This idea is excerpted from Barbara’s book “Handle with CARE — Motivating and Retaining Employees” (McGraw-Hill). To order this book, go to the Online Store section of Barbara’s website by clicking on the book cover.

*Give an employee a surprise day off.

*Write and perform a song about your employees.

*Have a surprise “Queen/King for the Day” celebration for someone who is always there to support others.

*Send flowers to an employee’s spouse, parents, or significant other, thanking them for the great work that employee is doing.

*Use candy names as ways to appreciate employees. When they have met a sales or other goal, give them a SKOR bar. If they have gone the extra mile, how about a package of EXTRA gum? If they have done something really valuable for the team, choose a $100,000 Bar. If they always make everyone laugh or keep their spirits high, give them a “Snickers.” If you go to a good candy store, you can personalize something for each person on your team.

*Find a key employee on your staff who enjoys and is good at making employees feel good and make employee recognition a formal part of his or her job description.

*Ask each employee to write down at least 8 things they would like for rewards or recognition—at least two that cost no money, two that cost from $5 to $50, two that cost from $50 to $200 and two dream things.

*Have a senior manager wash an employee’s car.

*Take out an ad in the local paper celebrating an employee.

*Give an employee a pair of painter’s gloves with the fingers dipped in red paint as the “I work my fingers to the bone award.”

*Send each employee a glass container. Then give them a different kind of candy to fill it every month.

*On the employee’s birthday let them choose from five different envelopes, each with something they have suggested they would like for a reward.

*Keep an “Appreciation Box” on your desk so employees can let you know what others have done for them.

*Help one of your star employees run for an office in a trade association, If they win, take away some of their responsibilities so they can handle the extra work they’ve taken on.

*Have an “Achievements Box” in your work area where employees can write down whenever something positive happens. At the end of the week, read each entry to employees.

We would love to hear how your company shows appreciation to your employees. Share your ideas in the “Leave a reply” section below!

Life is All About Relationships
Barbara A. Glanz, CSP, CPAE Speaker Hall of Fame

As I was speaking to Bank of America managers in Dallas, I talked a lot about building relationships—relationships with employees, relationships with colleagues, and relationships with customers. These folks were each going to manage their own banking centers, and they were at the very end of a three month training session. They had been in class since early morning, there had been an open bar and dinner, and then I was scheduled to speak, certainly not the professional speaker’s favorite venue!

What happened that night was absolutely amazing as these precious people opened their minds and hearts to fully realize the awesome opportunity they would each have to create workplaces where both employees and customers would feel valued and respected, places where people could be their very best selves. Not only did I receive a spontaneous standing ovation when I finished, but people lined up across the room to give me a hug, and many waited for nearly an hour to have me sign their books. Later that evening as I was pondering the tremendous impact my words had on the audience, the connection that occurred between us, and the deep spirit of caring that was created in that room, the following thought occurred:

LIFE IS ALL ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS! Some last a lifetime, others are precious gifts of the moment, but some, even though short-lived in the eternity of time, will change our lives forever.

These are the relationships that imprint themselves onto our very being and stretch us in ways that can bring both intense joy and excruciating pain. And yet most of us would never wish them out of our experience because these deep soul connections teach us more about our real selves than we could learn in any other way. And even though life may force us to move on to other paths, we are grateful.

“Life is made up of many partings welded together.”
– Charles Dickens, Great Expectations –

“I am a part of all I have met.”
– Tennyson’s Ulysses –

……. I would like to think of our friendship as being like two rivers, which one day, within the fleeting moments of time, met and suffused – two rivers that arose from different valleys to flow together toward the sea. As time would have it – our lives – like rivers, stir and break to carve our separate courses toward destiny’s distant uncharted waters. No longer will the rivers together flow – no longer will they laugh at rain together. Time and space will be between them. But as friends who together flowed through the valleys of knowledge, each will retain a part of the other. Each, several years hence, will look back upon moments past with a smile.

Sometimes rivers meet again – if only for a span – so perhaps somewhere within the eternity of time our lives will again converge. But …..if not even for a moment can we relive the friendship we have had – I will cherish until death the mere fact that I have known you.

How blessed I feel to have loved and been loved in a wide variety of relationships throughout my lifetime. We may lose our health, our possessions, and even the physical presence of those we love, but NEVER will we lose the memory, however fleeting the relationship, of connecting heart to heart and soul to soul.

For each friend I’ve met on my journey — from seat mates on airplanes, to members of my audiences, to friends who have walked beside me for over 50 years — I say from the depths of my being, “Thank you for touching my life.”

When I think of a life filled with purpose and meaning, it is all about building relationships. What kind of relationships are you building each day?

Blessings and love,
Barbara

BARBARA GLANZ BIO
For free articles you can use in your company newsletters and an archive of dozens of immediately applicable “Ideas of the Month,” go to www.barbaraglanz.com.
Internationally known speaker, author and a member of the prestigious Speaker Hall of Fame, Barbara Glanz, CSP, CPAE, works with organizations that want to improve morale, retention, and service and with people who want to rediscover the joy in their work and in their lives. Barbara was voted “best keynote presenter you have heard or used” by Meetings & Conventions Magazine, July 2010. She is the author of 11 best-selling books, including The Simple Truths of Service Inspired By Johnny the Bagger; The Simple Truths of Appreciation; Handle with CARE—Motivating and Retaining Employees; CARE Packages for the Workplace–Dozens of Little Things You Can Do to Regenerate Spirit at Work; Building Customer Loyalty and CARE Packages for Your Customers. Using her Master’s degree in Adult Education, Barbara lives and breathes her personal motto: “Spreading Contagious Enthusiasm™.” She is the first speaker on record to have presented on all seven continents and in all 50 states. For more information, she can be reached directly at 941-312-9169; www.barbaraglanz.com; bglanz@barbaraglanz.com.
You can learn more about her work at www.barbaraglanz.com

SPONTANEOUS TREATS–The Key to Employees’ Hearts!
By Barbara A. Glanz

Employees need to feel appreciated. They need to be managed on both the Human and the Business levels. We also know that happy employees are more productive employees. One of the most special ways a manager can fulfill all of these needs is to surprise his or her employees with a treat.

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SPREAD CONTAGIOUS ENTHUSIASM–Tips to Rebuild Employee Morale
By Barbara A. Glanz

Today’s workplace is enveloped by the fear of downsizing, loss of job security, overwhelming changes in technology, and the stress of having to do more with less. According to a recent Roper poll, employee morale and job satisfaction are at the lowest point they have been since Roper first began doing the poll decades ago. Managers must recognize this phenomenon and do their best to counteract it if their organizations are going to survive.

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