With increasing numbers of businesses competing on experience over salary, company culture matters more than ever. In a bad company culture, the most neglected factor is employee recognition. Specifically, recognising invisible work.
After years of research into employee engagement, I noticed that lack of recognition affects every aspect of an organisational culture. From hiring to productivity and retention. It begs the question, why do companies consistently fail to recognise their staff?
Without affirmation, employees are prone to disengage, which leads to lower productivity and higher turnover.
So what exactly is invisible work? Most organisations understand and manage performance through measures. Goals cascade from the top of the organisation and performance management practices seek to drive goal attainment and goal alignment, resulting in only a thin slice of contribution being captured. Many activities that would be deemed as not directly contributing to movement of key performance indicators, such as investing in building a positive, recognition-based culture, aren’t visibly connected to revenue growth.
I’ll give you the example of my sales team to demonstrate the detrimental effects of invisible work. Generating new business can be time consuming and laborious, especially for startups. Sales requires a thick skin, but it can be incredibly rewarding.
Most sales teams receive rewards based on deals closed, but incentives and bonuses do not acknowledge the hard work required by most leads. If a deal fails at the final hurdle, your sales employee won’t receive any affirmation for their weeks, or even months, of hard work. And if the deal failed for external reasons, their motivation to continue will quickly diminish.
All those steps before closing a deal, that’s invisible work.
The remote working challenge
Invisible work affects every role across all departments. In a climate of remote and hybrid working, invisible work has become even harder to acknowledge. Leaders need to create smart systems that circumvent physical distance and human error, ensuring employees feel valued for their day-to-day work. One way to do this is with recognition.
However, one of the biggest problems for workplace culture is high employee turnover. The intersection between high attrition and remote working leads to disconnected teams.
The result is a lack of cohesion, reduced accountability, slower growth, and quiet quitting.
So in a fast paced work environment, it’s paramount that your team strives towards a common goal. A strong company culture of recognition will ensure that all contributions are noticed.
When employees receive recognition from their managers, they are more likely to be engaged and less likely to leave.
If you want to attract top talent, the growth and development of your current team should be your priority and word will get around. If you think a bad reputation won’t reach your next hire, think again.
Social connection is key to improving company culture
Social connection is increasingly understood as a core human need. Researchers have linked lack of it to inflammation, accelerated ageing, cardiovascular health, and suicide. As leaders, we shouldn’t be ignoring it.
One of my favourite thought leaders Brené Brown says the best social connection is the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard and valued. She says this is when they can give and receive without judgement and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship.
Without visibility, employees feel less connected and motivated as a result. Performance drops, the business misses targets, and revenue is impacted.
For data on the lack of social connection at work, look no further than Microsoft’s annual Work Trend Index from 2021. Their software analyses trillions of productivity signals — including emails, meetings, chats, and posts — across Microsoft and LinkedIn user bases. It also includes an employee survey of more than 30,000 people in 31 countries around the world.
After analysing the data, I noticed three trends: people feel disconnected; remote work has shrunk networks; and even close team interactions have diminished.
The study also found that younger workers and new starts may be more prone to social isolation. These employees said their relationships with their direct teams were worse and they had a harder time accessing leadership. Workers aged 18 to 25 reported lower engagement and motivation. To make things worse, they struggled to speak during meetings and bring new ideas to the table.
The research shows that working from home makes people feel less connected, leading to lower participation and motivation. For me, the first step to address this problem is to create a culture of recognition to encourage manager feedback and peer-to-peer recognition.
I have grown my remote-first company with recognition built into our culture. Based on evidence from experts and behavioural scientists, I believe that the answer to invisible work lies in social connection and recognition.
Celebrating small victories will make your team feel valued and ensure motivation remains high. With more visibility, the opportunities to celebrate your employees increases.
Most companies engage with some sort of internal employee recognition program, but many neglect the role of continuous action. After implementing basic initiatives, like rewards, they fail to follow up on results. If you make recognition a priority, it will encourage visibility, improve social connection and increase motivation across the company.
The modern world of work faces many challenges. Recognition shouldn’t be one of them. Inexpensive to implement but costly to forget, recognition is the core of a great corporate culture.
- Mo provides managers and employees with a platform to share their personality, values and achievements.
