Small businesses deep down know that their growth is dependent upon keeping their employees loyal and happy. And, the key to doing that is keeping employees engaged, making them feel good about their contributions, and planting the seed to inspire them to perform better in the future.

How do SMBs go about doing all that? While compensation revisions are one way to entice employees to stay longer, most employees need more incentive than a once-in-a-year pay hike to take the extra step in their productivity, which is where employee rewards and recognition programs play a substantial role.

Chances are you already have an impromptu employee rewards program in place. If your manager offers public accolades for each of your small wins, you’ll work even harder knowing that you’ll eventually get your moment in the sun. However, managers are human beings too, they couldn’t possibly keep track of every milestone an employee achieves.

What happens if the managers fail to acknowledge the employee’s small win? Employees will lose the hope that their work will be recognized, this hopelessness will breed disengagement and eventually result in churn.

Now, imagine the benefits a small business can enjoy if they have a solid rewards and recognitions program that runs on its own like a well-oiled machine. A transparent, automated R&R process can eliminate any chance for bias, encouraging employees to do their best since their hard work will never go unrecognized.

Before we go any further, let’s see the problems with an archaic rewards program, how a standardized employee recognition program can benefit an organization, and how can SMBs leverage HR process automation to implement their own rewards program to uplift employee spirit.

Shortcomings of manual employee rewards program

In today’s culture of instant gratification, employees expect a quick turnaround and appreciation for their best work. So, the ability to notice, encourage, and reward outstanding employee performance is the heart of long-term employee retention and satisfaction.

It is a fact that 69% of employees would work harder if they felt their efforts were better appreciated in a timely way. Meanwhile, a recent Deloitte research shows that organizations with employee recognition programs have a 31% lower voluntary turnover.

There is no room for inefficiencies in employee recognition. All of your systems need to be integrated seamlessly to deliver a hassle-free experience. Thankfully, with the use of HR process automation, businesses can eliminate the time-consuming and error-prone manual processes while leveraging a large amount of employee performance data to deliver a personalized and interactive employee recognition experience.

How automation streamlines an employee rewards program

HR process automation enables businesses of all sizes to deliver a highly personalized recognition process across the performance cycle affordably. If leveraged appropriately, R&R automation has been proven to increase satisfaction, happiness, and ultimately, profit margins.

To execute a great rewards and recognition automation strategy, employees must understand what motivates their employees to give their best and how to go about enhancing that experience. Then, the HR team can split employees into little groups (based on department or skill set) and create flows and R&R campaigns for each employee group.

Listed below are three automation strategies and technologies for delivering an outstanding employee experience:

1. Email notifications

While timely notifications can be used at various points during the employee lifecycle, it is a specifically powerful tool to use after the milestone achievement in an employee rewards program.

When managers receive automated emails about the achievements of their employees, it will help them inform, announce, and communicate the same with the entire team. With this information in place, managers can do an array of things from throwing a surprise party for the top performer to leaving a sticky note or message on their desk saying “well done”.

2. Intelligent chatbots

A cloud-based rewards and recognition platform can capture real-time feedback given by managers and peers and store them in a centralized location, speeding up the rewards cycle and improving employee convenience.

HR automation platforms that come with built-in chatbots will help free up human resource managers to tackle more complex rewards issues and develop meaningful employee relationships with immediate answers to commonly asked questions, integrating with other HR systems to provide an update about their progress, and  gather employee information to make performance recommendations through productivity hacks and performance tips.

3. Meaningful insights

Inorder to understand employee expectations better, SMBs must rely on the historical data they have to continuously improve the employee experience and engagement. HR automation tools can help businesses to turn a ton of employee survey data into actionable insights. Armed with this information, both functional and HR managers can make informed decisions to improve employee experience across the hire-to-retire lifecycle.

Automation is the future of employee rewards

Making employee happiness and satisfaction a priority is critical to make your business flourish. Placing your employees ahead by automating your employee rewards program with other critical HR functions will help businesses facilitate a far-reaching transformation without leaving a negative impact on employee-employer relationships.

The day you lose sight of the fact that your employees are the heart of your operation, will be the day when your business starts to tumble down the hill of efficient operations. So, what are you waiting for, add an employee rewards program to your HR automation project and see for yourself how it can deliver an unforgettable employee experience that improves retention while reducing costs.