3 Ways to Show your Employees you LOVE them!
According to Gallup, 51% of U.S employees say they are looking for a new job or watching for active openings. Since it’s Valentine’s Day, I thought it would be a good reminder for anyone in a leadership role to maintain some perspective on what is the most important part of any organization… THE EMPLOYEES. Take it from a former recruiter, it is critical that you tell your employees they matter before your competitor does.
Three ways to show your employees you “love” them:
1. Ask them what they enjoy doing most in their job and why.
This type of inquiry will help you to gain an understanding of where their strengths may lie and how you can build more of what they are naturally inclined to be good at into each day. A mistake that many leaders make is assuming that just because an employee is good at a certain task, they must enjoy doing that task. Wrong. When leaders notice an employee doing well in a specific area, the natural trajectory is to give them more of it to do because they are good at it. You could be looking past the reality that the employee doesn’t enjoy doing that task much at all and is actually drained from doing it.
Gallup research has confirmed, when employees are able to focus on their strengths for 80% of the day, they tend to be happier and want to do more of what makes them feel successful. If leaders don’t take the time to understand more about their employees and what really makes them feel satisfied in their roles, this type of oversight can be a reason you lose good employees in the long run.
Employee engagement will increase if employees are able to focus on what they do best each day. When possible, avoid those areas which can drain an employee… better known as, their weaknesses.
2. Acknowledge their contributions, not just the revenue they generate.
Your employees invest most of their time each day at work. Sure, they do get paid, but take the extra step to invest back into your employees and let them know they matter. Make sure you don’t just focus on one or two employees that make the company a lot of money, but also those employees that are living out the values of the organization through their behavior and contributions. Everyone is good at something, so be sure to find ways to acknowledge everyone for what they bring to the team. Administrative employees may not be the revenue generators of the organization but without them, the revenue generators wouldn’t be able to do what they do effectively.
The receptionist who sits at your front desk is just as important to your organization as the top sales person. If he or she doesn’t treat your customers well, they will find another company to do business with in the future.
3. Create opportunities for employees to use their strengths.
Pay attention and listen when an employee shows interest in different aspects of your business. Through time and life experiences, people change what they want to focus on and may be drawn to areas that are different than what they have done successfully for years.
There were many times during the last two years of my career that I communicated my passion for developing young leaders and wanted to build a leadership development program for our organization.
I raised my hand on several occasions to seek out a role in this area and invested a lot of time in addition to my regular job duties because I had such a passion to see this through. It was something I had a natural talent for and each time I was able to use my gift, it ignited me inside and I couldn’t wait to get to work the following day to do it again.
Be in touch with what truly drives your team members. Don’t be a heartbreaker!
(If anyone is interested in learning more about this topic, Love & Work by Marcus Buckingham is an INCREDIBLE resource for applying love in the workplace!)
