Don’t Forget to Say, “Thank You”

“Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.” With that immortal phrase of appreciation, Winston Churchill ensured that no one would forget the efforts of the Royal Air Force in beating back the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain.

Matching Churchill’s eloquence is a daunting goal, but figuring out how to simply acknowledge hard work and heroic effort is a huge step in the right direction. Data from Hidden Brain Drain strategy sessions repeatedly underscores this principle. In the words of one participant, “Thanking people for their hard work and commitment is the key to making them feel appreciated.”

“Because few people expect much in the way of reward these days, a small but personalized ‘Thank you’ can have a big impact,” says Steve Richardson of American Express. “I try to personalize everything. Even when I send a recognition note to a big group or team, I try to add a personalized paragraph in each person’s e-mail so it’s highly tailored to the individual.”

Public recognition is also a powerful tool; it doesn’t cost money but can reap a huge return. For example, Cisco uses its Collaboration Across Cisco award to recognize employees who have had exceptional success using Web 2.0 technology to collaborate with other employees, customers, or partners. Every few months a winning team is showcased at the company’s quarterly meeting, and its successful projects (along with those of four finalists) are shared on the company’s intranet. At year end an overall winning team is selected, and a $5,000 charitable contribution is made in the team’s name.

A senior executive spending personal time with an employee is another popular reward. “Being taken to lunch or breakfast by the boss once in a while not only shows appreciation but interest,” says one strategy session participant.

“Just be sure not to devalue your appreciation with overenthusiasm,” warns another participant. “Thankyous are only appreciated if they are heartfelt and not just token.” And even though it’s understood that stressful times make people snappish, sprinkling around a few “good jobs” doesn’t make up for bad behavior. “It’s extremely important to treat people nicely in times like these,” the participant added.

Promote Existing Wellness Benefits

Study after study shows that high levels of stress, experienced day in and day out, are significantly detrimental to health and well-being. Scientists warn that stress contributes to health problems ranging from obesity and diabetes to heart disease and infertility. One study shows that working more than sixty hours a week and failing to get regular sleep can double the risk of having a heart attack. But only 28 percent of Americans say that they do a good job of managing stress.

Companies need to get involved. Not only does stress undermine the health of employees—reducing resilience and undermining performance—but also it can directly impact the bottom line. Merrill Lynch found that health care costs at the company shot up in 2008, a year of great turmoil, as many employees leaned heavily on medical services. Stress, it turns out, costs money.

Organizations can help employees build resilience and keep in peak form by reminding them about company-sponsored (and outside) initiatives that offer aids to physical wellness—stress management, smoke-cessation programs, cancer screening, and the like. In recent months, Goldman Sachs and Pfizer—among others—have reached out to the Maurer Foundation for Breast Health Education to present programs that demystify breast cancer and champion early detection through mammography, clinical breast examination, and monthly self-examination. Overloaded executives welcome these reminders—in the midst of a global recession it’s so easy to neglect oneself. One female manager described the Maurer Foundation program as a “wake-up call”—it spurred her to perform a self-examination that led to the discovery of a small lump—and early-on treatable cancer.

Many companies already offer on-site gyms or free memberships to local health clubs. But even though periodic memos might encourage employees to take advantage of these facilities, stressed-out participants in Hidden Brain Drain strategy sessions say that’s not enough: “In this environment it’s easy to feel guilty about taking time out to go to the gym,” said one participant. “It attracts negative attention. Colleagues question whether you’ve gotten your priorities straight.”

If you want to show your employees that you really care about them, one of the strongest signals you can send is making it easy for them to exercise. But how do you position or justify this in a recession when everyone needs to be on the case all the time? One manager solved this problem by creating a workout rotation for his team: each person signed up for a different time slot, ensuring that the team was never seriously depleted.

At Ernst & Young, partners have access to a variety of wellness and leadership programs which can be customized based on their needs. These programs include day-long health physicals at renowned health and wellness facilities, training on energy management and wellness, and whole-life coaching. One whole-life coaching program covers physical fitness, family dynamics, financial health, and career development over a 12-month period. “The hope of the program is that people who have become depleted will be rejuvenated,” says Carolyn Buck Luce, who went through the program. “The symbolism is powerful. For the firm to let you know that they want to invest in you—in the full round of your life—sends a tremendous message. And because the coaching is tailored to the specifics of the E&Y culture and customized to fit the needs of men, women, and multicultural executives, it helps our top talent maintain their enthusiasm and energy throughout the various stages of their careers.”

Use Time as Currency

Tough times are the right time to formalize flexible work schedules. Companies that treat time as currency—through remote work options, staggered hours, reduced-hour arrangements, and mini-sabbaticals—earn the appreciation and loyalty of their high performers. Such employers also drive performance; by offering a rich menu of flexible work arrangements, they are more likely to attract and retain talented employees than companies that do not. “Flexibility is one of the most important aspects of being a competitive employer,” says Kerrie Peraino, chief diversity officer at American Express.

Flexibility is a powerful lure in recruiting highcaliber people. Work–life balance has always been prized by working women juggling the demands of family and high-powered jobs, and now these moms are being seconded by members of the incoming Generation Y cohort, who consider it a basic entitlement to play as hard as they work.

When companies allow people to work from home for part of one or two days a week, they gain numerous low-cost, high-return advantages. The most obvious payoff: employees are able to concentrate without being interrupted by phone calls, meetings, and other workplace distractions. Eliminating watercooler gossip sessions—a significant time sink in a high-anxiety environment—is a huge boost to productivity. In the words of one strategy session participant, “People are much more productive when they can avoid office chitchat and eliminate useless commuting time. A day to focus without constant interruption can be really valuable.” And when comp is down, the cost savings associated with flexibility are important. “Savings on commuting costs can be huge!” added another participant.

In April 2009, the U.S.-based office of Booz & Company replaced its longtime unpaid sabbatical policy with a new Partial-Pay Sabbatical program. The new program, available to all employees—not just consultants—offers participants between one to twelve months off, during which employees receive 20 percent of their base salary, full health-care benefits, and a guarantee that, when they return, they will have their job for at least as many months they took time away from the company. First offered in Europe in early 2009, where uptake has been over 30 percent, Partial-Pay Sabbatical is much more than a cost-management tool—the global consulting firm sees it as a way to increase engagement by allowing people to relax, advance their education, spend time with family, volunteer for a charitable organization, or even take on a part-time job to gain additional experience.

Flexible work arrangements can also potentially benefit employers by bringing down the fixed costs of office real estate. The proverbial lightbulb went on in Citigroup’s corporate real estate division when it was discovered that too many real lightbulbs were shining in too many empty offices. On any given day, the occupancy rate of Citi’s offices was at best 60 percent. The company was wasting resources on offices that no one was using. The result: Citigroup’s Alternative Workplace Strategy, or AWS, program. In addition to driving cost savings through remote working, use of hotels, and moving of people to less-expensive offices, AWS is a key element in Citigroup’s newly positioned and newly enhanced flexible work strategy, itself a strong recruitment and retention tool for Gen Y and female employees.

AWS will launch globally in mid-2009. By 2011, Citi hopes that most employees will have moved into one of the many “space solutions” offered through the AWS program. The goal is to shave 15 percent off the company’s global office space needs, which will have significant cost savings over a three-year period. Citi expects the AWS program to also help drive down attrition rates, because of the greater flexibility offered to employees. This will produce additional cost savings for the company.

Paradoxically, although an increasing number of organizations have come to realize that all hands can still be on deck even if not all bodies are at their desks, tough times deter employees from taking advantage of flexible hours. Even those who would benefit most from working at home feel they dare not do it. “Sadly, there’s a stigma, which seems to have gotten worse in this recession,” notes one strategy session participant. Explains another, “Working remotely from home looks less ‘dedicated,’ even though most people work even harder at home and, interestingly, are more often available.”

One solution is to position flexibility as a business imperative. Historically, Sodexo, a leading provider of food and facilities management solutions, worked with employees to create flexible schedules on a caseby-case basis. But in 2008 the company launched a formal flexible work arrangement that is business based. Flexibility must be mutually beneficial, for both the business as well as for the employee. Rather than managers deciding on an ad hoc basis which employees would be allowed to telecommute or flex their schedules, managers now follow corporate procedures and evaluate flexible work proposals against business needs and impact.

Flexibility is no longer a favor or perceived as an entitlement. To qualify, employees must be in good standing and have no past or current performance issues. Eligible employees complete their own flexible arrangement proposals, and managers assess whether the arrangements will allow workers to meet performance and productivity goals. Each flexible arrangement begins with a trial period, with biannual reviews to gauge success and fix problems. Employees must resubmit a flex request each year, so renewal is not automatic but earned.

For top talent, flexibility is an important aspirational goal. Even if they cannot avail themselves of flexible hours right now, hard-driving high performers who routinely give 110 percent to the job can dream about how things can change as soon as the load lightens. Companies that want to keep their best people would be wise to heed this comment from a strategy session participant: “I’m the primary breadwinner, so I can’t take time off now. But in looking for a new job, a role with flexibility will be my top choice.”

Encourage Employees to Do Good on Company Time

As you will see in section 7, corporate social responsibility (CSR) or social outreach activities are a proven win-win situation for organizations and their employees. One way companies can reward top talent is to make it easier for employees to volunteer on company time. BT recently tweaked its corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative. According to a recent internal survey, more than one third of UK telecommunications giant BT’s employees are already active volunteers on their own time and another 30 percent would like to volunteer but are not yet doing so. In April 2009, BT established a first-ever coordinated, companywide volunteer program, realizing that this could be a key factor in motivating and retaining high-potential employees. The new program will make it easier for BT’s 106,000 employees to volunteer their time and expertise. “We are looking at ways in which volunteering can make a strategic difference to our business, and develop activities and partners around that,” says Helen Simpson who is leading BT’s new program. “The skills people develop while volunteering are central to many of our operations, so we can use volunteering to develop our talent pool and accelerate learning.”

Tough economic times impact the performance of the most important people in an organization. Companies need to understand that they can no longer motivate top talent in the traditional way—through enhanced compensation—and need to look instead for imaginative ways to boost performance, thereby building a strong foundation for growth and renewal.