GiftCard Partners Blog

Employee engagement has been defined as "the willingness and ability for employees to go the extra mile", but what about those employees who aren't willing to complete the first mile, never mind the extra mile? Improving our employee engagement strategies can attract employees and maintain motivated employees.

Employee wellness is a hot topic for employers in an environment where healthcare costs are rising and there can be a lot of confusion around new Affordable Care Act rules taking effect. Here are a few ways to ensure that your employee wellness incentives provide the ROI that you seek in investing in employee wellness.

Employers are spending more on health and wellness benefits while decreasing the amount of spending on other types of benefits.  According to the Society of Human Resource Management's (SHRM) 2014 Employee Benefits report, 28% of employers have increased the benefits they have offered to employees in the last year. Employers are finding it crucial to maintain or increase key benefits in areas where costs are rising - which has mainly been healthcare and wellness. And decrease benefits like undergraduate tuition, personal car use for business purposes reimbursements, and long-term care insurance.

A research group at University of Pennsylvania's Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics and the Penn Medicine Center for Health Care Innovation is testing an interesting theory that uses the model of a basic employee rewards program. Since many patients stop taking their medication regularly within a year of having a heart attack, so the research group is experimenting with giving patients a small prize for taking their meds on time (complete with transmitter outfitted pill bottles to prevent dishonesty).
The theory behind the doctors' research is exactly the same concept used by employers to incentivize employees towards a desired behavior in the workplace. The rewards are not large, and are modeled around a lottery system. Each day you take your medication on time you earn the CHANCE to  win a small monetary prize, and if you don't open your medication for 2-4 days the researchers are notified via the transmitters on the bottle and have a social worker contact the participant. This translates directly to the workplace. For a job well done, a small reward is given to motivate repeat behavior, however if an employees is slacking or not delivering the quality or production the organization requires, it triggers a feedback point from the manager to get the employee back on track. Using rewards in these types of instances, whether with patients or employees, that have trophy value like gift cards or time off can have a longer lasting impact than cash. Cash can be used for practical applications like bills, rather than allowing employees to build a lasting memory of treating themselves to a meal at
The Cheesecake Factory, or a new outfit from
The Limited. Building these types of experiences will solicit a stronger desire to repeat the behavior.
For more information on the University of Pennsylvania study or the reward system in the study check out this article from the Wall Street Journal.

Finally, after years of industry experts providing research on how effective gamified employee incentive program are,
Incentive Magazine has come up with a formula for how to prioritize and rank employee incentives and rewards. The SAPS hierarchy will help guide you to design the optimally effective employee rewards program to meet your organizations budget and your employees' motivational needs. Here is how SAPS works and why. Status: Think about boarding a plane, the most loyal airline customers always get to board first. Shouldn't your most loyal employees get first pick for things like which days they take vacation. Your most loyal employees don't want the same 5 year anniversary gift that sits like a paperweight on their desk. Allow them to chose something that reflects their loyalty in a way that matters to them. Access: Give access as employee incentives. These types of employee incentives don't hold any monetary cost but does hold intangible value to employees. Access to their C-level executive for lunch one day could incent a junior level employees to work hard and stay motivated to get some facetime with a high-level employees that they don't normally interact with. Power: Allow employees to gain power through peer leadership. Power doesn't need to come through promotions, but can be earned by becoming a peer leader. Employee incentives can earn them a spot to lead an employee committee on organizational recreation or an employee committee on safety. Good behavior should be met with more opportunities to exhibit good behavior. These types of employee incentives create a natural culture of leadership and professional development. Stuff: Stuff should come last. Once an employee has reached past the first three levels of employee incentives, that is when you can reach for a bonus, or a gift card, or even a paid vacation. Stuff should come last, because an employee should have worked loyally through many other levels of incentives before an employer simply hands over the goods. However, when an employee does earn "stuff" incentives, it is because they are your most loyal employees, most deserving of incentives.