Approximately half of a company’s key employees will leave their jobs within five years, according to Tom Hudgin, president of Wilmington Quality Associates and recent speaker at Hardscape North America’s session “Retaining Key Employees… Creating a Self-Motivating Work Environment.” Your employees are your company’s most expensive assets — and most valuable. Retaining these top-performers is vital to the success and growth of your business. So, building a great team will motivate your employees to stick with your company for both the short and long term, no matter the economy.
Having the motivation to do well is not a command or a demand you can set for you employees, but you can create a company environment that allows employees to be a part of a team, build great relationships and further their own dreams and ambitions.
Using these strategies shared by Hudgin to build a great team will help build loyalty among employees so that they stay — and thrive — at your company instead of thinking the grass is greener on the other side.
1. Everyone is a sales person.
Each employee at your company needs to be able to understand and communicate what your business does and its core values. They need to be able to represent themselves in a way that reflects positively on the company, no matter who they meet.
2. Everyone is equally valuable.
Everyone is needed to make the company function. Each employee has crucial role for the successful performance of the company. No matter if you are the CEO or the secretary, the role is equally important and necessary.
3. Everyone wants to be a master at something.
Keep working on improving yourself and the company. Employees will take that example and it will motivate them to improve themselves and their work. An employee who is willing to better themselves will be even more beneficial to your business — and most likely will be a top-performing employee who will see your business through the tough times.
4. Everyone needs to be caught at doing something right.
How often do you tell someone they are doing a good job? Now how often do you find yourself addressing problems from someone doing a poor job? Make it a point to go around once a day, or even once a week, and find one of your employees doing something right — even the simplest tasks. Acknowledging their efforts will motivate them to continue doing the task the right way.
5. Everyone should be encouraged to share ideas.
Get a new perspective. Find out what the efficiency issues are from each employee. See if they have ideas to improve their workflow. Make it a point to ask each employee to come to the weekly or monthly scheduled meeting with an idea to share with the group. Once they realize their ideas are valuable and considered, they will have an eagerness to share them. This eagerness and enthusiasm will spill over to your customer base.