Reward, Recognize and Re-energize Your Enterprise:

Work and fun are no longer mutually exclusive. It seems that the "F" word has been worming its way into the workplace in recent years, as a way to energize employees and combine fun and effectiveness.

Creating a motivating environment by consciously choosing to develop policies, reward and recognition programs that are meaningful to workers is the first step to creating a corporate culture by design and not default. Start by asking employees a few simple questions:

1) What motivates them at different levels? Develop a menu of options from their response for their file. If we offer incentives that don't interest employees, then the reward loses its appeal. Knowing specifically what motivates people allows you to customize their incentives and they will appreciate it.

2) What types of recognition would they prefer? Some people like public acclaim and fanfare, others prefer a more private applause from a colleague or supervisor.

3) What do you want out of the relationship with your job? Answers will reveal their level of commitment and purpose for being there.

4) What do you do for fun and how do you spend your leisure time? This question gives you insight into another side of each person and how they choose to spend their discretionary time. We are so much more than just our job title and what we do in our leisure time reveals volumes more about us than our position in an organization.

5) In your ideal workplace, what would improve the quality of life and how would it be more meaningful to you? This question solicits suggestions on how you can improve the working environment in the eyes of the workers. When workers feel ownership in making changes, they support the ideas more readily. People also respond well when they see action taken toward their suggestions. Be aware of trends in the answers and these can act as footprints towards things you may need to change to improve the workplace. You now have a blueprint for success as your marching orders for designing a fun and effective workplace customized to the needs of the workers.

To get you started in developing a sincere implementation program, I will share a few low cost, fast, fun fixes I have gleaned over years of working with organizations to recognize and revitalize their workforce.

1) Be aware of your space, the form and function of your environment as well as the colors. Ensure appropriate privacy while creating an open and sharing team space. Ensure furnishings are comfortable and functional, and be aware of the need for individuality and for creating personal spaces. Educate yourself on color therapy and how colors affect us (i.e. fast food restaurants often use bright red and yellow which can be agitating or irritating if enveloped in them for too long. They want people to rotate through and not linger. Compare that atmosphere to fine dining establishments with a navy, hunter green or burgundy décor that invites customers to stay, get comfortable and spend more money.) One science toy store, Fun-da-mentals, had a giant paint-by-numbers party and invited customers to fill in the forms already drawn on the walls by an artist. The result was a tremendous splash of color with fun images of Einstein, dinosaurs and the galaxy surrounding workers and customers alike.

2) Invite workers to relax and be creative in the whole-brain rooms housing playful things to stimulate idea integration and the practice of safe stress. These rooms can have the requisite coffee machine along with other beverage choices, a mini trampoline, hula hoops, a treadmill, a TV showing the Cartoon Network, white boards for mind-mapping, bulletin boards, stress toys such as Nerf® guns and balls, Koosh balls, bubble pens, a basketball hoop or tails.

3) Post marker boards at each person's workspace and encourage others to write notes of appreciation on boards.

4) The Dragon Hill Lodge honors monthly birthdays with cake and ice cream for the entire staff. The birthday honorees for that month get to spin the wheel for a chance at prizes such as: a t-shirt, a lobster dinner for two, an overnight at the hotel, a day off with pay, a gift certificate or cash. Depending on your budget, you can create cause for celebration and use the wheel for other good reasons such as a big sale or making a deadline and change the prizes as needed.

5) Create corporate lore and traditions unique to your environment to celebrate successes or just generate spirit in the workplace. One recreation department in Indiana had a stuffed animal pig as a mascot. When the mascot was kidnapped by a worker and held for ransom ("Deliver a pizza to the youth sports department or the pig gets it!"), the supervisor played along and now it has become a tradition of kidnapping the pig- sending the photos of it blindfolded or tied to the train tracks and ransom notes asking for longer lunch hours or new supplies. They have even started a scrapbook with all the photos and letters. Such activity builds team spirit and camaraderie along with a healthy sense of humor.

6) Create a joy gang or morale committee whose job is to arrange for a consistent gathering and socializing event, and invite family members to some of them. Creating themed events where workers can receive public network with colleagues can give workers a sense of pride with some friendly competition. Try coordinating events around lesser known holidays such as National Energize Your Life Week the last week in October, or National Playful Professionalism Week the last week in April, or April is National Humor Month with Fun at Work Day in the first week of the month. Find these unusual celebrations in chases calendar of events or in the free monthly ezine livewire from www.funatwork.org or the Fun at Work News ezine at www.fun@work.com.

Some event ideas

- May is physical fitness month- Hahn Air Base hosted a couch potato week with a Mr. and Mrs. Couch Potato contest, decorate a Mr./Mrs. Potato Head contest, couches on wheels races and the restaurants featured different potato recipes. After the couch races, they hosted a parade of all entries.

- April hosts Administrative Professionals week: Funcilitators coordinates admin antics or office Olympics complete with events such as the rat race steeple chase, toss your boss (tossing a blow up doll), disc drive (teeing up a floppy disc and using a golf club to hit it for distance), and human bowling (using water bottles, skateboards and bike helmets).

- National Clean Out Your Desk/Office Day- Host a contest for the heaviest purse with the most junk in it, hold a competition for the oddest thing in a drawer or create an amnesty box for all those sugar, ketchup and creamer packets in workers' desks.

- Just desserts- the Heidelberg community services hosted a volunteer recognition night and build-your-own sundae bar. Certificates were read and given out.

7) Ask employees at all levels to create their own title and have business cards or desk placards designed with their new titles such as:

Goddess of First Impressions - Receptionist

Princess of P.R.- Public Relations Liason

Paintball Meister - Adventure Activity Specialist

Reality Officer - Office Manager

Chaos Coordinator - Executive Secretary

CFO- Chief Fun Officer - Training Development Specialist

Grand Pobaah of Sales - Sales Manager

Each month Fast Company Magazine prints a unique job title of the future.

8) Involve family members to improve loyalty, trust and extend the recognition beyond the work site into the home. Send a bouquet of flowers, movie tickets, restaurant gift certificates or a plate of cookies to the spouse or family with a note thanking them for sharing their family member with the company for some overtime hours. You could also send a note home to a worker's mother telling them what a good job their
offspring is doing.

9) Give out reward cards and pocket praises freely expressing your appreciation. Disseminate cards to colleagues so they can also give them away. Awards such as "Take off an hour early" or "Have a snack on us" gives people a little boost. Praise cards offer "Forget sheep...let's clone you" or "Your service left me breathless...I never inhaled." These cards as well as recognition fundamentals kits with a variety of awards and a CD ROM to make your own cards are available through www.baudeville.com. You can also send your appreciated through a greeting card with a gift card or a gift inside the card at www.BizBuilderCards.com. I'll pay for the card and postage for your first card.

10) We're a grazing society- take advantage of this habit and offer snacks at a staff meeting. The infamous candy jar on the desk is always a welcome sight or you can show appreciation with customized chocolate bars. SAS Software in North Carolina orders over a ton of M&M's per year to keep the bowls of this candy replenished at all times in the break stations on a continual basis.

11) Invite employees to create a treasure map- a poster with magazine pictures and words representing what motivates them, what they stand for the things that make them smile, or any other facet of their personality that makes up their authentic selves. These treasure maps give clues to coworkers about what drives them and helps managers customize incentive. It also fosters team spirit and builds bonds between people when they find similarities in their maps. Teams can either make their maps individually at home and bring them in or do a cut and paste party together. You can hold a contest to guess who belongs to each map. These maps also work as a goal setting poster that sets into the subconscious and helps draw the owner toward what they see in the poster.

12) Create a unique and interesting employee recruitment orientation program. Many of us may have received a going away party, but most of us never had a welcome aboard party. Try a game show theme complete with prizes for orientation questions. Try a scavenger hunt to introduce new hires to different people and departments in the organization or try people bingo to network with colleagues and learn lesser known aspects of the team.

13) Share information and give regular feedback to improve morale, trust, productivity and relationships. Generations X and Y have grown up receiving constant feedback on their abilities with interactive computer games. Their attention can be glued to a digital game because they are receiving feedback every sixty seconds. With that as a benchmark- the annual performance appraisal doesn't cut it. Select a variety of modes for feedback including balloon-o-grams, gift certificates, e-mail, personal thank you's and lunch together. The National Association for Employee Recognition (www.recognition.org) offers a whole slew of articles and ideas on their website. Their annual convention is filled with industry experts as well.

14) Create a flexible, lenient and casual work environment aimed at taking care of employees' needs so they can focus on work and taking care of the customers' needs.

15) Create games for sales incentives to reward employees. Offer a free throw for every sale on the company basketball court. Each basket earns the employee $20. Or offer a virtual baseball game- one sale is a single and earns a small prize, three sales is a triple and four is a home run with larger and better prizes. Offer minor league and major league prizes depending upon the amounts of the sale.

These ideas will get you started thinking in the fun and functional arena. To rev up your fun factor, purchase a pack of cards at www.funcilitators.com. This deck of cards called "52 Winning Ways to Have Fun at Work" is an actual card deck with four suits each with tips for teams or resources or holiday suggestions for infusing more fun and effectiveness in your workplace. For personal consults or onsite teambuilding to create a better place to work, call 866-FUN-AT-WORK or email me at Gail@Funcilitators.com to schedule an appointment with the CEO- Chief Energizing Officer, Gail Hahn, MA, CSP. We'd be delighted to hear your success stories too.