Criteria for Recognizing Employees

Not hardly a QuickBooks question. Google search.

 Hi there mav606

Encouraging employees to lead greener lifestyles (work & home), is a key tenet and step for a company going down the 'sustainability' path. It's crucial, in developing a 'lean-green' mindset across your organization.

Your question is however, somewhat difficult to answer, firstly because there are many ways in which a company goes green and some of them can save a considerable amount of money and, some efforts are more altruistic. Is an employee who saves the company $20,000 in production costs (waste reduction) to be rewarded the same as another employee who donates time to the local farmers market? Criteria at this point would be difficult to pin down, because so is the measure of success. Secondly, in reality, there is no such thing as 'non-monetary', if your incentives are to mean anything, they will cost something. A gold star wont cut it.

OK, so how do you do it? Max bang for your buck?

• You must throw out the idea of setting criteria. Instead, work with your employees to choose a 'sustainability' representative for each department. Each representative should collate and report on departmental efforts and each department should collaborate on solutions that reduce waste (in all its forms) & environmental cost. Asking your employees to do this is an amazing way to generate ideas for your business, since it is they that process the stuff that pays the salaries. They know where the bugs are and have great ideas. All this has cost you so far is salaries in time spent, but the rewards will be immeasurable.
• Give your staff the tools to be successful and create a 'Sustainability Mission Statement' as a guiding light. Flesh that out with specifics. I can show you what one looks like if you wish.
• Get creative with your rewards; they should be organization wide and non-competative. You could start the ball rolling by offering all your employees a 'free' in-home Energy Audit. Here in CT an 'official' audit costs $75 and they would get about $700 in services and products paid for by the CT Energy Efficiency Fund. You could give your employees 1 or 2 paid days a year to work with any local charity. You could give interest free loans to buy Energy Star products for homes which is obviously good in staff retention. There's lots of ways forward....

Thoughts? Best ~Gareth

Hello,

I'm not sure about criteria, but I do think there are several non-monetary award options a small business could consider.  For example, designating a preferred parking spot, or some other form of internal (to the business) recognition, like a traveling trophy (one that gets passed from one recognized employee to the next each month or quarter).

These can stir up some good natured competition among employees and drive awareness.  Hope this answer helps!