Boost employee morale

In a utopian world, any kind of underlying tension or unhappiness from employees may be resolvable by sampling throwing more money at the situation. Realistically, however, this simply isn’t possible for many cleaning departments, building service contractors (BSCs) or distributors — not to mention that perhaps being underpaid isn’t the true root of the problem. 

To boost employee happiness and satisfaction, many managers will need to get more creative in order to truly resolve issues with morale. To help both gauge dissatisfaction and find reasonable solutions, Business News Daily provided a series of actionable tips that don’t involve pay raises to accomplish said mission. 

1. Work-Life Balance. While it’s healthy to challenge employees and encourage them to go above and beyond, it can have an adverse effect if they feel as if their time spent at work begins to drown out other aspects of life. When it comes to getting the most out of a team, a manager should still be mindful of the amount of time being requested, and check in with employees if they potentially feel overwhelmed. 

2. Keep Them in the Loop. Even if they aren’t actively involved in every company project or initiative, giving employees consistent updates on future plans, community involvements, or simply the future vision of the team can keep them motivated and excited about the work in front of them. Doing so can be done during meetings, email updates, or simply in casual conversation throughout the week.

3. Transparent Communication. Sometimes managers think they’re doing employees a favor by intentionally omitting certain details about future company moves or projects — but the reality is more often than not, they’ll hear about bad news with downsizing, losing a big client, or something similar one way or another. By being upfront initially on difficult subjects, it can breed trust despite the initial disappointment. 

4. Offer More Vacation Time. While not directly a pay raise, offering additional time off as an incentive for good performance is an indirect way of putting something back in an employees pocket — just in the way of time and not money. By knowing a direct reward could be on the back end of a project, it can allow employees to tap into a gear/effort that perhaps they themselves didn’t know they had. 

For the complete list of strategies, check out the entire article here. For related content, check out this CleanLink feature on how to prevent employee burnout.