Helping businesses thrive and achieve performance
Organizations regularly fight to be the best on the market, to have a good share and also attract more & more customers with high-quality products and services. In order to achieve all these objectives, companies need to have engaged, happy, satisfied and productive employees. They are the key element for success in every organization.
Companies need to be aware of the significance of having thriving employees who are committed to their work, energized and satisfied. Researchers have identified two important components which pertain to this subject:
- Vitality: if employees feel energized, if they are committed to their work, passionate about what they do and also satisfied with their work and achievements, then they are going to thrive at the workplace and will get the desired results;
- Learning: employees can grow, both professionally and personally, by developing new skills and abilities.
Specialists have detected two perspectives through which a vivid, animate workplace can be created: the manager’s and the individual perspective of each and every employee.
Firstly, employers can appeal to the following strategies to ensure that their employees enjoy their workplace:
- Decision-making discretion: Employees feel more attached to their companies if they have the opportunity for individual decision-making regarding their work. In this way, they are more passionate and develop a greater sense of responsibility.
- Transparency: All the departments within an organization need to share vital information with all the interested parties, in order to ensure good organizational collaboration. This means that employees will get their job done quicker, they will be efficient and the quality of their work will increase.
- Minimizing incivility: Companies should not expect thriving employees in an environment where they are being treated in an uncivil manner. Managers must ensure that a civil tone is used between members of staff and that none of them sabotage the work of their fellow colleagues or try to humiliate them. These are not constructive ways to develop a business or improve it. In the hiring process, the interviewers should explicitly mention that uncivil behavior will not be accepted and whoever fails to respect this rule, will be sanctioned.
- Offering performance feedback: Employers should give constant and direct feedback to their employees regarding their activities. This will help them improve the quality of their work and it will create a learning and development environment. Also, a positive feedback once in a while should not be disregarded as being useless. A “Good job!”; “Congratulations!”; “Keep up the good work!” every once in a while can go a long way.
Managers have the capability of creating a thriving workplace culture by instilling in their employees the belief that their activities mean something, helping them acknowledge the impact they have on the company’s well-being. Thomas Britt and Steve Jex in Thriving under stress, have the following suggestions for managers who find themselves in such situations:
- Giving employees more freedom for completing their daily tasks. Employees should be able to carry out their activities in the most suitable way for them.
- Executives should maintain their employees’ motivation at a high level, by giving them from time to time a positive feedback. Simple praises towards employees’ work will be appreciated and increase their engagement. Bonuses motivate employees only for short period of time, but for a longer time frame, other motivational methods should be considered, such as: boosting employee confidence through appraisals, as mentioned above, offering them greater responsibilities, recognition of their work in front of their peers, personal and professional development opportunities and other such procedures.
- Managers should highlight the importance of their employees’ activities towards impacting the company’s prosperity, by requesting them to share testimonials regarding their work on the company’s website, short presentations of their actions in front of their colleagues or even reports with their daily progress.
Secondly, employees should want to thrive at work because this generates increased health, more energy and commitment towards their work and company, enhanced job satisfaction and as such, they can come up with innovative ideas for business improvement. Also, thriving employees are more appreciated by their companies and take initiative in enhancing their careers. There are four individual strategies for enabling such a mentality:
- Crafting meaningful work: By finding a purpose in their work, employees care more about their job. If an employee finds meaning in what he/she does, then he/she is more focused in completing his/her tasks and trying new things in a more efficient manner.
- Looking for opportunities to innovate: Employees can search for new opportunities to follow in order to develop themselves, such as: attending trainings and conferences, keeping up-to-date with the latest achievements in their work field by reading newspapers, articles and books. If an employee has multiple ways of gaining new information, this action will enable feelings of competence, vitality and self-determination for him/her.
- Investing in energizing relationships: In every workplace, relationships between colleagues is a very important factor in developing a flourishing environment. On the one hand, positive interactions between employees help them to learn from one another, make them happier and keep them motivated. On the other hand, negative interactions can also affect a work environment. Specialists state that these have four times the effect than the positive ones, so one should be mindful of them.
- Taking care of one’s health through energy management: Researches demonstrate that 7 to 8 hours per night sleep, exercises and a healthy nutrition increase a person’s positive mood throughout the working day. These actions will also help employees in avoiding burn out.
In my opinion, I believe that employees can thrive at the work place if they have the necessary means to do so. In this process, managers and employees are equally involved. Thriving employees are beneficial for companies wanting to increase their sales volume, market share, attract new customers and add further quality to their products and services.
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Tags: Employee Engagement, Employee Motivation, Employee Performance, Organizational Performance
