The Niles General Government/IT committee voted to give its support for the new employee recognition awards.
The proposal, which was devised by a group of Village of Niles employees, calls for the monthly Peer Award and the annual Above and Beyond Award. All full-time, part-time and seasonal village employees would be eligible, and the winners would be determined by an anonymous 10-member employee committee. Some details may still be changed, and it will be up to the Village Board to determine whether to approve it.
Assistant Village Manager Hadley Skeffington-Vos presented the proposal during the committee’s Feb. 11 meeting. She explained that the idea for employee recognition awards came from the employees themselves, and neither she nor other village officials were involved.
The proposal calls for two awards. The Peer Award would take place once a month. Nominations can be made by fellow employees. The committee of 10 anonymous employees would then look at the nominations and rank each nominee based on several categories using a number scale. Skeffington-Vos would then tabulate the results.
If the committee member gets nominated, he or she wouldn’t take part in the evaluation process on that particular month.
Skeffington-Vos explained that, if no one is nominated, the award simply won’t take place. On the other hand, if several equally worthy candidates are nominated, the committee may choose one and hold over the other application for a later date.
“Applications will be held for three months, so if there are 20 good application in February, they would roll over into March and April,” said Skeffington-Vos.
She indicated that more than one person could be nominated for the award if they all took part in the same praiseworthy act.
“If 2-3 employees pulled someone out of the river, they all get an award,” she said.
Winners of the Peer Award would get a $100 gift card for the Niles business of their choice, and they’ll get a parking spot in the village garage for a month. And, to encourage participation, an employee who nominated the winner would get $25.
The proposal also calls for Above and Beyond Award – an annual award that would draw from the pool of that year’s Peer Award winners. Winners of the Above and Beyond awards would get $500 Visa gift cards.
Skeffington-Vos emphasized that the awards would be entirely employee-run, and their supervisors would have no role in it.
“It’s run and operated by the employees themselves,” she said. “It’s not the bosses who name [the winners] – it’s their peers.”
Skeffington-Vos estimated that the awards would cost about $2,300 a year.
Village Manager Steve Vinezeano expressed concern about one aspect of the proposal. He asked how the price would be handled if more than one person won. Skeffington-Vos explained that the committee that created the proposal felt that each person involved deserved a full price.
“They felt it was unfair to make people who saved people’s lives split $100,” she said.
Vinezeano said he worried that this might lead to a sharp increase in the cost of the awards. But General Government/IT Committee chair George Alpogianis argued that the award committee were sensible enough to keep the costs under control
“I think they should have leeway,” he said. “I think they are reasonable people – they wouldn’t give an award to the entire [Department of Public Works] for shoveling snow.”
General Government/IT Committee member and Village IT Director Bill Shaw suggested two changes to the proposal. He would have Peer Award winners help choose the next month’s winner. He also suggested that all Peer Award winners should tell the award committee which one of them deserves to get the annual award. Shaw argued that this would be good for morale.
“It would help control disappointment for people who didn’t get [the Above and Beyond Award], so they’d at least know their input was considered in the process,” he said.
After some discussion, Skeffigton-Vos said she’ll take Shaw’s idea back to the employees and see if they would approve them.
The General Government/IT Committee unanimously voted to support the program. While the Village Board doesn’t need to sign off on the awards’ creation, they would need to approve the program’s budget. That would be part of the board’s budget planning process, which will unfold over the next few months.
Before the committee voted, Vinezeano said that its vote of support may help it along.
“Of course, it has to survive the budget process,” he said. “It would be nice to show that General Government [committee] is behind it.”
Igor Studenkov is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
