Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Employee recognition giving in crisis: a study of healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic

Employee recognition giving in crisis: a study of healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic Employee recognition systems are ubiquitous in organizations (WorldatWork, 2019) and have positive effects on work outcomes (e.g. Stajkovic and Luthans, 2001). However, psychologically meaningful recognition relies on the recognition giver being motivated to observe and recognize coworkers. Crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic may impact recognition giving in varying ways, yet little research considers this possibility.Design/methodology/approachThis longitudinal field study examined the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on recognition and acknowledgment giving among frontline and nonfrontline healthcare workers at daily and aggregated levels. We tested the relationships between publicly available daily indicators of COVID-19 and objectively measured daily recognition and acknowledgment giving within a web-based platform.FindingsWe found that the amount of daily recognition giving was no different during the crisis compared to the year before, but fewer employees gave recognition, and significantly more recognition was given on days when COVID-19 indicators were relatively high. In contrast, the amount of acknowledgment giving was significantly lower in frontline staff and significantly higher in nonfrontline staff during the pandemic than before, but on a daily-level, acknowledgment was unrelated to COVID-19 indicators.Practical implicationsOur results suggest that organizational crises may at once inhibit and stimulate employee recognition and acknowledgment.Originality/valueOur research is the first to empirically demonstrate that situational factors associated with a crisis can impact recognition giving behavior, and they do so in ways consistent with ostensibly contradictory theories. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Personnel Review Emerald Publishing

Employee recognition giving in crisis: a study of healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic

Download PDF
18 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/emerald-publishing/employee-recognition-giving-in-crisis-a-study-of-healthcare-workers-WjLl0Brdw8

References (64)

Publisher
Emerald Publishing
Copyright
© Emerald Publishing Limited
ISSN
0048-3486
DOI
10.1108/pr-11-2022-0784
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Employee recognition systems are ubiquitous in organizations (WorldatWork, 2019) and have positive effects on work outcomes (e.g. Stajkovic and Luthans, 2001). However, psychologically meaningful recognition relies on the recognition giver being motivated to observe and recognize coworkers. Crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic may impact recognition giving in varying ways, yet little research considers this possibility.Design/methodology/approachThis longitudinal field study examined the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on recognition and acknowledgment giving among frontline and nonfrontline healthcare workers at daily and aggregated levels. We tested the relationships between publicly available daily indicators of COVID-19 and objectively measured daily recognition and acknowledgment giving within a web-based platform.FindingsWe found that the amount of daily recognition giving was no different during the crisis compared to the year before, but fewer employees gave recognition, and significantly more recognition was given on days when COVID-19 indicators were relatively high. In contrast, the amount of acknowledgment giving was significantly lower in frontline staff and significantly higher in nonfrontline staff during the pandemic than before, but on a daily-level, acknowledgment was unrelated to COVID-19 indicators.Practical implicationsOur results suggest that organizational crises may at once inhibit and stimulate employee recognition and acknowledgment.Originality/valueOur research is the first to empirically demonstrate that situational factors associated with a crisis can impact recognition giving behavior, and they do so in ways consistent with ostensibly contradictory theories.

Journal

Personnel Review – Emerald Publishing

Published: Oct 16, 2024

Keywords: Recognition; COVID-19; Well-being; Intrinsic reward; Motivation; Stress; Longitudinal research

There are no references for this article.