Three tips to improve staff motivation

Recruiting top talent is one thing, but keeping them engaged is another. You’d hope if you’re dealing with talented professionals they will always get the job done and stay enthusiastic but sometimes it’s just not the case. Even the best employees can go through lulls of feeling demotivated at work so here are some tips to encourage staff.

1. Create publicly available performance metrics

Nothing fixes laziness quite like provable accountability. If you can find a way to prove, with numbers and not subjectivity, how employees are performing then you can motivate your staff to be more productive. Clear performance metrics make providing feedback easier and forces people to want to ‘prove’ they are valuable.

2. Provide clear rewards for hard work

When you’ve created your performance metrics, providing incentives to staff can be a great way to motivate them. Once your employees can prove how much value they’re bringing, you can reward them for work that goes above and beyond what’s expected in their role, or for hitting big milestones. It’s great to give your team something to look forward to at the end of their project or task.

3. Identify any underlying problems

Sometimes the reasons for unmotivated staff can be for personal reasons that aren’t discussed in the workplace. Poor relationships with managers, difficulties at home, sleep issues, distractions – there are countless obstacles all working professionals face. As a manager, particularly in small business, it’s integral to check in with your staff if they’re feeling down to try and find the cause of their changed work behaviour.

Saxon Marsden-Huggins is the managing director of Recruit Shop, which offers recruitment services to small businesses in Australia and New Zealand.