When economy is booming, it’s easy to lose valuable employees, if they don’t feel satisfied or happy with your company. To keep your well trained and skilled workforce happy, you need some special entrepreneurial skills. Here are some tips to keep your employees motivated and boost your productivity level.
1. Burn the bridges:
If people are kept in the dark about what’s going on, typically they will make up their own version of the situation and it likely won’t be a positive one. Instead of avoiding, minimizing or trying to hide a negative situation, tell it like it is. Trust that the employees will understand and appreciate being informed. Not sharing will only breed mistrust, suspicion, and fear.
2. Consider Them a Part in Decision Making:
It’s harder to develop loyalty in a large chain organization than in a small, close-knit group in which everyone clearly sees the impact of their decisions on those around them. The more decisions left in the hands of those affected by it, the better. If cuts have to be made anywhere, let the people affected by the changes have a say in what and where to cut. This keeps people more involved and gives them a greater sense of control about the decisions affecting their lives.
3. Give Everybody a Shot at Greatness:
Every situation has a positive in it if we look. Maybe there is time available for staff development, training, and team building activities that the hectic pace of having lots of business didn’t allow before. Use a slow period in business to be creative. Look for ways to develop skills that staff have an interest in, but did not have the time to focus on before.
4. Value Their Opinions!:
Asking employees for feedback and help during difficult times should not just be a public relations exercise, but a way to make the most of your employees’ ideas and talents. If you have asked for feedback before and done nothing with it, employees will be distrustful and suspicious.
Unless you are sincere and genuinely interested in hearing from your staff and plan to actually use their feedback, you’re better off not asking for it in the first place. If the information is useful and can be implemented, act on it quickly. If it is not feasible, thank them for their efforts and explain why it can’t be implemented. Assure staff they have been heard and their feedback will be given real consideration.
5. Confide In Them, Let Them Know What Your Plans Are:
Difficult times don’t last. While it is important to put effort and energy into getting through them, it’s even more important to see past them and to a brighter future. That means it’s crucial for everyone to maintain hope and a vision beyond the present. Keeping employees constantly informed and involved in long-term thinking and planning for the future, helps lift spirits and prevents knee-jerk decisions that could come back later to haunt you.
6. Odd One Out? Don’t Fire Away, Counsel:
Notice an employee behaving erratically for a while? Have you been seeing patterns of unusual clumsiness and uncharacteristic unprofessionalism? Their work is not up to the mark or on time? Before firing them, stop for a moment and wonder, could the problem be at your end? Is there a communication gap? Are they demotivated by the words or actions of a third party acting as a buffer in between?
The organization that you run has its building blocks, without your employees there wouldn’t be an organization to begin with. Treat them fairly and equally. And the next time one of them seems off the bandwagon, sit them down and ask what seems to be the problem!
NTP/CEED Bi-Weekly Huddle Hangout with Dr Wayne Dorband 1/29/14
Video Credits: Wayne Dorband
Dr. Wayne Dorband, doctor of Ecolonomics, discussed ways in which environmental professionals can present themselves in a good light as they attempt to obtain jobs in the environmental/ecolonomic marketplace.
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