Satisfied, dependable and productive employees make business happen. Often a consumer will choose to purchase your product or service based on the employee who represents that product or service.

It seems that one of the secrets to a productive workforce?and therefore a successful business?is an elusive thing called good morale. Just what is good morale? It usually refers to how your employees feel about their jobs, you and your business. And that can directly affect your bottom line.

So the next question would be: "What contributes to good morale in the work environment?"

It?s a myth that good employees care only about money. Money is important, but there are many items that contribute to an employee?s morale. Interestingly, some are so fundamental that we tend to miss them completely. For instance, do your employees feel:

* Treated fairly and respectfully?
* Valued and appreciated?
* Recognized and possibly even rewarded for their work?

It shouldn?t take you long to realize that if you wish to attract, recruit and retain good employees, fair and respectful treatment is a given. Employees who do not feel valued and appreciated will either contribute less effort as time goes on, or leave for greener pastures where they will be appreciated.

In addition, everyone likes to have achievements and efforts recognized. Even though personal satisfaction is usually generated from within ourselves, it is always more meaningful if someone else notices and shares the success. Thus the concept of recognition and rewards.

Rewards can motivate and encourage employees to contribute to their own success and that of your business. Now, we?re not talking big-ticket items like a car or trip to some exotic locale. On the contrary, employees are often delighted with a range of rewards that can be provided at little or no cost. Most importantly, ensure your program fits the culture and image of your company.

The most effective reward and recognition programs have five elements:
1. Achievable: Set achievable standards. If it can?t be accomplished, it becomes a de-motivator.

2. Objective: Tell employees exactly what it takes to achieve a reward or recognition.

3. Sensible: Include rewards that are logical motivators. If you are in your busy season, don?t award additional time off if your schedule can?t tolerate it for another six months.

4. Timely: Waiting too long to deliver a reward or recognition will lessen the impact.

5. Useful: If possible, measure and reward something that helps to produce useful business results.

There are no firm rules about what to recognize, but many programs recognize the following:

* Productivity/quality

* Customer service

* Peer recognition

* Superior performance or extraordinary achievement

* Safety

* Length of service

Remember, recognition and rewards need to be offered with sincerity and thoughtfulness. Recognizing employees is about giving thanks and credit where credit is due and making those employees feel valued and appreciated for a job well done.

Copyright ?go2 Tourism HR Society. All Rights Reserved. Republished under license. Permission granted by: NS Charney & Associates

By Howard Shore

You see it every day in your daily lives and particularly at year-end with all of the New Year resolutions and business plans.  Next year you are going to do all of those things you have never done and more. Or maybe you just want to get back to where you used to be.  You set goals for some really important reasons:

• Keep you on target

• Make better decisions

• Keep you focused

• Increase self-motivation

• Develop self-confidence

How many goals do you have going right now?

How have the anticipated rewards influenced your progress (or lack of)?

Are all of your goals planned out fully?  What difference might it make?

How do you know if you really are going to achieve those goals?

Here is a quick quiz to see if you are on track?

1.     I state my goals in a way that tells exactly what will be achieved and by when?

2.     My goals are measurable in a way so that I know whether they are achieved or not?

3.     I set goals that are attainable and are not designed to stretch to some level below that goal.

4.     My goals are set realistically high so that they require some sort of behavior change?

5.     All my goals have a definite target date for completion?

6.     I evaluate my goals to make sure that I do not have too many goals?

7.     I have taken time to prioritize my goals?

8.     I write down all of my goals?

9.     All the people who contribute to my goals know exactly what the goals are and how they contribute to them?

10.   I have thought through in advance and considered all the detailed steps that it will take to complete my goal?

The answer to every question above should always be yes whether it is a personal or professional goal.  For every question you answered ?no? you can probably drop your goal success rate down by at least 20%.  Do not try to put more importance on any one of these items as that would be like building the engine of your car or baking a cake and saying one part or ingredient is more important than the other.  The reality is if one part or ingredient is missing, your car will probably not start or your cake will not bake.

The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the some of the critical factors that can help you increase your goal success rate to over 90%. There are too many factors to cover in this article so my aim is to clarify some of the top (key) points. 

There are a lot of things you do (consciously or subconsciously) to achieve or not to achieve your goals.  While I would agree that outside circumstances can play a role in goal achievement, you must be honest with yourself. When you fail to achieve a goal, whether it?s more sales, customer retention, employee retention or something personal like weight loss, success or failure is more dependent on those responsible for the goal than outside influences.

COMMITMENT

I always get a funny look when I discuss this issue with clients and friends.  Many people think that because they made a decision, they made a commitment.  This could be the farthest from the truth.  Actually the hardest decisions oftentimes have the weakest commitments particularly the larger the group size.

Does this scenario sound familiar to you?  More than a year is spent thinking about something, maybe even a committee is created to evaluate it, consultants are hired, friends and colleagues conferred with, money is spent for market research, and finally an affirmative decision is made.  The project, system, process, or other decision is placed into action and all of a sudden the inevitable happens-- problems arise, big problems, little problems, and problems disguised as attitudes.

What happens to most people?s level of commitment when faced with these problems? Rather than solving the problem, ignoring all of the thought that went into decision, they allow emotion to take over and rethink the decision.  Commitment crumbles and with it the chance of following through on the decision.

IF YOU MAKE A DECISION?MAKE A COMMITMENT!

SMARTY GOALS

The first step in setting goals is to establish a SMART goal that is stated positively.  As alluded to in the Quiz, SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistically-high, and Time-based.  However, one often-overlooked item is the goal must be Yours. While this criterion seems simple it is actually not easy in execution.  If it were, everyone would be achieving a lot more goals.  Very briefly let us discuss what each of these criteria really mean:

• Specific ? You say exactly what it is you are going to do.  Hazy goals are doomed to failure.  For example, we are going to establish a new training program for our supervisors by 10/1/XX.  You are not defining what you want to train them to do.

• Measurable ? The goal must be stated in a way so that you can definitely know whether it has been achieved.  In addition, you should be able to see when the trend is negative so that you can modify your detailed action steps accordingly.  For example, we are going to increase the frequency of meetings with our hourly staff.  How often would you consider acceptable?

• Attainable and Realistically-High ? Goals should have sufficient rewards and/or consequences to be motivated and they must be attainable.  If it appears that your goal will not require any kind of behavior change, challenge yourself to make sure that it does.  Either the goal is too low or you are not being realistic on what it will take to get there.  The reality is you have set it as a goal because you are not already doing it and the definition of insanity is ?doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome.?

• Time Based ? When do you want this goal completed by?  Be honest, are there goals you have talked about for years that are still on your goal list?  It is probably because you have not committed to a deadline.

The following is and example of a SMART goal:

Get 10 appointments with decision makers in the manufacturing sector within 50 miles of Toledo that employ more than 250 people by the end of the quarter.

WRITE YOUR GOALS DOWN AND BROADCAST THEM

It is not unusual to meet people that have goals and nobody knows about them.  Even worse, they may not be written down anywhere.  In personal or organizational circumstances it is always best to write your goals down for the following reasons:

• It strengthens commitment

• Unwritten goals change unconsciously

• Rounds out your thought process and gives you an opportunity to think things through

• Provides a means to communicate to everyone who is responsible for execution

If you have goals and they are not communicated succinctly to everyone who is responsible for doing what it takes to get to where you want to go, what is the likelihood they are going to do it?  People like to have purpose and know where they are going.  We use goals to focus individuals and organizations in the same direction.  When we achieve goals it increase energy and that has a positive impact on results, thus further increasing energy, increasing focus on goals, increasing results, increasing energy, and so on.  It is that simple!

 Copyright protected worldwide.  by Howard Shore or Pablo Perez today at (305)779-3049 to learn more about Activate Group Inc.