A second employee just put in their two weeks’ notice with you. You don’t understand why you can’t keep quality employees around. It could be less of a them problem and more a you problem.
You’ve got to foster a healthy workplace in order to make your employees want to stick around and enjoy working for you. Stay away from micromanaging, encourage employee friendships and social connections, put some consideration in your workplace design, allow for friendly competition, and if you can swing it, give your employees the option to work remotely.
Keep reading to find out a little more about how you can incorporate these concepts into your workplace and get things going like a well-oiled machine.
1. Don’t Micromanage
You’ve most likely heard the term “if you want something done right, you’ve got to do it yourself”. This is a mindset you need to stay away from if you want to make your employees happy. If you try and hover it tells your workers that you don’t trust them.
This will cause your moral to take a giant nosedive, to say the least. Remember that you hired your employees for a reason. Let them do what you hired them for and try and sit back unless someone begins to struggle.
2. Keep Stress Away
Managers put in their job descriptions all the time that new hires must be able to handle working in an intense, fast-paced environment. This is a good concept in theory but it doesn’t work so well in practice.
These types of work environments are quite stressful. While an employee will try to stick it out, over time there’s a good chance they’ll cave to the pressure and quit. It leads to a huge turnover rate and causes you to have to spend out more money training replacements.
You’ll be much better off fostering an environment that’s less stressful. Give employees opportunities for healthcare and cut down on how much overtime you give them. Remember that your employees do have a life outside of work.
3. Encourage Social Connections
Team collaboration is an important part of running any business. Your employees need to be able to trust each other and you to have their back and give them the support they need to be successful.
If something goes wrong, try and work together to fix it rather than playing the blame game.When someone does step forward and confesses that they messed up, talk to them about how to fix it instead of blowing up at them. Learn to forgive mistakes.
If you don’t then a small issue could turn into a big one because the problem employee decided to try and correct the issue themselves out of fear. That’s a level of distrust you don’t want to foster.
4. Workplace Design
It’s hard for your workers to be productive if they’re shifting around in their chairs every five minutes due to being uncomfortable. Give your employees the opportunity to control the temperature at their desks.
Instead of going with basic office furniture, upgrade to ergonomic options. Equipment such as standing desks and ergonomic chairs won’t only make your workers more comfortable.They promote good posture and will stave off work injuries as well. Another thing to consider is that mobile training tables can be used anywhere a meeting is taking place.
Make little adjustments to the building to allow as little sound as possible to come in from the outside. Too much noise is distracting and will derail your worker’s focus. Lastly, be sure that each cubical and office in your building is well ventilated.
5. Promote Wellness
If you do your best to promote wellness then you’ll have fewer employees calling out sick. There are many ways you can do this.
If a worker gets the flu they will be out of work for a week or more. You can prevent that from happening by offering onsite vaccinations during flu season.
An active employee is a happy employee. Talk to the local gym and see if they can offer your workers a discount when they show their employee IDs.
Don’t forget mental health. Have an onsite counselor if possible. Allow for healthy options when you plan to buy a vending machine.
All of these things will keep your workers well and on their A-game. It also makes them feel like you care about them which will net you a nice little morale boost.
6. Allow For a Little Friendly Competition
You don’t want your employees to fighting but it’s fine to instill a little bit of healthy competition. Maybe set a sales goal and give a prize to the first employee who meets it.
Make a big deal out of praising a worker when they do a good job. Your other employees will see this and work to receive some praise of their own. This is a more subtle way to get some healthy competition going.
7. Give Your Employees the Option to Work Remotely
They’re many reasons why you want to give your employees the option to work remotely. For one, employees are happier and more productive when they can work from the comfort of their own home.
For two, it allows you to cast a much wider net when you’re hiring workers. You can pull from all over the world rather than just from the town where your business is located.
The largest tip we can give you for allowing for remote work is to invest in meeting room management software. It makes it easier to include your remote employees in meetings.
How to Foster a Healthy Workplace
If you can’t keep your employees around, it may be time for you to make a few changes around the office. If you don’t foster a healthy workplace, employees will become stressed or feel underappreciated and quit. Use the tips that you’ve read here today to decrease your turnover rate and get your office going like a well-oiled machine.
There’s more than running a business than making your workers feel comfortable. Check out our blog daily for more articles like this one.
