Companies spend millions of dollars and trillions of hours on picking and sending gifts to their employees. That’s a known fact. But are the employees always happy with what they get?
A recent survey showed that 56% of employees did not like the gifts they received. They felt that the gifts did not properly reflect their contribution to the company.
Companies spend hours brainstorming about what to gift their employees, then another few hours in selecting the vendors and then sending the gifts. In this process, they also end up wasting a lot of money. Yet, the result is hardly satisfactory.
To avoid this kind of wastage, many companies are coming up with the concept of letting their employees choose their own gifts. Sounds strange? Well, there’s a trick, but we’ll get to that later.
How Letting Your Employees Pick Gifts Can Be an Advantage
Letting your employees choose their gifts sounds like a dream come true for the marketing and HR teams. But automated gifting has made it a reality.
Before we discuss how this works, let’s look at some of its remarkable benefits.
1. This saves the company time
Choosing gifts for the employees is a time-consuming affair. It involves numerous rounds of meetings to decide on the gifts. However, the moment you let your employees select their gifts, you save valuable time that can be used to do other productive works.
2. No need to deal with vendors
When sending employee gifts in bulk, you have to go through the process of vendor selection. You have to request for quotes. This process is cumbersome and not exempt from malpractices. If the vendor cannot deliver on time or the products are delivered damaged, you are liable to get criticized by your giftee.
If the employees pick their gifts via automated gifting, the onus of dealing with the vendor is not on your shoulders.
3. You do not have to bother about deadlines
Gifts are often distributed during festivals, birthdays, anniversaries and are time-bound. Often there is chaos around the deadline. The gifts may not arrive on time, the vendor may supply faulty products, etc. As a result, the HR department is usually on tenterhooks during the gifting season.
Automated gifting takes away all these hassles and ensures your employees receive their gifts on time.
4. You have no risk
Letting your employees choose their own gifts saves you from criticism. We all know that it is not easy to satisfy everyone. No matter what you gift, some are going to dislike it. However, when they choose it themselves, they have no one to criticize.
5. Minimize Office Gossip
Festival gifting can snowball into a big topic for office gossip. The coffee machine corner, cafeteria, and elevators would buzz with office gossip surrounding the gifts. Gifts will be compared, defects will be highlighted, and unnecessary issues could creep. The best way to nip in the bud is to let the employees choose their gifts. This would leave no room for criticism.
6. Employees feel valued
A survey found that 56% of employees feel that the gift they receive from their company does not reflect that they are valued.
To make your employees feel valued, you don’t always need to give them expensive gifts. Instead, you need to give them the ‘right’ gift. A gift that will make them feel valued. The best way to do this is by letting them choose their gifts. This is not only a way to appreciate them but also to make them feel valued and trusted.
7. Gain Loyalty Points
The trust that companies show to their employees will help them gain loyal employees for decades. When an employee feels valued in a company, they stay and even put in some extra effort.
A recent survey showed that 68% of employees would prefer to choose their own gifts if given an opportunity. But companies often take the easy way out and give a gift card instead. It seems like a perfect short-cut solution, but there are cons to this system. Gift cards are like putting a price tag. It is like deciding their value depending on the cash amount on the card.
Another flaw is that gifts-card are easy to purchase but also easy to forget. Surveys found that most employees even do not care to encash the gift card. Another major flaw with gift cards is that they seem generic and impersonal. There is no creativity, thoughtfulness, or appreciation in giving a gift card.
Statistics show that 81% of employees prefer a personalized gift as it imbibes a sense of gratitude and belongingness. This brings us to the trick referred to at the start of the article.
We get it that simply asking your employees what they want every time is a tad too awkward for both parties. On a large scale, not feasible either.
Here comes Eva with its automated gifting platform. See how it works.
When an employee picks a gift using EVA, you can also attach a personalized handwritten note along with the gift. This will make the gift even more special and increase its recall value.
Another way to improve brand recall is to display your brand logo and theme on the gift boxes. However, ensure not to overdo it, or it simply becomes a cold marketing act.
To Sum Up
Gifts are not appreciated for their actual monetary values. Throwing money without thoughtfulness would not give you engaged employees. Gift-giving becomes a personalised experience for employees that is appreciated by companies that go beyond gift cards and generic gifts.
In the current job scenario, the demand for recognition is more than ever. As an employer, if you wish to retain talent, you need to recognize the importance of your workforce. Make each employee feel like a valued member of the company. The key to doing this is personalizing employee appreciation. And the best way to do this would be by letting your employee choose their own gifts.
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