In this day and age, it’s more important than ever for businesses to have happy and productive employees. When employees are loyal and engaged in the company, profits are higher. On the other hand, when people feel unmotivated or not appreciated, the business suffers.
Studies show that engaged employees miss less work, perform better, are more supportive of changes and willing to make them happen. But keeping employees happy is hard work. Why? Because happiness is, primarily, an inside job. In other words, happiness comes from within a person. However, friends, family and employment can add to or detract from someone’s happiness. So if the workplace is stressful or unfavourable things are happening, productivity goes down.
“To win in the marketplace you must first win in the workplace.” – Doug Conant, CEO of Campbell’s Soup
Take a look at your role as a business owner in getting the most out of your staff. Ideally, you should be creating a conducive workplace where people are performing at their peak consistently. The way you set them up to achieve this outcome will give a massive difference in terms of their ability to make it. As a business owner, training and managing your staff is actually about a personal goal of managing yourself.
Here are 5 key areas that you can elevate in your own life to see them reflected in your team:
TIME MANAGEMENT:
You must manage your time. As a workplace leader, your employees are likely looking to you as an example of someone who has good time management. It’s important that you show up on time and you leave on time, and every minute of that workday is invested into high quality productive effective work. Aside from achieving more with well-managed time, you are also setting a good example to your staff to get more tasks done effectively and efficiently.
HEALTH AND WELL-BEING:
It is important that you take care of your health and well being. Overall good health and well-being will give you the energy to run your business and the right headspace to make good decisions. Staying in contact and spending quality time with business colleagues, friends and family will help build your support network, generate the flow of ideas and improve your overall happiness and sense of wellbeing. So as your body will serve you, you get the most out of every day, and then you can lead your team with vitality and convey the passion that you’ve got for your business.
MINDSET:
Another aspect of your life to elevate to create a happy and productive workplace is your mindset. Great leaders don’t “demand” excellence. That’s already established by the example they set. Put yourself in an employee’s shoes. When you work for a true leader, you know the bar is set high and big things are expected – every day. Set goals to keep you focused and out of ruts and push for continuous learning to keep you sharp. This way, your staff is inspired to excel in their craft as well.
RESOURCES:
You need to be careful with managing your own life so that it reflects well in managing your resources. Every single part of the resource that you have needs to be looked after and invested in too well and you need to make sure that they are maintained and cared for. There’s no point complaining about staff not caring about your resources like not properly handling equipment or about high-cost overhead in your business if you’re not being frugal and shrewd with how you manage your resources yourself.
RELATIONSHIPS:
And finally, the last thing you need to be able to manage well is your relationships. You must take care of nurturing positive healthy relationships across every domain of your life. Whether this is with your staff or the leaders in your business, or whether this is with your personal friends and family, if you have great skills to develop highly rewarding and valuable relationships, this will then reflect down into the company culture that you are developing. There is no point in complaining about the staff that don’t support each other or staff that are not collegial and united if you are not taking the lead in this. Manage your relationships knowing that this will set the pace for the culture that you’re building for your company.
By manifesting how you want your staff to perform in the workplace, you are setting a great example that will ultimately lead to the achievement of your goals as well as leading a happy and productive workforce.
