6 Ways to Boost Morale at Work
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
Businesses can’t run effectively if their employees aren’t motivated to work.
Employees who are unhappy and have low morale have decreased job performance and satisfaction, which can negatively affect your company.
Conversely, employees who are enthusiastic and excited to show up to work every day can greatly impact how your company performs in a positive way.
If you notice your workers are burning out, unhappy, or have decreased job performance, try these 6 ways that can help boost morale and bring a positive change to work.
1. Provide Positive Feedback
Providing positive feedback is an extremely powerful tool to boost the morale of employees who are lacking motivation.
Constantly giving negative feedback and never highlighting what an employee is doing well can lead them to resent you and find that no matter what they do, they’re not good enough.
When providing positive feedback, make sure it is timely, constructive, and specific, leaving no gray areas.
This will open up a direct communication channel between you (the manager) and your employees.
Negative feedback can often spark anxiety.
Consequently, providing positive feedback that offers areas of improvement without putting an employee down will encourage them to use their strengths to fix their weaknesses.
2. Reward Your Employees
Sometimes, all it takes to boost morale in the workplace is offering incentives.
Incentives can come in various forms, such as physical rewards like custom USB drives and T-shirts for those with the most sales or monetary rewards like bonuses for when sales goals are met.
Here’s a list of various ways you can boost the happiness of your employees with incentives:
- Offer performance-based bonuses
- Create team-based incentives
- Review your compensation plan and offer merit increases to deserving employees
- Hand out prizes, gift cards, and other fun items
3. Create a Snack Room
It may not seem like much, but food is a great way to boost morale at work. With this in mind, creating a snack room with a variety of choices to choose from will not only fill your employee’s stomachs but their hearts as well.
Creating a budget to fill your kitchen, storage closet, or dedicated area of the office with healthy treats like fruits and vegetables and salty snacks like nuts and pretzels will surely be a hit.
Additionally, consider dedicating one day a week to hire a catering service that brings in breakfast bagels or lunch, such as sandwiches, to show your employees you value them. Plus, no one can argue with a free meal!
4. Be Transparent
If you’re a business owner or manager, being transparent is crucial. If there’s one thing employees get frustrated with, it’s not knowing what’s expected of them.
To inspire workplace success, make sure you clearly outline promotional paths so your employees know the actions they can take to advance their careers.
Every employee has their own career goals, so providing guidance, mentorship, and encouragement will not only hold employees accountable for their job requirements but will boost morale and work productivity as well.
5. Get the Team Out of the Office
Getting your employees out of the office for team-building activities will break up dull days at work and give your workers a much-needed break. This will give them a boost of energy to come back the next day, ready to work harder.
Remember, however, that days out of the office shouldn’t just be breaks. There should be a time when coworkers who normally don’t interact with each other are able to spark new conversations, build healthy relationships, and understand how each role in your company works.
These out-of-office events can be something as simple as an extended lunch or a company-wide vacation.
6. Create a Positive Company Culture
Positive company culture is one of the most important factors that can boost morale at work. 84 percent of executives and 88 percent of employees believe workplace culture is important to business success.
The bottom line is that no one wants to work in an environment that is unfriendly, negative, or doesn’t fit their values. Some ways to create a positive company culture include:
Communication: Allow open dialogue between managers and employees, as well as across departments with collaboration tools like Slack.
Pet-Friendly: Allow your employees to bring their furry friends to work. Having dogs, and even cats, is a great way to reduce stress and bring a smile to everyone’s face.
Team-Bonding: Create team bonding opportunities where departments mingle with each other to learn new ideas to increase their work performance.
Flexibility: Be flexible. This can mean allowing flex hours, allowing employees to come in and leave at different times of the day, as long as they work their 8 hours. Or, it can mean giving employees the opportunity to work at home on certain days of the week or month.
Wrapping Up
Boosting morale at work may take some time at first, but with these 6 tips, you’ll notice your employees are more motivated, engaged, and happy with the work they do. These mood-boosting habits will make a difference in workplace satisfaction and job performance!
