company Culture
If staff feel overworked, mismanaged and under pressure from unrealistic expectations, company culture can be poor.

The cultural pressure to work harder and for longer can take its toll on your employees. No longer will your workplace be viewed as positive by staff and their families. Your reputation as an employer may also suffer.

This cultural expectation damages an employee’s work-life balance. Becoming increasingly stressed, staff may feel demotivated and unsatisfied as a representative of your company. Your talent retention may suffer, as staff seek a better working culture, and business performance will undoubtedly deteriorate.
 
How Best to Support Stressed-Out Staff
As a business, its crucial that you work to prevent stress from taking over your staff. It can hinder productivity, deteriorate relations between staff and your company and damage your reputation as an employer.

So, what can be done?
 
1. Monitoring
Without turning into ‘big brother’, monitoring your staff, the hours they work and the tasks they can complete will indicate how overworked they may be.

This can help to resolve any mismanagement issues, with all staff benefitting from fairer task distribution and a breakdown of unrealistic expectations.
 
2. Improve Company Culture
This will not be an overnight solution. But small steps can make a difference. These include ensuring:

• All breaks are taken by staff
• All staff have the opportunity to confidentially voice concerns or issues that may be causing them to feel stressed
• Staff are offered the opportunity to get away from work stations during breaks

Company culture is crucial for employees to experience great job satisfaction. If a culture is negative, this can induce work-related stress and damage your business during the long term.
 
3. Training
Adequate training of all staff in their roles is crucial. Staff will feel stressed when they are overworked, but this can also creep-in when they feel unable to complete certain tasks.

If they are forced to take longer to complete a task, this can impede on an employee’s work-life balance.

In Ireland, mental health is now high on the agenda for employers as a way of differentiating themselves and increasing their talent acquisition. To remain a competitive employer, your business should take mindfulness training seriously.

In fact, studies have found that staff who feel the need to mask their feelings can experience exhaustion and stress.

​Demonstrating your willingness to invest in your own staff’s mental health, training in mindfulness will give employees the ability to voice concerns and ensure they are fighting fit for your organisation.