Smart tips to attract, keep and motivate the best employees

by Groshan Fabiola I try to cover as many topics as I can

In today’s work and business environment, attracting, keeping and motivating young and skilful employees is a rather difficult task. Increasing the satisfaction levels that your employees have as part of your team depends on a series of variables, and attaining high levels of retention and satisfaction amongst them is a continuous work. Nonetheless, the results are satisfying for all the parties involved. If you want to have happy and motivated employees, keep reading below.

Create a positive working environment

Some of the most successful companies and corporations around the globe seem to promote a progressive working environment, a relaxed one, a working environment that offers family-friendly advantages to all employees. Intelligent business owners and CEOs realise that in order to keep your most important asset – the human resource – coming each day for work and providing a work of the highest quality, you have to keep their interests high, reduce the stressors in the work environment and offer a little extra each day. Also, most CEOs realize that the duty of creating and reinforcing a positive work environment falls exclusively in their hands. CEOs are those that coordinate and maintain a good relationship with the workforce, during their entire collaboration. There have been cases in which the salary was highly motivational, the healthcare benefits as well, but the CEOs or other superiors had a damaging behaviour towards their employees. The rates of employee turnover are directly influenced by the relationship that direct supervisors have with those under their coordination. A good working environment is created by them, just as a stressful and damaging one is. So, before blaming your workforce that they leave your company, analyse the team of supervisors.

Good behaviour should be rewarded and recognised

A good way to motivate your employees is to start recognizing their contributions and rewarding those. If not on a daily basis, at least periodically, when the time is appropriate. Incentives and even presents are highly appreciated and they create and reinforce a stronger team and happier employees. A good reward idea during the holiday season is to stock some small fabric sacks with small meaningful items and have those waiting for your employees in one of the mornings that precede the holiday. Original reward methods are also a great idea. Offer your employees the opportunity of doing something they normally wouldn’t. Show them that they have your complete trust. In most of the cases, cash is, of course, a good reward method. But showing trust is a greater one. Do the same with your best employee’s families. For instance, many companies had higher retention rates of their employees if each year, when Children’s Day came, the employee’s children received a check and a trip to an amusement park. Showing your employees recognition and rewarding their hard work comes in different forms and you have to find the one that suits your company’s philosophy the best.

Try to increase the engagement and involvement levels in the workplace

Chances are, all your employees are showing up for work on a daily basis. But are they engaged and involved in the work they perform? Well, a great strategy that you can put into practice is asking for suggestions and ideas. Your employees are more likely to increase their engagement if they know that on a daily basis, their opinions and ideas matter. Also, this will not only create a better and more productive company, but this is how innovative ideas are born. Let different departments collaborate discuss and propose solutions. A fresh eye on the matter will certainly create more opportunities, while increasing the engagement levels that your employees have. Also, treating your employees as equals is a great way to get them involved more. Forget about marked and reserved parking spots for directors and CEOs, forget about the small perks of having a lunchroom all for yourselves. This won’t keep your employees engaged and will most probably tear apart your teams.

Help them develop new skills

When it comes to retaining and motivating your employees, you have to make sure that in exchange for their work, you help them perfect their skills and even attain new ones. Training as part of their employment time at your company is the perfect strategy to make them want to work with your team even longer. If employees appreciate something more than recognition of their work, this is free training programs, opportunities to develop their skills even further and to learn new ones. Coaching and training programs are a sure recipe to create a better work environment, more loyal employees and why not, happier ones, too.

This is only a few of the tips HR specialists can give a CEO at any time, if they want to attract, retain and motivate their workforce. Although may think that the salary is the main motivator, this is far from being true.