How To Get Ready To Educate People About Giving Recognition

When you think education and training is the next steps to take with making real recognition happen where you work, there are a few things to take into consideration first before planning the training program.

In fact, if you prepare yourself and the prospective learners properly, then they will better learn how to give more meaningful and effective recognition to those they work with.

Prior preparation also impacts those involved in designing and developing the learning curriculum and planning the right methods of delivery.

Let’s get ready to educate your employees about recognizing one another the right way.

Purpose for Recognition Training

It’s essential that you and the individuals you are preparing to train understand the purpose for this training on employee recognition.

Here are some questions to think on.

• Why recognition education and training, and why now? 

• What do you want to have happen following the learning sessions?

• How is this training going to help me?

• What benefits will we get from doing this?

When managers and employees know the “why” behind the recognition training they will nod their heads and be ready for the training session or online instruction.

Know Who You’re Training

You had better know exactly who you’re training to give more effective recognition to people. Depending on their position and job task it may affect the length of the training content and how employees receive the learning content.

Consider the following questions in preparing for the training.

• Who are you training about recognition skills? 

• What type of employees are you dealing with: full-time, part-time, shift-workers, managers/supervisors, unionized employees, etc.?

• How will the different job responsibilities impact the design and development of the training content?

• When is the best time to conduct the training? Or will you release employees to take online e-learning courses?

Being aware of the different employee types and the nature of their work can steer the direction for what the training materials and curriculum should look like.

What Will Be Taught?

When a person is learning to swim, you don’t just throw them into a pool and shout at them to swim. You learn body position, arm movement, leg action, and breathing technique. 

It’s the same thing with giving employees recognition where they need to know an individual’s recognition preferences, how to use effective verbal and nonverbal communication skills, understand what happens topeoplewhen they’re recognized, and when they are not. 

You need to be thinking about the following.

• How are employees already familiar with giving recognition? 

• What are the learning objectives you want to see employees achieve?

• What knowledge, skills, and attitudes are you expecting developed?

• How can you best prepare employees before they take any training?

There are a lot of factors to give meaningful, memorable, and motivational recognition. Whatever you can do to identify what employees need to know, think, and do to give effective recognition, the better the training will go.

Know the Workplace Context

Working in an accounting office versus working on a manufacturing shop floor makes for a different recognition experience. You can easily stop and acknowledge an employee in an office setting. But you can’t shout your recognition across the floor when an employee has a visor and ear protection on while welding metal parts together. 

• What is the context in which they will put the recognition skills into practice?

• Are their environmental work differences to be mindful of? 

• What percentage of the learners are office workers versus manufacturing?

• Or perhaps other unique work situations? 

Best Training Method

There are many demands on people in the workplace mainly because of meeting customer expectations in delivering quality goods or service on time. People are busy in their jobs and taking them away from work to do some training has to be setup the right way. How training is presented must suit the individual learner’s preferences and their job role.

• How is education and training currently being delivered? Is it viewed as being effective in producing good outcomes?

• What is the best method of learning instruction for the diversity of various employees’ work roles and responsibilities? 

• Does time limitation and work demands dictate using online microlearning modules? 

• Would in-class instruction provide better opportunities to practice face-to-face recognition giving?

Consider whether you can afford only one delivery method for everyone or different methods tailored to specific work groups.

Implementing the Training Delivered

In preparing to educate people on how to give more effective employee recognition, you must clarify how you will know the difference the training has made on attendees behaviors. 

You need to go beyond whether the participants enjoyed the training. You must determine if they learned the knowledge, skills, and attitudes you wanted them to. Have they applied what they learned back on the job? It’s also important to know that the training results impacted people and performance.

• How will you know if the recognition training has been effective? 

• What can you design and develop to transfer the learning back on the job?

• How will you draw upon managers and supervisors to assist with implementing recognition skills?

• Are managers of attendees at the training prepared to set learning expectation before they attend the training and follow up with them afterward?

Hopefully, these thoughts and questions can guide you in getting things ready for educating and training your managers, supervisors, and employees, on how to be the best recognizers in your organization.

Recognition Reflection: How much time do you take before starting any training to prepare everyone to be fully engaged in what they will learn?

Roy is no longer writing new content for this site (he has retired!), but you can subscribe to Engage2Excel’s blog as Engage2Excel will be taking Roy’s place writing about similar topics on employee recognition and retention, leadership and strategy.