I watched an interview recently of an entrepreneur who started a business based on a very creative and innovative idea, and now, several years later, she is a multi-billionaire. She talked in the interview about her strengths being creativity and design, as well as never being afraid to try, even if failure was the end result. However, just as important as her strengths were in starting the business, she contributed the success and growth of the business to not being afraid to recognize her weaknesses. She was not, as she put it, a “Business-Person,” nor had she had a single business-related course in college. She recognized that in order for the business to thrive and be successful, it was important to hire individuals with the business skills and experience necessary to grow the business, thus “Hiring Her Weaknesses.” In fact, she’s not even the CEO of her own company, allowing her to remain focused on creativity and design of new products, without the distraction of running the day-to-day operations of the business.
I mention this interview because the philosophy of “Hiring Your Weaknesses” is also relevant and important to the success of any Employee Recognition or Customer Incentive Program. We see it so many times in our business where program-sponsoring companies try to design, implement and manage their incentive and recognition programs internally, without having the necessary educational and/or work-related experience and expertise required. The result of such a decision often leads to programs not reaching their full potential and very often failing altogether, due to one or more of the following: poor program design, failure to implement properly, lack of, or poorly executed, communication strategy, inadequate funding/budget, insufficient technology and other reporting tools necessary to properly track, measure and report program results to management.
Designing, implementing and managing Incentive and Employee Recognition programs is truly a core business competency in its own right (which is why companies like QIC have businesses) and should hopefully lead potential program-sponsoring companies to recognize the need to “Hire Their Weaknesses,” before attempting to design and self-manage programs. In doing so, they would clearly benefit from a professionally-designed program, based on best practices; coupled with all the program support, services, and resources necessary to ensure a successful incentive and/or recognition program. Plus, valuable resources allocated to managing such programs could be more efficiently and effectively utilized on core business competencies.
If you’re thinking about implementing an Employee Recognition and/or Incentive program, remember that “Hiring Your Weaknesses” is relevant to these programs too. So do yourself a favor and ensure your program’s best chance at success by hiring a professional incentive and recognition company to assist and manage all of your incentive and employee recognition program needs – the cost/benefit will be well worth it.
