As a business owner or manager, you are responsible for the success of your overall team. No one can run an entire company alone. You need efficient, effective experts on your team that can focus on different aspects of running a business. From marketing experts to sales managers and creatives, you need different personalities and specialties across the board. You also need to be able to engage these individuals in the overall goals and efforts of the company. Without having your employees completely on board with you, you are going to be fighting an uphill battle from the start.
So how do you engage your employees in a meaningful way? The answer isn’t throwing a pizza party or allowing casual Fridays once a month. Beyond the gimmicks, you need to do some real restructuring if you want to engage your employees in ways where they really feel like they are a part of the business. Bring them into the overall decision-making and delegate tasks that play to everyone’s strengths. You can’t do everything alone and you can’t only give out busy work either. To truly engage your employees, you need to show them just how valued they are with added benefits, a say in the company goals, and attention to their strengths.
1. Offer great, unique employee benefits.
When people interview for a job, they want to know their day-to-day activities, how much they’ll be paid, and the additional employee benefits. Individuals are typically happier in their jobs when they have great benefits offered to them. This includes insurance programs, 401Ks, bonuses, and holiday time-off. But what can help make a company stand out to employees are the unique benefits.
One of these examples is an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). You may be wondering what is an ESOP? This is an employee benefit plan that gives your staff stock ownership in your company. This provides great tax benefits for you and your team members. It is the most flexible liquid strategy for you as a company and one of the best practices to get your staff involved in your accounts. With tax-deductible gifts, your employees get financial dividends and benefits while feeling more engaged through company stock options.
2. Make employees an active part of the workflow.
A way to engage your employees with your business is by actually making them an active part of your company objectives. Rather than just telling them what to do, let them be a part of the OKR process. OKR is an acronym that stands for Objectives and Key Results and can be a way of framing the business goals that make up your overall company strategy. This includes setting transparent goals, measuring successes, and analyzing previous metrics. Rather than just getting to the end of the quarter or setting stretch goals, true employee engagement involves a commitment from your team to adjust to these high expectations and ambitious goals. Team members will be more motivated to work hard when they understand why they are doing it and when they can see measurable results.
3. Play to everyone’s individual strengths.
Most people are proud of the work that they do. As you are working on employee engagement, this is perhaps the most important thing for you to remember. Each person on your team has unique strengths and skillsets. Take the time to get to know the way everyone operates. Having that detailed knowledge will help you delegate tasks that play to everyone’s strengths. This creates that set of camaraderie between team members. Everyone can feel confident and secure in their tasks and their work because it is specially designed for them. This helps foster a happier and more productive work environment overall while engaging your employees with the company.