Anyone who has lost a “good” employee (especially unexpectedly) to another job knows that finding a person who has the training, experience, and the required character qualities to excel at the job is difficult. What’s more, staff turnover is related to loss of productivity, relational damage with patients, and a negative impact on staff morale.
Many business owners and managers believe employees are motivated primarily by financial gain to stay. In actuality, the vast majority voluntarily leave because they don’t feel appreciated. Studies substantiate this: Specifically, The Sloan School of Business at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that not feeling appreciated was 3 times more predictive of employees leaving than compensation factors.1 Additionally, in a recent “Grant Thornton State of Work in America Report,” 15% of healthcare workers said they were remaining with their current employer because they felt valued, while not feeling valued was their main reason for leaving.2
So, how can the practice owner show they truly appreciate their “good” employees? Here are the answers.
Don’t Assume You’re Already Doing It
Many leaders think they are doing okay in this area; that their employees know they appreciate them. In fact, while close to 60% of managers feel they are doing a good job in recognizing their team’s hard work and contributions, roughly a third of employees (35%) agree.3
Something else to consider: An employee recognition program is not the same as appreciation. Most employee recognition programs are designed in a way that they are generic (everyone gets the same certificate and gift card), group-based (a lot of introverts hate going up in front of a group), focus solely on high performers (leaving out the majority of employees), and are viewed as inauthentic (“It’s the back-office’s turn to get the award this month”). As a result, employee recognition rewards performance, but it does a poor job of helping employees feel valued as individuals.
A key concept to understand is that not everyone feels appreciated in the same way. In fact, there are 5 languages of appreciation4 important in the workplace. They are (1) Words of affirmation, (2) Quality time, (3) Acts of service, (4) Tangible gifts, and (5) Physical touch. To determine how each employee wants to be shown they are appreciated, you could ask them and/or have your team members take an online assessment, which identifies both their preferred languages of appreciation and the specific actions most meaningful to them.5,6
Focus on 4 Key Factors
There are four key factors necessary for employees to feel truly valued.7
1. Communicating regularly (not just once or twice a year at a performance review). In an optometric practice, this can be making time once a week or more to acknowledge a job well done. For example, this can be thanking an allied health staff member for keeping everyone on schedule by facilitating dilating drop insertion into a tentative toddler.
2. Using the appreciation language and actions most important to the recipient (not the leader.) If one of your opticians says that tangible gifts resonate best with them, consider giving them a gift card or free movie tickets, as an example.
3. Delivering the appreciation both personally and to individual employees. (Not as a group “blast email” and not through another employee.) As an example, perhaps you noticed that the front desk staff was particularly adroit with a difficult patient. Instead of sending them all the same “thank you” email, show authentic appreciation to each individual member of the staff.
4. Making it authentic vs “going through the motions.” People have a fairly sensitive “radar” to situations when others are giving praise or compliments, they don’t really mean; this seriously undermines trust in the employee-employer relationship. Not saying anything is better than trying to “fake it.”
Staff Appreciation and Profit
Ultimately, running a practice is about serving your patients well and making a profit doing so. As a result, some readers may be thinking, “Look, I want people to enjoy their work, but I don’t have time to be a cheerleader.” I ask those readers to consider that when staff don’t feel valued:
- Tardiness increases.
- People call in “sick” more often.
- Productivity decreases.
- Policies and procedures are not followed regularly.
- More conflict occurs over petty issues.
- People become more irritable.
- Patient complaints increase.
- Turnover increases.
The reality is that when team members feel truly valued, your busyness decreases because you are not having to deal with these time-consuming issues. OM
References
1. Sull, D., Sull, C., Cipolli, W. & Brighenti, C. “Why Every Leader Needs to Worry About Toxic Culture.” MIT Sloan Management Review. March 16, 2022. Accessed March 5, 2025. https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/why-every-leader-needs-to-worry-about-toxic-culture/.
2. “Staffing and well-being factors afflict healthcare workers.” Grant Thornton. Accessed March 5, 2025. https://www.grantthornton.com/insights/articles/health-care/2023/staffing-and-well-being-factors-afflict-healthcare-workers.
3. Wigert B.“The Strengths, Weaknesses and Blind Spots of Managers.” Gallup Workplace. Accessed March 5, 2025. https://www.gallup.com/workplace/645299/strengths-weaknesses-blind-spots-managers.aspx.
4. White, P., & Chapman, G. (2023), The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace (Chicago: Northfield Publishing)
5. “Motivating by Appreciation. Discover Your Language of Appreciation.” Accessed March 5, 2025. https://www.mbainventory.com.
6. White, P. Differences in preferences for appreciation across various work settings. Strategic HR Review, 22 (1):17-21.
7. White, P. Appreciation at Work training and the Motivating by Appreciation Inventory: development and validity, Strategic HR Review. 15 (1): 20-24.
