Did you know in the United States 65% of employees are happy at their jobs? If you are a manager and looking to increase the number of happy employees at your company this article is for you.
The happier your employees are the more successful your company is likely to have. Keep reading to find out how to increase employee happiness at your office.
Work-Life Balance
Are your employees missing deadlines and projecting negative energy through the office? Don’t ignore these signs of disengaged employees.
Finding a balance between work and life can be challenging. It’s easy to take work home and continue to worry about it after the office is closed.
Promoting a balanced life can be incredibly helpful in the workplace. It shows your employees you care about them.
It helps them reduce their stress and enjoy work more. This will then lead to better productivity. An overworked, stressed-out employee won’t last as long at the company.
Better Schedules
If you’re wondering how to encourage a balanced life, start by offering flexible schedules. If employees are able to work on their own time they will feel more relaxed and refreshed.
One of your employees may be a morning person and do amazing work at the beginning of the day while someone else may be a night owl and do their best work in the afternoons and evenings. By forcing those two employees to have the same schedule you are losing and wasting their potential. They won’t experience as much burn out and you’ll decrease your employee turnover rate and help you retain employees.
Listen and Make Changes
Unhappy employees often feel unheard. If big changes are made without them they will feel like they don’t matter. It can be beneficial to ask your employees about how they are feeling or if they have any suggestions.
However, if you ask for their opinions be sure to make changes for them. If they feel overworked, help them out. If a decision is going to affect them directly be sure to ask how they feel about it beforehand and make adjustments.
Reward Good Work
It can be easy to give your best employees the hardest jobs. However, this can lead to a decrease in employee happiness. Some may feel they are being rewarded for good work with more work. This isn’t a great feeling.
Instead of giving your best employees more responsibilities when they do a good job reward them. You can offer prizes, days off, and bonuses to improve your employees’ happiness. Even an email shout-out or having upper management personally recognize them can be encouraging.
Many companies will do prizes or rewards once or twice a year but do it more often to increase employee happiness. This can also make them feel seen, respected, and valued.
Don’t Compare
The fastest way to discourage an employee and ruin company culture is to compare your team to each other. It will cause your employees to resent each other and you. They will not respect you as a leader if you are constantly keeping score.
If an employee needs to improve on a task or on their assigned role have a conversation with them without bringing up how much better someone else does their job. It can be discouraging to employees if they feel they are always in competition with their coworkers. There’s a difference between healthy competition and comparison.
Safe Work Environment
An easy way to improve company culture is to create a safe working environment. Make yourself approachable so your employees feel comfortable coming to about issues. Safety training courses are also a great way to improve the culture in the office as they make the expectations known to everyone.
Include Benefits
Benefits can be tricky. Each of your employees will have different needs. Some may be looking for best small business workers comp insurance, more disability insurance while some may want more vacation time or longer maternity leave.
There may not be a one-size-fits-all when it comes to your benefits package. To reduce the number of unhappy employees offer a variety of different options.
Think about wellness packages and possibly adding incentives to promote a healthy lifestyle in the office. Maybe they want their birthday off, you’ll never know until you talk to them.
Be Honest and Understanding
Being truthful isn’t always easy but your employees appreciate your honesty even if it’s hard for them to hear. While at the moment the truth may not make your workers happy but in the long run, it will improve company culture.
Having an understanding of your employees’ situations can go a long way too. Increase employee happiness by offering empathy and comfort even if you don’t know all the details of their circumstances.
Reasons to Improve Employee Happiness
As a manager, you have many responsibilities but it’s important to take your employees’ happiness into consideration. People who are unhappy at their jobs will likely quit. Why should they stay somewhere that makes them sad?
Happiness is contagious, meaning happy employees will provide better customer service to your clients which is always good for business. One happy employee can also set the mood for the whole office. Happy employees will also be more productive and motivated to work.
Increase Employee Happiness
Since the pandemic, people’s expectations for their working environment have changed. It may be challenging for you an employer to adapt to these changes but once you do you’ll create a better company and business.
Your employees won’t be the only ones affected by these changes. You and your customers or clients will also notice a difference and be happier.
Increase employee happiness by implementing the steps listed in this article. Keep browsing our page for more tips and tricks.
