Employee recognition and rewarding is a key component of employee engagement. Recognizing and rewarding employees who go out of their way to achieve great things for your company goes a long way in their retention. It shows them that you appreciate what they do. Employees who feel appreciated stay longer in a company. Research shows that very few employees are engaged in the Kenyan job market. This means that more companies will continue experiencing high levels of attrition.
The HR Forum held on 28th September 2018 at the Sarova Stanley. The theme had a sharp focus on recognizing and rewarding employees right. This theme was a spin-off from the previous HR Forum that focused on Employee Retention.
Speakers at the forum tackled topics that fed into the main theme with the aim of exhausting the topic and creating awareness on the subject matter. These topics included;
- Introductions By BrighterMonday CEO and TATC Managing Partner
- Labor Laws
- Remuneration and Benefits
- Performance review systems
- Compliance and Integrity
Table of Contents
Introduction by BrighterMonday CEO Emmanuel Mutuma
Emmanuel Mutuma emphasized on the application of employee recognition as a way of improving employee retention. He touched on tow previous surveys done by BrighterMonday on the job market that showed the low levels of engagement and the fact that over 70% of employees in companies don’t intend to stay. There is a need to change the current narrative by identifying where we are going wrong. This presentation by Emmanuel provides more insights into the topic.
Employee Performance in relation to Employee Recognition by Heather O’ Shea, Managing Partner The African Talent Company
Heather O’Shea touched on the correlation between employee recognition and employee performance. She emphasized on the need for employers to know their high performance and understand them. Not every high performer should end up managing a team. sometimes they perform best as part of a team rather than by leading it. This performance identification is critical even in understanding behavior and why people in the work place do the things they do.
Labor Laws in Kenya By Isaiah Kirigua, AG Labor Commissioner Ministry of Labor and Social Protection
Isaiah Kirigua from the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection touched on Labor Laws in Kenya and the issues surrounding performance of employees in the workplace. He expounded on the proper use of performance improvement plans and what they should achieve. He also talked about chatters by the ministry that influence performance, remuneration and employer-employee relations. He mentioned that The Industrial Relations Chatter is the same one that was signed before independence, and it undergoes reviews from time to time.
From The Gallery
Remuneration and Benefits By Reuben Mbindu,Chief Human Capital Officer at Equity Bank
Remuneration and benefits are top in the list of reasons why people sign contracts and why they chose company A over company B. this means that the package a company offers to its potential employees determines if they’re going to stay or leave as soon as they get something better. Sound remuneration programs are created with the company’s budget and employee contribution in consideration. This means that a working compensation strategy should be structured, reasonably competitive and affordable to ensure sustainability. To get more information and setting up effective compensation strategies, take a look at Reuben’s presentation here.
Performance Review Systems By Purity Kajuju, Head of Reward EABL at Diageo
The first step in creating a robust performance review system is by segmenting employees into three categories; Star and good performers, Under-performers and Non-performers. This will ensure that your approach to each employee in the company will be based on what needs improving and not just a general approach. It also provides an opportunity for coaching and mentorship that is specific to an employee’s need. The performance review system should be so ingrained in the culture of the organisation that everyone knows how it runs and managers are trained on how to handle issues. For every performance review session, documentation is critical to provide a source of future reference, as well as create a trail of action for legal purposes. To find out more on how to set up working performance review systems, take a look at Purity’s presentation here.
Compliance and Integrity By Muthoni Nyoike, Senior Managing Counsel Oracle
Compliance and integrity is a core component of organizational culture. Integrity and compliance acts as a shield to a company’s reputation, brand and culture. Employers need to understand that it is not just about meeting targets, but doing it ethically. Compliance should be so ingrained in a company’s culture that the process of how deals are made, targets and met and closed matters as much as the objectives. Employers should begin to reward and recognize employees who walk away from unethical deals and penalize those who hit targets using unethical means. Compliance policies should be so clear in a company and should be set in place right from recruitment of employees and in all other performance-related procedures. It should start with management and cascade down to all departments for it to become part of the company culture. Take a look at Muthoni’s presentation here to get more insights on compliance and integrity and how you can make it part of your daily company life.
Environment and Performance By Chris Mureithi
Chris Mureithi’s talk emphasized on the relevance of environment in relation to behavior and performance. Human beings become a product of their environment and are motivated by factors in that environment to either perform or not. We should, therefore, be careful of the environment we expose ourselves to.
Catch a peak of sights and sounds at the event in the video below.
Be sure to join us for the next HR Forum for another invigorating discussion as we change narratives in the market. All communication on the same will be done on our channels.
