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Human Resource Management professionals and scholars have a common mantra: the human resource is the most important resource in an organisation.

This is a fact because human resource is the one that manages the other resources, including money, machines and material assets.

In fact, the current saying in the HR space is that “employees are the organisation”. It is, therefore, imperative that proactive measures are taken to empower and reward staff for this adage to hold meaning.

It is sad that the remunerative benefits of employees continue to diminish under the weight of increasing taxes, reduced allowances, compounded by poor working conditions, archaic HR policies, vindictive attitude and toxic work environment at the watch of HR professionals.

has exerted financial strain on employees thus causing mental health challenges. It is evident that the workforce in many organisations is disengaged as evidenced by incidents of employee suicide, corruption, absenteeism, alcoholism and low morale.

According to the expectancy theory of motivation by Porter and Lawler (1968), people do best when there is an implied benefit and that the reward will be worthwhile. This is the reason employers need to guard and enhance the benefits due for employees.

Non-financial perks for employees like mortgages, enhanced pension scheme, medical packages, wellbeing benefits and holiday packages act as forms of motivational rewards with better outcomes compared to cash related incentives.

It is, therefore, incumbent upon HR professionals to come up with progressive compensation plans to boost employee morale.
— Fredrick Mainda
—[email protected]