How to Motivate Employees: 15 Simple and Effective Ways
Creating a work environment where employees are engaged and feel valued is essential to boosting motivation and job satisfaction. Something as simple as thanking an employee for a job well done can go a long way in achieving this. However, there are many theories and methods for how to motivate employees.
According to ZipdoOpens in a new tab, 69% of employees would work harder if they felt appreciated and recognized.
In this article, we give you some tips to motivate your employees so you can improve the employee experience, build relationships, and encourage better productivity in your company.
How do motivated employees contribute better to company goals?
There are many benefits of improving employee motivation, including higher employee retention, engagement, and productivity within the company. When an organization’s employees are motivated and feel invested in their work, this helps tremendously in boosting performance and improving its future outlook and profitability.
Increased retention rates
When employees don’t feel highly engaged in their work, they’re more likely to start seeking employment elsewhere. Feeling unappreciated and undervalued in their current place of work sets the tone for employees to become resentful and unproductive.
In fact, 63% of employees agree that showing increased appreciation and recognition to employees will make them more likely to stay in their roles. When employee retention rises, this leads to higher profitability because the organization doesn’t need to incur the costs of hiring and training new employees as often.
Improved performance
We often think of organizations as entities in and of themselves. However, any company is a product of the people who work in it at the end of the day.
When these people feel motivated and content with how the workplace functions, their productivity will rise. As a result, the performance of the organization as a whole will improve.
Better employee engagement
Motivated employees tend to feel a greater sense of belonging to their company and produce outstanding work. They feel that the company’s best interests are the same as theirs. In turn, they’ll remain engaged in pursuing these interests. Higher employee engagement leads to a greater potential for the company to grow and thrive.
Check out this Guide to Employee Engagement Surveys to gain six tips for building, sending, and acting on employee pulse surveys.
Stronger company culture
Establishing a well-defined and effective company culture is essential to organizational health and success. However, that’s easier said than done.
A company’s leaders and management can preach the pillars and values of the desired company culture all they want. Ultimately, if the company’s employees aren’t motivated to apply these values in everyday work life, it’s all just words in the wind. This is why it’s essential to have motivated employees who are invested in the company’s culture.
What contributes to employee motivation?
Employees are complex human beings, not simple machines. As a result, you can’t apply the same one-size-fits-all logic when trying to motivate them.
Learning how to motivate employees as a manager involves understanding that different people are motivated by numerous factors. These factors are classified into two main categories: extrinsic motivators and intrinsic motivators.
Extrinsic motivators
Extrinsic motivators are things like money and rewards. For example, some companies give quarterly or annual awards to the highest-performing employees. Monetary incentives are the most common forms of employee motivation. Some of your employees will feel more motivated when they know that their work will lead to a salary raise or a financial bonus.
Recognition from management or peers is another form of extrinsic motivation. Some employees will work harder in pursuit of public appreciation and recognition. When they receive it, it gives them a sense of value and the feeling of being respected within the organization.
Intrinsic motivators
Other employees are motivated through intrinsic aspects, such as finding fulfillment in their roles. These employees value finding meaning in their day-to-day work activities. When a person cares about their work, they’re more likely to put more effort and attention to detail into it. As a result, it’s a good idea to value attitude just as much as resumes during your recruitment process.
Some employees derive their motivation from the joy they get when they help others. If you’re in a client servicing industry, this could mean feeling that they’ve fulfilled the client’s need to the fullest extent. It could also mean feeling that they’ve helped elevate their coworkers and contributed to their growth.
How can managers increase employee motivation and engagement?
Employee motivation is vital for overall organizational productivity, and managers play a huge role in fostering that drive. Managers are also responsible for knowing how to measure motivation and creating a positive work environment that empowers employees to perform better.
According to studies, motivated employees are 87% less likely to quit their jobs. While raises and benefits are essential, factors like peer motivation and feeling recognized are even more vital motivators.
Strong leaders possess a unique role, as they often have remarkable influence over their teams. They can motivate their staff by:
- Being supportive and appreciative
- Spending more one-on-one time with each individual employee
- Being transparent about departmental and company changes
- Listening to employees’ concerns
- Leveraging employees’ needs and desires to inspire productivity
15 effective ways to motivate employees
In any workplace, there will be times when employees won’t feel their best. Life can be stressful, and at times it can feel impossible to separate one’s personal life from work. Company leaders can boost motivation by showing an employee how valued their efforts and contributions truly are.
If you don’t know where to start, here are some of the best ways to motivate employees:
1. Be friendly
Your employees spend much of their time inside the office or tethered to their computers from home. Thus, it’s essential to make their work environment as friendly as possible and keep employee morale high. A pleasant atmosphere encourages employees to stay motivated and become more eager to come to work.
Being friendly can increase employee satisfaction and strengthen team spirit. However, you should avoid becoming too friendly and dissolving all professional boundaries. Such behavior can allow room for disrespect, make it harder to give feedback, and lead to favoritism concerns.
Try to find balance and maintain boundaries when interacting with your employees as a manager. This doesn’t mean you can’t speak freely, but you should always be careful of oversharing.
2. Show appreciation
Employee recognition is extremely important, as your workers deserve to know when they’ve done a good job and that you appreciate their efforts.
Recognition and gratitude create positive emotions in employees’ minds, leading to more job satisfaction. These feelings are vital for their engagement and productivity. After all, employee engagement and recognition are linked.
While words of affirmation are essential in the workplace, a simple “Well done!” is usually overused and insufficient. Thus, if you want your praise to be effective, you’ll need to be direct, specific, and timely. This shows that you’re paying attention and respect the importance of their actions.
Luckily, Workhuman® offers a product called Social Recognition® to help with this. Not only does it allow you as a manager to express gratitude, but it also lets other employees give thanks as well.
3. Offer rewards
Whether tangible or not, giving your employees rewards can be a fantastic way to show appreciation. This can translate to a day off, more flexibility in their schedule, or a simple push toward a promotion. In addition, recognizing employees with material rewards, such as gift cards or other treats, can go a long way in showing gratitude.
Workhuman’s Social Recognition® solution can help with rewards as well. This product encourages employees to nominate each other for reward points. It also allows them to exchange those points for their choice of merchandise, gift cards, etc.
4. Provide feedback
Another vital action to motivate employees is by providing them with feedback. If your clients or customers express appreciation for specific things, it’s important to share that with your team. It’s also essential to communicate negative feedback without placing blame or being punitive.
It’s hard for employees to improve their performance if they don’t know what they’re doing wrong. Not only does this clear communication allow them to fix their mistakes, but it also motivates them to keep doing what works.
You should provide feedback regularly and not just wait for annual performance reviews. This lets your team make necessary adjustments as they go along instead of discovering issues later on.
Giving and receiving feedback isn't easy, but it is incredibly impactful when done thoughtfully. Use these 9 Tips for Giving Feedback (Without the Stress) to get started.
5. Give employees autonomy
Giving employees autonomy means offering them a certain degree of independence and empowering them to make decisions. It’s all about giving them control over their tasks, allowing them to own their mistakes, and fostering a culture of trust.
This trust is essential in the workplace because it creates room for personal growth. It frees employees from feeling constrained by strict rules or constant supervision, allowing them to do their best work. Consequently, it improves their problem-solving skills and motivation.
You can foster this autonomy by communicating clear expectations, providing guidance when needed, and offering opportunities for skill development.
6. Encourage healthy competition
Friendly and positive competition can be a spectacular idea to motivate workers and increase employee productivity. It fosters an environment where they strive to outperform themselves and their peers. Through this, they can inspire each other to go the extra mile and accomplish tasks. Plus, it leads to enhancing their skills, from problem-solving and creativity to self-management.
When managed effectively, competition can be a powerful tool for individual and collective improvement, which leads to company success. Excessive competition can lead to stress, collaboration breakdowns, and a toxic work atmosphere. To foster healthy competition, you’ll need to establish a clear focus, encourage teamwork, and discourage negative behavior.
7. Explain your decisions
Sitting with your team and discussing the reasoning behind your decisions is crucial for transparency, trust, and effective communication. As a manager, when you explain your choices, it provides clarity and insight into the decision-making process.
Employees are more likely to support and follow decisions when they understand the logic that led to them. Moreover, such an action makes employees feel that you, as a leader, value their input.
This type of communication also fosters a shared sense of purpose and commitment. As a result, employees can better align their efforts to accomplish organizational goals.
8. Be open and transparent about organizational changes
Being transparent about organizational changes plays a massive role in maintaining trust and meeting employee needs. It also reduces uncertainty and helps navigate through transitions successfully. It also helps eliminate the circulation of rumors and misinformation.
In general, communicating openly demonstrates your respect and commitment to employee well-being. Whether it’s a strategic shift or policy adjustment, being open about it can ease employees’ anxiety and resistance. This invites feedback and input from employees, making them feel heard and involved in the change process.
9. Offer flexible work hours
Remote workers can be more productive than office workers, even when sick. This means that productivity isn’t related to the workplace or hours. On the contrary, employees should be able to work better when they set their own schedules and have control over their work environments.
Generally, productivity varies from one person to the other, depending on a person’s lifestyle, responsibilities, and personality. You can’t expect every employee to be the most productive, only from 9 AM to 5 PM. That’s why offering a flexible work schedule can keep employees motivated to work.
A few ways to give your employees more flexibility include:
- Flexible daily working hours, such as leaving early when arriving before the set hours
- Remote work opportunities to reduce the need for a daily commute
- Compressed workweeks, such as working longer hours per day but having fewer work days per week
- Flexible lunch or break times to better suit employees’ schedules or biorhythms
- Summer hours to promote work-life balance
10. Practice team bonding activities
Whether virtual or in-person, team-building activities can be a great way for your staff to bond. These activities encourage employees to communicate more effectively, as well as build trust, boost morale, and reduce stress.
Since they often involve problem-solving, leadership, and decision-making challenges, team-building activities help develop employees' skills. You can choose from a wide range of activities, such as sports, board game nights, themed parties, or even enrichment classes.
11. Listen to employees’ problems and consider their needs
Listening to your employees and considering their needs is crucial for maintaining their motivation. When they feel valued and heard, their job satisfaction increases, leading to higher productivity.
What’s more, it also aids in the early detection of issues, which allows you to avoid larger future challenges. After all, every person is different. So, your job as a manager is to figure out what drives each of your team members.
Mainly, achieving that requires creating open communication channels, practicing active listening, and conducting regular check-ins. To help you with that, Moodtracker® can be a fantastic tool. It empowers you to collect employee feedback and suggestions.
12. Understand employees’ ambition
It’s essential for you as a manager to understand your employees' core values and ambitions and help them align that with their work. To achieve this, you should engage with them in open conversations to learn about their area of interest and career aspirations.
Once you get where your employees are coming from, you can work with them on setting their career paths and even offer them mentorship. Moreover, try to encourage them to take on challenging projects that will help them grow closer to their goals.
Not only does this motivate them and increase their productivity, but it also fosters loyalty to the business.
13. Include employees in goal setting
Another effective strategy for enhancing motivation and performance is including employees in goal setting. When they actively participate in defining goals, they gain a sense of ownership and alignment with the organization’s mission and vision.
So, allow employees to contribute to the company’s strategic path by listening to their opinions and getting their input. Additionally, provide well-defined goals that connect their efforts to the broader organizational objectives.
While doing that, you should also showcase the company’s commitment to employees' development, outlining their growth opportunities. All in all, when employees understand their role in achieving business goals, they become loyal contributors to the company’s success.
14. Create engaging work opportunities
As a skilled manager, you’ll become more attuned to what your employees find interesting over time. Consequently, you’ll be able to design roles that align with their skills and passion, which allows them to leverage their strengths.
It’s always easy to find ways to make daily routines more engaging. For example, you can rotate responsibilities to avoid monotony and provide new challenges. Furthermore, you can also dedicate a portion of your work hours to creative thinking and personal projects to help employees think outside the box.
In all cases, providing engaging work experiences enhances job satisfaction, increases employee retention, and inspires your staff to excel.
15. Be a respectful and supportive manager
Being a manager isn’t about accolades or egos. Instead, it should center around supporting your workforce. It’s crucial to be a respectful, honest person who cares about employees’ well-being. After all, a supportive manager is a valued manager.
Therefore, spending time with your team can have great effects. For example, having a one-on-one meeting over a cup of coffee and listening to an employee means a lot. Additionally, showing empathy, offering help, and acknowledging their contributions can go a long way.
Another way of showing your support and care is celebrating little wins with your team. Even if you can’t arrange a get-together, a virtual Workhuman® tool can do the job.
FAQs
How do managers stay motivated?
As a manager, you need to set clear goals and celebrate achievements to stay motivated. Plus, you should prioritize self-care, maintain communication with your staff, and seek opportunities for personal growth. Remember, you have a huge impact on your team’s success.
Why is motivation critical for employees?
Motivation is important because it fuels enthusiasm and productivity, helping company objectives be met more quickly. Moreover, it fosters a positive work environment, increases job satisfaction, and enhances performance. All in all, motivated employees are more likely to achieve goals and contribute to the company’s success.
What are the two types of employee motivation?
The different ways to motivate your employees are classified into two main buckets. There’s extrinsic motivation, which corresponds to monetary and material factors. The other type is intrinsic motivation, which includes job fulfillment and the satisfaction of helping others.
Conclusion
Keeping your employees motivated and in high spirits is a key factor in determining how successful your company will be. Knowing how to motivate employees requires creating a culture of engagement, mutual trust, and job satisfaction.
By understanding your employees' individual needs and being supportive, you can reignite the passion of even the most disengaged employees. You can boost employee morale by recognizing and appreciating your employees’ achievements, empowering your employees, and fostering a healthier work-life balance.
So, whether through recognition, communication, or flexibility, your effort to motivate employees is an investment in your business’s success. Your employees deserve to know that they’re an important part of the organization they invest so much in.
About the author
Ryan Stoltz
Ryan is a search marketing manager and content strategist at Workhuman where he writes on the next evolution of the workplace. Outside of the workplace, he's a diehard 49ers fan, comedy junkie, and has trouble avoiding sweets on a nightly basis.