We take a look at a few proven staff engagement strategies and explain how they can be aligned with your business’s objectives to boost employee performance.
Do your employees come into work every morning enthusiastic and eager to do their best work or does your workplace have disengaged staff and a toxic culture that’s affecting everything from customer service to productivity?
If your workplace is more like the latter then you have a serious problem, but thankfully, it can be resolved. There are a number of different strategies you can use to turn your workplace around and make it somewhere your employees are happy to be.
In this article, we’re going to take a look at a few proven staff engagement strategies and explain how they can be aligned with your business’s objectives to boost employee performance.
- Lead from the front
The culture of a business mimics that of the senior management team. It’s completely unrealistic to expect your team to adhere to values you don’t hold yourself. The adage “Do as I say and not as I do” is much too familiar in business and the result is a disengaged, unmotivated team. You need to set an example in terms of everything from punctuality and appearance to work ethic, honesty and a willingness to accept responsibility for mistakes.
- Reward creativity
Any sign that your employees are willing to go above and beyond the bare minimum should be encouraged, even if the ideas they come up with cannot be implemented. Recognising and rewarding your employees for their suggestions and creative thinking is the key to keeping them invested and engaged.
- Promote from within
After the initial settling in period, most staff will take a look around them to see where progression could come from. If they feel there is no opportunity to advance then many will quickly lose motivation as their hard working will ultimately go unrewarded.
Being committed to promoting from within shows staff that you are confident in their skills and abilities and will give them the chance to prove themselves. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t look externally for skills you lack, but regularly promoting employees can do a huge amount for morale and staff retention.
- Offer rewards
Recognising and rewarding employees who have gone above and beyond or who have simply done excellent work is a simple but essential way to motivate your team. That may sound expensive but rewards do not have to be monetary. You can give them days off, acknowledge their contribution in office-wide emails and publications or even work with an office fruit provider to supply your best performing team with a basket of fresh fruit.
- Conduct exit meetings on the way out
You might assume exit meetings are too late in the day to motivate an employee, but the lessons you can learn can be invaluable for the rest of your team. It may be that the reason employees are leaving has nothing to do with their workplace motivation, but they could still have some excellent insights that can help you improve. This is just one of a number of reasons why you should always conduct exit interviews.
What strategies do you use to motivate your team? Please share your tips with our readers in the comments below.
