Everything is going well, and your company is raising the ranks at a steady pace. All of a sudden, your employees aren’t feeling energetic, they are not working as much as before, they are lethargic, and there is a decrease in overall productivity. You look into their remuneration and tell yourself that they are receiving adequate compensation, and there should be no reason for them not to feel motivated. There must be something else going on then, right?
Well, yes. There is a much stronger driving factor when it comes to employee motivation and productivity. This factor is far more critical than remuneration and can help to make or break the deal for most workers.
This factor is the work environment. We can find several studies which prove that even if an employee receives reasonable remuneration for their job, they eventually become less productive if the work environment is not healthy. If you are looking for tips on how you can motivate your employees and make them more productive, then here are some things you can do:
1. Make the Office Comfortable
Although you might think that salary and benefits are the most significant motivating factor for an employee, several studies suggest that this is untrue. A pleasant, clean, safe, and comfortable working environment can do much more in terms of keeping an employee happy and productive.
When it comes to creating a for your employees, here are a few little changes you can make:
- Get rid of any old, rusty office furniture and invest in right, comfortable furniture instead for a healthy workplace environment. Try and opt for modern office furniture, as they are usually more ergonomic and look aesthetic as well. This doesn’t need to be a considerable investment, but making sure that your employees are physically comfortable is a huge factor in their productivity scales.
- Keep plants and greenery around the office. You don’t necessarily need to have an indoor garden with a waterfall! However, small plants around the office and the desks of the employees can work psychological wonders on them. If space allows, you can even hire a professional to tend to an outdoor garden, where employees may walk or spend some time during their break.
- Hire the right cleaning services, which ensure that the office environment is always clean and healthy. No one likes to work in a dirty environment, and it can be a vast demotivating factor for employees to come to a messy workstation.
- Change the office wallpaper or paints every once in a while. You should think of doing this, especially if your office still holds old, dingy wallpapers or a poor paint job. If you don’t want to invest a massive amount on this right now, you can simply hire some local artists to spruce up your office space with their creative genius!
- Lighting can make a massive difference in the productivity and motivation levels of your employees. Ensure that you invest in good table lighting as well as adequate lighting around the entire office. For a greener alternative, you can also include natural light, which creates a much better working environment in comparison to artificial lighting.
2. Offer Due Credit, Appreciation, and Rewards
One of the most important factors which keep employees productive and happy in an office environment is feeling appreciation and getting due credit. Of course, a reward system is simply an additional bonus!
Most workers feel that their superiors don’t notice their efforts, or even if they do, they do not appreciate them. This is an intense demotivating factor, and eventually creates job dissatisfaction, frustration, and causes employees to quit.
As an employer, you must be mindful of each of your employees, their contributions to the organisation, and offering them due credit for the same. A simple act of appreciation can do wonders in boosting employee morale, whether you do it publicly in front of other employees, or you do it personally.
Here is an important workplace wellness strategy to remember:
Creating a reward system could encourage employees to work harder and be more productive. You could offer incentives or bonuses, either quarterly, half-yearly, or even annual bonuses. It could also be in the form of a commission structure that is better than the competitors. You could even offer a profit-sharing for your company.
These simple things will help employees to not only do a better job but also motivate them to stay longer in your company.
3. Give them Opportunities to Grow
A huge motivating factor for any employee is the opportunity to grow within a company. Most employees will end up leaving their current roles if they find other companies offering them better growth opportunities. If your company is rapidly growing, giving your employees space and opportunity to grow within the company can be a massive motivator.
Often, employers make the mistake of thinking that merely offering more money or benefits is enough of a motivating factor. However, growth, stability, and opportunity are some of the strongest motivators for employees.
By allowing your employees to grow within the organisation, giving them better roles, more responsibilities, and adequate rewards for their work, you will find your employees feeling far more energetic and productive. The employees feel like the organisation trusts them, values their worth in the company, and wants to give more significant responsibilities to them.
In case you are looking to fill up a vacancy in your organisation, consider which of your existing employees might be a good fit for a higher position. You can have internal recruitments, examinations, and other tools which help you assess which of your employees would fit into a unique managerial role in the company.
If you notice some of your employees showing particular skill and aptitude in specific roles, consider giving them a higher position or shifting them to a more permanent role. This will provide the employees with a feeling of actually building a career with your company, rather than just thinking of the job as a temporary stepping stone to something bigger.
4. Give Your Teams Some Autonomy
All human beings strive for autonomy. No employee or team can ever feel their worth and value entirely in a company without a sense of independence.
When it comes to motivating your employees, this can be a more significant factor than you can imagine.
In fact, instead of micromanaging your team members, or walking them through entire processes, allow them to work out the tasks in their way and come to you for help. By always asking for updates and keeping tabs on them, employees often feel like you don’t trust them, and you think they will mess up the task at hand.
Instead of giving your team a blueprint for every task or project, allow them to figure it out on their own. Let them feel that you are always around to help them in case they need it, but you are not trying to push your thoughts or agenda into their work.
Although this might seem like a very non-traditional approach, in the end, it helps make your employees more independent and lets them figure out how to go about their work on their own. It gives them a sense of value, independence, and lets them know that you trust them. It is a huge motivating factor and will eventually yield higher productivity.
5. Check-in Personally with Employees
You should not just assume that all your employees have the same or similar needs and requirements. You need to ensure that each employee feels like you recognise them, acknowledge their work, presence, and appreciate them.
When it comes to empowering employees with tools and skills, check-in with individual employees to assess what kind of help they might need to be more productive. If you can, then provide them with an opportunity for additional training, courses, or a chance to upgrade their skills, if they feel that they are lacking.
Even in terms of support, it is essential for you to individually check-in with your employees every once in a while to see how they are doing. You can ask them to work questions if they are happy if they feel like they are doing enough or wish to take on more tasks. You might also ask them personal issues, and if you can determine that they might be feeling stress, anxiety, depression, or fatigue, you should encourage them to get professional help.
If your organisation offers this tool, then you should refer the employee for a regular checkup and evaluation of both physical as well as mental health.
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6. How you Deal with Negative Feedback
It is not uncommon for employers to want to give some sort of negative feedback to their employees. However, when it comes to delivering this message, most people often get it wrong.
Just like you would give positive feedback immediately, you should do the same for negative feedback. As far as possible, you should ensure that you provide this negative feedback personally to the employee, rather than through someone else. Try and involve as little people in the process as possible, keeping only the employee in mind who is to get the message.
You should also not provide this negative feedback in front of other employees, as this simply creates an air of tension, disgruntlement, and embarrassment.
You don’t want to embarrass or chastise your employee. You simply want to bring a mistake to their attention and help them overcome it.
Your dialogue delivery should be proper and make sure that you give your employees a chance to rectify their mistake without bringing it out in the open.
7. Communication as a Tool
Communicating with your employees should not merely be a means to an end. It should be a tool that you utilise to connect with them, interact with them, and understand each other’s needs better.
When it comes to communicating what you expect of your employees, use direct means as far as is possible. Of course, you should also use emails, voice and video calls, and even text messages. However, nothing beats direct communication.
Conversely, you should also ask your employees what they want and what they expect of you and the company. Any excellent communication is a two-way street. It can turn out to be a great morale booster for your employees if you sit with them and discuss their role in the company, what you expect, what they expect from the position, the company, and also how you could provide it.
Make sure that you are using the latest communication tools in your office. There are always new tools in the market, and your company should make it a point to implement these tools for more natural communication.
8. Offer Flexibility
A study in Forbes reveals that 46% of the respondents of the survey think that flexibility is the essential factor that they look for when they are searching for a job.
Studies reveal that most of the successful companies offer flexible scheduling as a part of the company policy. These companies have the most productive workers as well as the happiest ones.
Technology is a great tool that organisations must learn to use to the optimum, allowing their employees to feel a sense of belonging, motivation, and a will to contribute more to their organisation. When it comes to keeping your employees feeling productive, only offering incentives and remuneration is never enough.
An employee that feels part of the organisation, part of the team, will always offer more in terms of effort and productivity to their organisation. Once employers or supervisors understand this, they will be able to provide better opportunities to their employees, thus securing them as well as the profit of the company.
While these are just some of the essential tools that you can keep in mind, there is always the tool of communication. With the help of proper notification, handling employee dissatisfaction or un-productivity will become a thing of the past.
