To vent about my workplace being TOO happy

[wheresmymojo]

I need to vent on here because I'd look like a really shit manager if I said anything in real life.

I work for a big company but one that has a lot of staff in their 20's. It has a culture that is genuinely lovely most of the time, relaxed and about bringing fun to work. Great.

However, there are times when bringing fun to work crosses over into feeling like you're working at a kindergarten...

Examples:

• We already do a whip round to on everyone's birthday and they get gifts and a present (lovely).

• We're also asked to send a celebratory message on each team member's 'work anniversary' (I mean...a bit much for me but fine)

• Now my team would like a card every year to celebrate their 'work anniversary' (this has tipped me over the edge)

• We have a million ways the teams get recognition including a monthly shout out at the strategy cascade (fine) and now a badge you put on your security pass strap (a bit extra but okay). We have an annual awards ceremony (fine). Now the teams say they don't get enough recognition (erm...what?)

A lot of people there haven't worked anywhere else and it feels like we're not exactly setting them up to understand work in the 'real world'.

Am I being a miserable git?

I mean almost definitely but I think I'm the only one that feels we go a little bit too far. I'm like the Grinch

You should be giving personal recognition on a face to face basis not just waiting for the award ceremony that's lazy and you're not doing your job as manager if you do. You don't give them an award each do you, so naturally some are going to feel unrecognised.

I'm not sure 'happy' is the right word OP as it's all very performative and trying a but hard but I know what you mean.

No advice, sorry - at my organisation we genuinely care for staff and recognise achievement - but nobody is routinely getting birthday gifts or a work anniversary card (thankfully).

Christ. Hope they never have to come and work in the public sector, I haven't been thanked for anything in about 15 years.....

I think there maybe a point here. What are they missing from their actual manager that makes them feel that they need this type of company acknowledgement.

Personally I wouldn't care less about a badge- I'd prefer a bonus or pay rise for the company to say they acknowledge my effort.

Yes, work anniversary is a bit much but then I don't even like the whole forced birthday card thing.
Recognizing achievement though is always a good thing. If they feel they don't get enough recognition though, they need to work in a public sector job like teaching, you are actively demoralised and your performance judged at every turn. I dream of a job where you have time and head space for all of that!

It does seem over-recognition for minor stuff which will inevitably water down a thanks or celebration for more important progress.

We do (small office of 6) birthday card from all and reciprocated with cake from staff member (or strawberries and cream from me as I'm mid Wimbledon).

Present if 50 or 65 from a whip around.

Retirement present.

Meal out (paid for by work) for meeting significant pressurised deadlines. Ad hoc but usually max 2 a year.

Christmas meal.

If you aren't careful you spend more time on this stuff than you do the day job! If I do well I'd prefer it to be part of my payrise assessment than an internal pat on the back.

We've never recognised start date anniversaries as that's overkill although I was the business owner when I'd done 30, so treated everyone to afternoon tea because I felt like celebrating, but it wasn't a thing, I just felt a bit generous that day.

I think the more you give/ reward the more people expect. It’s abit like children, the more they get at Xmas the higher the expectations for the following year! But you are right mostwork places aren’t as generous with their praise.

Urgh this was my last work place, we had a social reward platform where you had to write a post akin to a Facebook post (I don’t have Facebook because I hate the boast posts) that had points attached which amounted to a fiver that could be redeemed for vouchers etc.

As a manger of a small team it was a lot of pressure to spend my budget each month , my team was great got all the work done etc and we had a fantastic relationship, but I really struggled to spend my budget which basically forced me to chose half my team to reward each month. I literally ended up rotating between each member of the team and it was basically “well done for coming to work and doing your job Fred” most of the time type posts.

Team members also had a smaller budget each to recognise their peers, and they also hated having to do it. It was just really forced, and then when you actually did something over and above your job, the fiver and the thank you really didn’t feel like enough. E.g:

“thanks plop for saving us a million pounds this year, here is five quid you can redeem for a coffee mug, keep up the good work we really value you”

You lost me at “strategy cascade”!

My work is like this: all shoutouts on Teams, badges and wankery, and overwork and not enough money. I’m old and miserable and just want a chunky pay rise and to be left alone.

I’m all for happy workplaces but a lot of these initiatives sound very shallow and surface. Stuff like cards and whip-rounds and beanbags and beer fridges… IME it’s sticking plasters for a broken leg.

If the culture at work is fundamentally poor, then people aren’t going to feel fulfilled and will look for ways to psychologically shore up their own status. And if there are lots of 20-somethings there, they won’t necessarily have the longevity or experience to recognise that noisy corporate playgrounding helps no one.

I think you’re pointing at the wrong target here. I would imagine it’s your corporate culture — which percolates down from the top/C-suite, people unlikely to be 20-somethings — that’s driving this.

Suppose all this distracts them away from the absence of pay rises...

I had a happy clappy workplace that disability-discriminated me out the door. It’s all so disingenuous. If I was interviewing somewhere with so much as an over stocked biscuit tin nowadays, I’d be wary of what they were compensating for

I agree that them asking for more recognition is probably because the awards ceremony bullshit feels fake and contrived and not genuine.

Do you have weekly f2f 1-2-1s with your team? Where you give direct feedback on their work? Managing twenty year old does take more hands on time: they are still early career

My DS has just finished an internship at a place that sounds a bit like this, perhaps because he is young (21) he really liked it and thrived on the recognition and motivation... maybe some of us are too old and jaded. My own boss gave me a lovely handwritten thank you card this week, with some very thoughtful and personalised comments .. I was very pleased.

Do you have an appraisal system and a salary review system? If so, that should be enough personal recognition for most purposes.

Now, biscuits is one area where my workplace excels. We have a "feeding station" where everyone contributes treats that they like, so there's always something nice.

Sometimes we have a "bring and share meal" in the office for special occasions.

It's nice and stops the manager having to make all the effort.

Oh god i worked in a place like this. We did:
Recognition in 121's
Recognition in the weekly meetings
Recognition from senior management on the monthly calls
Could nominate people for company-wide recognition with decent monetary prizes (£50+)
We also organised events throughout the year like buffets etc to say thanks - a mix of the company paying for it and people opting in to bring stuff (zero pressure to)
We did 'on the spot' recognition outside of the routiney stuff above too whenever someone did something great.
We were always careful to not recognise the usual suspects constantly so there was no accusation of favouritism, and we'd recognise people for things like 'that customer was an arsehole and you didnt swear at them' to make sure we were recognising the tough bits of the basic job, not just fancy singing all dancing stuff. We also didnt just rotate through people for the sake of it. (Which was hard sometimes because then you end up having to recognise the same person you did a few weeks ago)

And we STILL had people complain there wasnt enough recognition.
(V good notes on wanting pay rises rather than recognition as i am absolutely the same and think its a much more worthy token of appreciation. The staff at our place were all on 10k more than the equivalent role elsewhere and were big on getting 'thanked')

However id look at the people saying It cos ours fell into 3 categories:

• The people who would complain no matter what
• The people who have a chip on their shoulder and see 'favouritism' where there is none (and most of the time seem to think 'favouritism' is when... 'that person volunteers to do stuff' or 'that person does 10 emails in the time it takes me to do one because i've spent 40 minutes doing my Tesco shop')
• The people who are actively not doing great at their jobs, but do still get recognised when they do still do something well, but still claim they get no recognition. I had one person complain in a meeting that she hadnt been recognised in ages. She was being performance managed and she still had been recognised twice in the last 6 months!!

my thoughts exactly!

Do they get meaningful, genuine feedback?

Do they have regular reviews, promotions, payrises?

Sounds like they get recognition in ways that barely matter but do they actually get real recognition?

Another council worker here, no recognition in over 25 years! No happy clappy, no awards ceremonies for best tea maker, have to pay for your own Christmas meal etc. They certainly need to get into the real world! Imagine they got a job in local authority and was expecting all that.. think you need to tone it right down tbh.

We have a million ways the teams get recognition including a monthly shout out at the strategy cascade (fine) and now a badge you put on your security pass strap (a bit extra but okay). We have an annual awards ceremony (fine). Now the teams say they don't get enough recognition (erm...what?)

Sounds like the team are asking for recognition in terms of a salary increase & someone has decided that another fun initiative will make everyone feel warm & fuzzy instead.

Have you ever considered that it's not a race to the bottom? Just because your workplace is crap everyone else's should be?

I've worked in the "real world" in a variety of companies, and always had decent compensation, good perks, nice managers, recognition, awards and more. Let's stop making workplaces crap just because some people feel like that's the "real world" - it's not. Maybe if you worked in the real world you'd have higher expectations?

@Miajk it's not a race to the bottom. Public sector working to us is normal. You don't need loads of happy clappy badges and shout outs when you come to work. You need to do a good job and be proud of yourself for what you achieve. Things that people are describing here sound utterly ghastly and not in anyway the gold standard workplace.

Some people obviously do need that though hence cultures like this exist. Not sure why that's difficult to understand.

The work anniversary thing is excellent - just like "Brownie birthdays" when you'd get a birthday badge on your anniversary of joining. 😂