Best Practice for Keeping Employees Happy

Workers who feel listened to, rewarded and involved will be happier and more productive. Image courtesy of stockimages and freedigitalphotos.net

• Invite employees to take a satisfaction survey about their jobs and work environment. Pay attention to the results – there may be things you can implement with next to no cost, such as casual dress Fridays, which will change your employees’ perceptions of their working life.
• Trust your employees to do a good job. Most employees do not like to be micro managed, and will do well if you give them space and let them get on with their work.
• Promote a good work and life balance; appreciate that they have lives outside of work and do what you can to help, for example allowing flexible working schedules or allow them to work from home when circumstances are appropriate. If their child is sick, they will work better at home knowing they are on hand than they would in the office where they are likely to be distracted. It’s good to encourage employees to socialise with one another within the workplace too at planned events. It helps the cohesion of the team and gives a chance to award recognition to those who have worked hard. A company gathering for holidays shows respect for your team.
• Provide opportunities for professional development. You could invest in training for a qualification which would benefit you both. It’s important you provide your workers with development so they are getting something from their time working for you, but you will also see the returns on this when their performance improves.
• Keep your workers in the loop about your business! Nothing smacks of lack of respect more than if you found some news out about your company from the newspaper, online or from your competition, and not from your manager. Keep everyone involved or they will not feel valued.
• Include staff in reviews to how the business is run; it directly affects them, so listening to them will not only show them they are valued but will give you the best possible insight into what the right solution is.
• Reward and praise high performing employees, it makes them feel valued and encourages good performance for the future!