Nearly half of managers would prefer to receive a bonus as a Christmas present from their employer, compared with just one in 10 who ranked promotion as the perfect gift.
This is according to a Christmas survey of 3,300 managers by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM), which also found that one manager in six would like more training and development as their seasonal gift and one in eight would opt for more staff.
When asked what new year’s resolution they would be making, 38% of managers said that they wanted to improve their work-life balance and one in five aimed to be a better manager in the coming year.
Penny de Valk, chief executive of ILM, explained that the preference for bonuses over promotion reflected the fact that many workers are currently thinking more about short-term financial security than long-term career progression.
“Where possible, organisations looking to thank staff for their hard work can rest assured that some sort of seasonal bonus will be particularly well received this year,” de Valk commented.
Christmas parties, meanwhile, were a cause for concern for managers, with 45% considering them to be fraught with difficulty and more than two-fifths having previously experienced conflict at these events.
Furthermore, it seems that respondents are concerned with their own conduct, with one in seven worrying that they will embarrass themselves at their Christmas party this year by getting drunk and behaving badly.
A recent survey by XpertHR found that two-thirds of employers do not have a policy in place setting out the standard of acceptable employee behaviour at their work Christmas party.
This is despite the fact that employers may be held indirectly liable for harm caused to other employees or third parties by negligent acts by their staff, including at events outside normal working hours.
For more information, read Personnel Today’s guide to Christmas employment issues.
