Looking for some new employee recognition award ideas? Consider unique, personalized experiences that will motivate your employees.
Traditional incentive, reward & recognition program design relied on traditional economics: the belief that employees act rationally when making decisions in their own best interests and, that employees are primarily motivated by money.
The Incentive Research Foundation (IRF) finds that because 70% of human decision making is based on emotion rather than rationale, behavioral economics may be a better predictor of behavior than traditional economics. Reward and recognition program designers can now tap into the emotional engagement of employees through strategically chosen reward options. One of the most powerful ways to emotionally connect with employees is through experiences. It makes sense then that individualized experiences are trending in reward choices.
Once you make the shift to unique, personalized incentives, you’ll need to move beyond the same old employee recognition award ideas for your experiential rewards & recognition programs! Here are 3 reasons to reward your employees with baseball tickets:
- Baseball is uniquely “American”. Whether you have a favorite team or are a fan of the sport in general, baseball is known as America’s Pastime. What better way to tap into the emotions of a recognition program recipient than to reward them with tickets to their favorite stadium, or a game with their favorite team?
- Baseball is a memory in itself. Most people have some kind of memories around baseball. Whether you played baseball as a kid on a formal team, played catch with your Dad on the lawn, played a pick-up game in the street or school yard or just listened to games on the radio or TV, most people have some memory of baseball that pulls at their heart strings.
- Baseball is for everyone. There is no one profile of a fan. Baseball appeals to all demographics; you don’t have to have a certain skill level to enjoy the game, you don’t need to be in a certain economic bracket and there is no age limit. Baseball is universal.
The Benefits of Using Experiential Rewards in your Rewards & Recognition Program:
- Experiences are shared. Whether the experience is shared in person or afterward in recounting their experience, there is an opportunity for the reward recipient to tell others about their accomplishment as well as the experience itself. This offers residual value to the sponsoring company as well as reinforces the accomplishment every time the recipient tells others about their experience.
- Experiences are memorable. In the world of employee incentives, it’s easy for cash to be confused with compensation. It’s also easy for the recipient to fritter away the cash on gas or groceries. For an employee reward program to be effective, the employee has to make the connection between the goal accomplished and the reward. An experience will be remembered long after a cash reward is spent.
- Experiences can (and should) be personalized. There is no one-size-fits-all reward any more. Each employee has particular hobbies or interests. Employees appreciate being recognized for their accomplishments. When the rewards are personalized and represent and experience they may not be able to get on their own, it makes the reward & recognition program that much more meaningful.
Click here to read more about travel and experiential packages for award programs provided by this company, Online-Rewards.
