Motivate, Incentivize Your Team After the “Great Resignation”

It’s no surprise that there is currently a major push for labor reform. Individuals are no longer settling for jobs that do not accommodate them and their needs. In 2021, more than 47 million Americans voluntarily quit their jobs, an event being called “The Great Resignation.”

This mass exodus of employees is in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many families struggled to find childcare, pushing parents out of their jobs. But many other workers simply saw the flexibility that was possible amid the pandemic and wanted that same flexibility in their day-to-day jobs.

As a result of the Great Resignation, it is more important than ever to keep your team motivated and incentivized to continue doing the level of work that pharmacies require in order to operate efficiently.

During a presentation at the NCPA 2022 Annual Convention, held October 1 through 4 in Kansas City, Missouri, Ashley Moose, PharmD, co-owner and manager of Moose Pharmacy and director of network development and marketing at CPESN USA, shared successful models currently in use across independent pharmacies to motivate and incentivize their employees.

Model 1: Achieve a Task & Receive a Bonus

The name of this model is fairly self-explanatory: when a staff member achieves something, like completing a certain training program, the receive a bonus. Under this model, employees see wage increases that coordinate with specific achievements. For example, an employee can make an additional $1.00 per hour for becoming a certified pharmacy technician, or an additional $1.50 per hour for earning a community health worker certificate.

This model encourages staff knowledge expansion, job satisfaction, marketable staff credentials, enhanced services, OTC revenue growth, and more.

Model 2: Growth & Development Model

The goals of this model are to improve pharmacy technician performance and reward employees for high performance, stimulate and provide pathways for technician growth, and create streamlined and straightforward tools to quickly evaluate and promote technicians.

This model clearly lays out different levels that pharmacy technicians can achieve based on their accomplishments, what work they do day-to-day.

Model 3: Education Equals Reward

This simple model includes hanging a poster in the pharmacy that shows completion rates for different Pharmacy Management System learning modules for each employee. For every 10% of the program completed, employees receive a $10 bonus. When they completely finish the program, they will have received a total of $100 in bonuses.

Model 4: Attendance Bonus Model

This model aims to improve and reward employee attendance and punctuality, reduce employee callouts and unexcused absences, and enhance team relationships. Within this model, employees can receive monthly, quarterly, and/or yearly bonuses based on their attendance. This includes both punctuality and ensuring that employees clock in on time and stay at work for the full duration of their shift.

Model 5: Pharmacist & Clinical Services

In this model, certain metrics are set at the beginning of the year and must be completed in order to receive a bonus. Goals like completion of medication therapy management training, administering a certain number of vaccines, and completing a certain number of chart reviews are all put in place in order to improve patient care and outcomes and reward pharmacists for their clinical work.

Model 6: New Patient Referral Bonus

This model rewards staff members for every new patient they can recruit to the pharmacy. Staff members document on an internal form the referral name and date of the prescription pick-up and send a handwritten welcome note to the new patient. The staff member than receives a bonus of $15 to $20 for each referral they make.

Drug Topics’ coverage of the 2022 NCPA Annual Convention and Expo is sponsored Prescryptive Health.

Reference

Moose A. 7 fool-proof ideas for incentivizing and motivating your team. Presented at: National Community Pharmacists Association 2022 Annual Convention; October 1-4, 2022; Kansas City, MO.