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Executive Times |
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2007 Book Reviews |
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The
Carrot Principle: How the Best Managers Use Recognition to Engage Their
Employees, Retain Talent, and Drive Performance by Adrian Gostick and |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click on
title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Recognition I was prepared
to dislike what I read in The
Carrot Principle: How the Best Managers Use Recognition to Engage Their
Employees, Retain Talent, and Drive Performance by Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton. I expected some anemic advice
based on personal experience. Instead, I found a research based study,
proving the case the authors make for what works when it comes to providing
effective recognition at work. Any executive responsible for others in the workplace
will find useful and practical ideas on the pages of The
Carrot Principle. Here’s an excerpt, from the end of Chapter 7, “The
Building Blocks of a Carrot Culture,” pp. 97-101: The Value of
Culture If your
firm were a computer, your corporate culture would be akin to the operating
system, guiding how team members think, feel, and act on the job. If your
organization were a living, breathing person, your culture would be your
personality and very soul. It runs that deep. In fact, culture colors
everything we do. Culture is how you do things: the rules, spoken or unspoken,
that you play by. Culture is the foundation of everything you embrace, and
the reason for everything you do. For
employees and managers alike, understanding the company culture helps us
make tough decisions instinctively, without having to refer to policy manuals.
In the best organizations, culture promotes collaboration and links diverse
individuals throughout offices. Culture also can enhance respect between
coworkers and clients. At the most basic level, it tells customers what to
expect from us. Of course, culture also affects our ability as managers to
attract better talent. We’ve
discovered that the more that organizations help individuals understand and
fit in with the culture, the greater success the firm and its employees will
experience. It’s a bit like creating a giant mosaic, made up of thousands of
individual Pieces. In a corporation, something extraordinary happens when all
the individual pieces combine to reflect the same company culture. The effect
is absolutely awe inspiring. It is not
possible to achieve sustained, long-term success without a strong, positive
corporate culture, which is what makes the culture clash that accompanies so
many corporate mergers and acquisitions such a dilemma for leaders. In fact,
the reason most mergers fail is culture clash and people issues, and yet,
most senior leadership teams have little idea how to address this issue. In
most cases during a merger, they either outsource the culture dilemma to
consultants or ask human resources to figure it out while the rest of the
senior leadership team focuses on perceived “important” pecuniary issues. Is
it any wonder that more than two out of three mergers fail to deliver anticipated
results? DHL
experienced challenges in blending cultures when it began acquiring various
companies in the DHL’s
Carrot Culture revolves around customer service. Others turn on innovation
and research, while for still others, the crucial
factors are zero defects and never-miss delivery. At KPMG,
building a culture that recognizes and rewards outstanding performance is
always top of mind. Said Joe Maiorano, the
executive director of human resources, “Whatever you read about supportive
cultures says you need commitment from the top. We have commitment from our chairman
and CEO to be a great place for all of our people to build a career and work.
Recognition is a component of being an employer of choice, and leaders are
accountable to recognize their individuals’ and teams’ performance.” We’ve
found that great cultures are built best by frequent, specific, and timely
team recognition celebrations and individual recognition. They are places
where the recognition doesn’t just trickle along; it flows. At KPMG, for
instance, 60 percent of employees received an award of value in a
twelve-month period we examined, and many of those employees received
multiple awards. In fact, with 19,000 eligible employees in the That point
bears repeating. In many cases, it’s insecurity that drives many high
achievers to perform so well and so consistently. Great cultures are
sensitive to our needy natures, and they celebrate a lot—not only individual
achievement but team successes too. For example, they celebrate corporate
milestones: perhaps joining the “We often
ask audiences if they think their companies celebrate success enough, and
typically no more than 10 percent of the crowd says yes,” said business gurus
Jack and Suzy Welch. “What a lost opportunity. Celebrating victories along
the way is an amazingly effective way to keep people engaged on the whole
journey. And we’re not talking about celebrating just the big Wins.” What’s most interesting is what happens
to the psyche of people in celebrating cultures. They start to believe that
they are part of a company of champions, and that generates pride. Employees
can’t help but think, “We are always celebrating. So we must be winning.” And
that means that even when employees find themselves behind in a goal, they
seem to band together to find a way to pull out a victory. Authors
Deal and Key explain the value of frequent celebrations within a corporate
culture this way, “They bond people together and connect us to shared values.
. . . When everything is going well, ritual
occasions allow us to revel in our glory. When times are tough, ceremonies
draw us together, kindling hope and faith that better times lie ahead.” Unfortunately,
the inverse is true in organizations where excellence is expected, not
rewarded, and tough times are dealt with harshly. Not only are these
organizations no fun to work in, they fail to drive long-term outstanding
results. Building a
culture that celebrates is a key responsibility of a leader. When
celebrations stop, we’ve found achievement slows to a trickle. The Building Blocks
of Recognition Great
organizations and effective managers create a Carrot Culture one person at a
time by using a variety of inclusive and meaningful recognition experiences.
Fortunately, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time you recognize.
Here are four of the most common forms of recognition that make up the backbone
of a healthy recognition culture: ·
Day-to-day recognition. These are the pats on the back,
the handwritten notes, the team lunches, on-the-spot award certificates, the
gifts of thanks, and other ways you regularly praise and express gratitude to
employees. This is often low-cost but always high-touch recognition. ·
Above-and-beyond recognition. When your people go above
and beyond, they deserve a more formal response from the organization. These
awards provide a structured way to reward significant achievements that
support the company’s core values and business goals—whether the achievement
of a sales goal, the implementation of an innovative idea, or providing
exceptional customer service, for example. ·
Career recognition. Most organizations provide a formal
program to recognize people on the anniversary of their hiring date, giving
managers a prime opportunity to highlight cumulative contributions. In most
organizations, this is the most underused vehicle for rewarding and
engaging employees. ·
Celebration events. These celebrations reinforce your
brand and thank everyone in a team, division, or an entire organization.
Events to celebrate include the successful completion of a key project,
achievement of record results, company anniversaries, or new product
launches. These four
recognition types are the essential tools of a Carrot Culture, and it’s
vital to know how to use them. Ongoing training will help managers understand
the why of recognition and learn
the details of how. Let’s
start by examining the basic recognition tools and how a blend of informal
and formal recognition provides numerous opportunities for managers to
recognize and engage their people. The
Carrot Principle is packed with ideas for recognition. Whether you do a
little or a lot of recognition in your workplace, you’ll come away from this
book with loads of ideas on all the possible ways in which you can improve
the effectiveness of recognition at work. Steve Hopkins,
May 25, 2007 |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the June 2007
issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/The
Carrot Principle.htm For Reprint Permission,
Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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