Article: 3 ways to make Total Rewards work

Compensation & Benefits

3 ways to make Total Rewards work

Individual plans, pro-social behaviors & post-retirement benefits are the best ways to prop up a Total Rewards strategy
3 ways to make Total Rewards work

If one has to go by the results of the latest study on Rewards and Recognition done by Randstad India, 50 per cent of employees across companies surveyed want more money/benefits and 65 per cent of the Indian respondents are looking out for opportunities of career growth and advancement on the job. Human Resource managers often face a dilemma when it comes to this tool of employee motivation. Speaking of which, what can HR managers do to retain their workforce? One of the ways is to have an effective rewards and recognition plan in place.

For starters, we’d say that it is time to look beyond the provision of monetary benefits at the workplace. Today, employees expect an organization to be more creative when it comes to rewarding and recognizing them for their performance. They want to feel more valued and they expect organizations to trust them w.r.t the responsibilities entrusted. For organizations to meet these expectations, they need to tap into the ‘intrinsic abilities’ of their employees. How can this be done?

Organizations need to be able to involve their employees while forming a rewards and recognition plan for them. When employees understand the impact of their involvement in this procedure, the acceptance and sustenance of such an initiative is likely to be higher.

In line with ‘Management by Objectives’ where the performance management system is tailor-made to the goals of the employee, the organization can create an individualized plan to reward and recognize its employees. The key challenge here is to strike a balance between individual, team and organizational performance.

Another element that needs more focus is aligning one’s rewards and recognition policy with the culture of the organization. When the reward system reflects the values of an organization, employees are bound to be more committed to the organization. An interesting way of doing this would be to emphasize on pro-social behaviors at the workplace.

What are pro-social behaviors? They involve behaviors that are carried out keeping in mind the collective good that can be derived from it. If organizations were to encourage employees to help one another and get rewarded for it, this can impact organizational culture in a positive manner.

For instance, organizations can create a metric by which they can reward organizational citizenship behaviours (OCBs). OCBs are actions that employees engage in when they go beyond the requirements of their job. By rewarding employees for such behaviours, organization can help inculcate the values of pro-social behaviours while ensuring its own success.

Lastly, it is time to focus on benefits that an organization can provide to its employees in the post-retirement stage. As a concept, many companies may have given up hope when it comes to ‘organizational loyalty’, however, when organization create a structured plan for their employees post their retirement which allows them to live life comfortably, there are certain benefits that can follow.

At an initial stage, the organization might wonder if it is under any obligation to provide tailor-made benefits to their retired employees. What if these benefits were to sustain the interest of these employees in your organization and lead to referrals of fresh talent into your company? Wouldn’t that benefit any organization?

As a Human Resources manager, one needs to know that such initiatives can be a success only when the organization has a transparent and fair Rewards and Recognition procedure set up. Only when employees are kept into the loop, can a ‘Total Rewards’ system be established and run successfully in an organization.

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Topics: Compensation & Benefits, #TotalRewards

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