Regina Thomas 3m 754 #officemorale
The views of this article are the perspective of the author and may not be reflective of Confessions of the Professions.
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Outstanding leaders feel concerned about their employees’ morale. If morale is not a priority, your employees can suffer. Positive work culture allows people to reach their peak performance. A work culture that is negative, stressful, and full of bad attitudes will negatively affect morale and productivity. There are several things that employers can do to improve workplace morale.
Help Employees Live a Balanced Life
It is important to have employees who take their work seriously. However, as the saying goes, “All work and no play can make Jack a dull boy.” Work and play must be balanced in order for people to perform at their best.
Burnout caused by long work hours and stressful work environments is not good. When an employee feels burnt out, they can resent the employer who is making them work so hard. Eventually, top talent will walk out of the door and accept jobs, even jobs that pay less money, that are in a less stressful environment.
Some organizations have made a rule that work emails cannot be sent between 7 PM and 5 AM. By enforcing this rule and similar rules to encourage a good work-life balance, employers can help their employees feel more energized and upbeat. This leads to a long-term increase in productivity.
Trust Your Employees
Trust builds morale. One way an organization can show that it trusts its employees is by letting them know how certain decisions within the organization are made. Most people want to know what their future and the company’s future will be. If they feel like their employers are lying to them or that their employers are keeping valuable information from them, they are going to lose trust in leadership, which will damage morale.
If employees feel that communicating or contributing is going to lead to reprimands, they are going to clam up. If they don’t trust management, they are only going to give the bare minimum. They will be afraid of excelling because they don’t want to do anything that causes them to stand out and negatively draw attention to themselves.
Trust is built when open communication exists when an organization is making major changes. Communication minimizes uncertainty and can build excitement about new opportunities. When employees feel that they are part of something bigger, they feel more invested in their employment. Improved morale leads to increased productivity.
Good Leaders Are Born and Trained
Organizations that are known for having good morale are led by people who are talented leaders. Some people may naturally be good leaders. However, most leaders who build morale have been trained. They have gone to courses and received things like the ICP ACC agile coach certification.
Training helps leaders lead with their heart and a purpose. It helps leaders identify individuals within their organization who have the potential to do more. A good leader can look inward while being fully engaged in what’s going on with their staff. Training can help leaders learn how to sense dips in morale and then adapt their leadership style to keep their employees feeling positive about themselves and the work they are doing.
Leadership is especially important now as the world is going through rapid changes. Employees may feel that the writing is on the wall for them or for the organization they work for. This brings uncertainty. If leaders do not help to build morale, their employees’ negative predictions about the future could become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
“My Door Is Always Open” Must Be More Than Just a Phrase
It one thing to tell employees that they can come to you with anything. It is another thing to show that this is real. A good leader who feels concerned about morale is going to be on the front lines and talking with their employees.
They are going to be performing stay interviews. A stay interview is where management may talk to employees to figure out what keeps them there. This is the time to ask if you could change anything, what would it be? Of course, for these types of interviews to work, there needs to be trust between management and employees.
Conclusion
When there is low morale, employees will do just enough so they don’t get fired. However, when morale is high and people feel that they are part of something bigger, they will give their heart to the job. It’s up to outstanding leaders to engender trust and build the lines of communication that will lead to increased morale.
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