First, the bad news. Employees are really unhappy. Most of them of can’t wait to jump ship and find another job, according to a new survey of 17,000 employees across 19 industries in the U.S.
According to “Mind the Workplace,” a joint study by the Faas Foundation and Mental Health America, a majority of employees are so dissatisfied with their workplace, they “speak poorly” about their company and their boss. It gets worse. A full 71 percent of employees are thinking about—or actively looking— for new jobs. What leaders should find truly frightening is that 83 percent of those respondents who want to quit say they spend twenty to thirty hours a week thinking about a new job or looking for one. Those are hours they are certainly not thinking about how to make their current employer more profitable.
Now the good news. Great news, actually. The study finds that if leaders want to keep employees happy and loyal, there is a “low-cost” option that “makes a significant impact.” The ‘option’ is called praise. You’ve heard of it, but are you implementing it? According to the study, “Staff recognition and praise matters more than compensation, indicating that improving managements’ skills and ability to provide verbal and written support is more meaningful than increasing salaries…employees want to feel valued.”
Behavioral economist Dan Ariely would agree. In his book, Payoff, Ariely reveals the results of experiments which find that money matters far less to employees than either they or their bosses think. “When we are acknowledged for our work, we are willing to work harder for less pay, and when we are not acknowledged, we lose much of our motivation,” writes Ariely. “Acknowledgement is a kind of human magic—a small human connection, a gift from one person to another that translates into a much larger, more meaningful outcome.”
If you really listen to employees, you’ll find that a lack of recognition does, indeed, count for more than you might think. I recently spoke to a highly compensated sales professional at a publicly-traded company. Like the majority of people in the workplace study, she didn’t have positive things to say about her company, she wanted to quit and was actively looking for a new job.
“You’re one of the top salespeople in the company, you make far more money than most people, and you know your product really, really well. Why leave?” I asked.
“I’ve made a lot of money for this company. You’d think they’d show me some appreciation,” she responded.
In this person’s mind, compensation was not the same as appreciation. Appreciation is an emotion, a feeling that your boss values your contribution. Those leaders who actively engage people’s positive emotions have companies that score better on almost all metrics: financial performance, employee engagement, retention and recruiting.
A positive comment or ‘thank you’ goes a long way. I once met a receptionist at a large company whose CEO had a great reputation among his employees. The company’s financial performance was strong, employee engagement was high, and turnover was low. “It’s interesting,” the receptionist began, “hardly anyone notices me and they don’t look up from their computer screens as they walk into the building. But the CEO makes eye contact, stops, asks me how my day is going and thanks me for doing a good job. I love it here.” If you listen carefully, you’ll note that the receptionist didn’t say anything about loving the work; she loved the praise.
In his book, Social, psychology professor Matthew Lieberman says that our primitive brains are built to think about our place in the social structure. We desire to be socially accepted, and praise is a direct way to gauge if we’re accepted or not. “Our brains crave the positive evaluation of others almost to an embarrassing degree,” writes Lieberman. “ A kind word is worth as much to the brain in terms of rewards as a certain amount of money. ”
Have you put in a kind word today? The outcome might be more valuable than you imagine.