How to motivate employees with non-monetary incentives

Even your best-performing agents will have off days.

It’s natural – from time to time everyone wakes up not quite in the mood for a day at work. However, as a manager, the onus is on you to minimize how this impacts task completion by motivating your staff.

While incentivizing is often done through monetary means – promotions, bonuses – the truth is that this isn’t always possible.

In this article, we’ll explore some current methods being adopted by workforce managers to motivate their staff through non-financial encouragement.

1. The fun of gamification

One of the newest tools in a personnel leader’s arsenal is gamification.

Reduced to its fundamentals, gamification involves turning a pre-existing task or process into a game. This holds a number of benefits in the workplace:

• Motivation – It’s true that familiarity can breed contempt when it comes to repetitive daily tasks. By turning these into a fun activity, however, you can prevent complacency and engage staff. In fact, when properly implemented, gamification can enhance employee motivation by 51.6 percent, according to Karl Kapp, Instructional Technology Professor at Bloomsburg University
• Education – By flipping duties on their head in this way, you force yourself and other participants to think about them in new ways. This can result in learning outcomes that improve your systems in the long run.
• Participation – A side benefit of gamification is the way that it encourages employees to work together – this teamwork can contribute to an overall increase in cohesion in your contact centre.

All sorts of daily tasks can be overhauled with gamification, but here are a couple of great examples:

The Quality Scores Sports Game: 

Monitoring quality is high on the priority list for any manager, and why not make this process fun for staff who might otherwise see it as daunting? First, work out a sport that your staff are into, and then assign points that link quality scores to a sports event scenario.

For example, if U.S. football was your chosen sport, an average quality score could equate to an extra point (one point), a good score to a field goal (three points), and an excellent score to a touchdown (six points). You could run this competition over a month, with the agent who gains the most points winning a prize.

The Customer Experience Game:

Customer experience is hugely important to a business’ bottom line. Indeed, 73 percent of consumers worldwide name this factor as important in influencing their buying decision, states research from PwC. 

In this example of gamification, each agent has a sheet featuring a list of factors that contribute to a good customer interaction. The idea is that customers complete the sheet by checking off specific items – for example, informing clients of upgraded products. However, they can only check one box per customer – this prevents the game being over after one call, and encourages staff to alter their approaches to dealing with different callers.

Gamification is the latest technique in workforce motivation.

2. Flexible work arrangements

More and more, we’re seeing an erosion of the traditional 9-5 office job. This trend is particularly true in line with the desires of Millennials and Generation Z, who are filling up an increasing percentage of the job market. Flexible working arrangements have been shown to build loyalty among this demographic of employees, and improve business performance, according to Deloitte.

Call Design’s ME mobile app allows staff to manage their schedules by swapping shifts with colleagues and requesting time off. This allows them to create a program that provides them with an optimized work-life balance, meaning they’re working at times where they feel most motivated to do so.

To do this effectively, you need to establish a process that both you and your employees should stick to. Flexible working requires trust on both sides, but can do wonders for your staff’s motivation when properly implemented.

3. Awards ceremonies

Whether on a grand, annual scale, or at smaller departmental meetings, public recognition of hard work can go a long way to encouraging similar performances in the future.

A great alternative to monetary rewards in these instances can be personalized gifts. Branded company items, for example mugs that also feature the winner’s name or photo are a great touch. Gift tokens that match with that individual’s personal interests also often go over well – for example, movie tickets or books and sports tickets.

For smaller scale wins, a post on a company-wide intranet or social media platform can reinforce the perception that stellar performances don’t go unnoticed.

Internal awards ceremonies motivate staff by showing the rewards and recognition available to hard workers.

4. Involvement in decision making

While, traditionally, decision making is left to senior management, there’s a lot to be said for opening the floor to employee input. Your agents see the business from a different perspective, and will doubtless have ideas of procedural changes you can make that will improve efficiency.

As well as potentially improving the day-to-day running of the company, such initiatives make it clear that you value your staff’s input, which can be a highly motivational tool. Communicating that you’re always open to new ideas will encourage individuals to go beyond the scope of their role and brainstorm concepts that could help shape the future of the company.

From your point of view, that practice of regularly engaging with your team in this way also shows you who might be most suitable for more senior roles, should such an opportunity come along.

With so many different ways of motivating your staff with non-monetary incentives, there’s no reason for not starting to implement some of these ideas today. For more training and solutions to improve performance among your agents, get in touch with the team at Call Design today.