6 Ways to Motivate Employees

There are many ways to motivate employees to perform at their best. The most common ways are promotion and money. These days, employee motivation has gone way above the use of money and promotion to gain their full attention at work. The leading employee motivation strategies are not new but only have various names. However, the basics of how to motivate employees are commonplace. But in this article, you will learn the most effective strategies you can use, to motivate your employees, to do their jobs efficiently to enhance productivity, save time and increase overall company profitability. I call them effective management strategies that get results every time because the employees are motivated to perform their roles well. 

The strategies are giving them free hand to make decisions, setting clear goals for them, making feedback easy and an avenue for improving standards on the job, setting up clear benchmarks for meeting goals, determining how problems are addressed whenever they occur and praising an employee with sincerity whenever they do something right. Let me explain their usefulness and how to use the 6 ways to motivate employees right now.

6 Ways to Motivate Employees

1. Give Them Free Hands to Make Decisions

To build trust and empower your employees, give them free hands to make decisions in each employee's sphere of influence. Allow your employees to make their own decisions. But be around to guide them if they need any help. 

If you do this, you would be a very efficient manager loved by the staff. Your role as the business owner or manager is to groom each employee to become the best representative of your company.

You are mentoring them to function at peak capacity, so put them through the standards and operational system of your company, and then allow them to make decisions in areas concerning their usual job roles.

Be out of the way most times, except when any of them have any difficulty doing the job. If you follow this strategy, staff morale will rise, and you will have a highly motivated workforce.

2. Set Clear Goals and Expected Results

Another one of the ways to motivate employees, is to set clear goals. Setting clear goals saves you and your employees time and money. They must understand the instruction, to carry it out well. Take time to do this well, because it is the foundation for the success of any enterprise.  

By setting clear targets and your expectations, your employees will carry out their tasks daily without distractions. Also, they will become better at their job and highly motivated. They will feel more comfortable to go to work daily and work gladly because they know what their superiors expect from them. Besides, this motivates the employee to work with a relaxed mind leading to better results.

3. Make Feedback Easy

Making feedback easy will build rapport and motivate employees to do well. It also makes feedback an avenue for improving standards on the job.For typical Managers, feedback is always an avenue to tear their subordinates down and point out the areas they had failed to live up to their expectations. 

This is demotivating, to say the least. Shredding your employees during feedback will dampen their morals. If staff morale is down, you lose time, valuable contribution and it costs the employer money.

Make feedback a win-win scenario. Make it a simple discussion of company goals and employee’s performance.

Where performance did not meet your expectations, give your candid opinion on the best way forward after hearing the employee's reason for the problem. Ask for the solutions to the problem from the employee. Guide her with targeted questions aimed at getting practical applicable solutions to the problem both of you are trying to solve.

Start a question and answer scenario until you have led the employee towards suggesting possible solutions to the problem. Now ask the employee to implement suggestions you both agreed would solve the problem. 

Follow up and ensure the problem is solved using your employee’s submissions of solutions reached through your thought-provoking questions and answer sections. This occasion where the employee seemly solved her problem, has a multiplying motivational implication for the staff. First, it tells the employee you value her contribution and person, and so she would work as co-owner of the company cheerfully.   

Second, it puts self-confidence into the employee and her ability to do a good job even when the situation seemed hopeless initially. What effect do you think that will have on her rating of you as her employer and your company?  

In her eyes, you would be rated as a thoughtful and considerate manager, with the best people's skills she had ever met since she began working to earn a living. Your attitude in the above scenario was that you attacked the noticeable gap on expectations for that job or project, but never attacked your employee. You even solved the problem through her help and won her approval as a good manager. 

As an employer, you have the right to show anger, only towards sloppy performance but never at the person that did the job. The reason for being angree, is to motivate an employee to do a better job next time not to pull her down.

Your sincerity in keeping the line of communication open, between you and the employee, motivates her and creates bonding of both parties which leads to progress for the company.

4. Set Up Clear Benchmarks for Meeting Goals

Setting up benchmarks is another one of the ways to motivate employees. A company where employees know the prevailing goals and the yardstick for measuring results are never confused about expectations from them.

These employees, as a result, serve with ease and flair and are usually enthusiastic and self-motivated to deliver top performance and have uncluttered tables and work schedules. They are usually not pressed for time or looking harassed by the huge expectations from Management.  

Because of clear benchmarks already set by the company, they have more free time and use it to create an unmatched performance for themselves and their place of work enthusiastically. 

5. Determine How to Solve Problems if They Occur

You can motivate your employees by determining in advance how problems are addressed whenever they occur. All the channels to be followed are laid out and explained to employees. Even new employees are given an induction. This introduction of problem-solving methods and how to get solutions is highly motivating.  

Just imagine how you would feel, if on resumption on your first day at work, in a new place of work, no one welcomes and gives you clear guidelines. Also, imagine if no one informs you about the work process, work ethics and culture of that organization. Would that not be very frustrating no matter how motivated you maybe? Yes, you would be confused and frustrated. 

Well, that is just how stressed and confused, you would also be if there were no defined methods, for the company’s employees to resolve issues on a day to day basis regarding their work. It may be just a simple method of asking quality questions, to break down the exact problems. Also, it might be suggestions on ways of bouncing ideas around their heads until they find the potential answer.

Besides, it could be to show you how to do a thorough brainstorming section by yourself before forwarding your suggestions, to your superiors for consent to use the idea. It does not matter what the situation is, writing a procedure or manual will motivate employees.

6. Praise with Sincerity

Praise with sincerity when employees do something right and are supportive when they fail to meet your expectations. This is one of the ways to motivate employees. Praising your staff has a way of giving them a boost, a reassurance that all their efforts mean a lot to you the employer. 

If you refuse to acknowledge your employees when they meet set goals or do something nice for the company, then you would be setting up the company for a fall. Moreover, human beings like it when you call their names, say thank you, shake their hands or pat them on their shoulders and to say thank you for a job well done. 

If you thank them properly, you would end up motivating the employee to perform better.  Why? Thank you energizes them, and puts them in the very best moods so that your company gains due to better performance on the job. 

Also, keep it simple and natural. Be sincere when you use the praising strategy and do not overdo it. If you do, it will lose its appeal to working the magic of lifting your employees, and boomerang to hurt the company more. 

Final Words

In this article, I explained 6 ways to motivate employees. Also, you must do it well to create the necessary momentum that would impact the company positively. The spin-off benefits are tremendous. They include the profitability of the company, saving time and scarce resources, creating happy and joyous employees, who are ready to give their best for the advancement of the company goals.

Besides, it reduces staff turnover, increases efficiency and improves productivity. From the strategies in this post, you can see that employee motivation is a win-win plan for the employer and employee. So, ensure you effect it to reap inherent benefits for the company and staff. 

Finally, watch out for the concluding part of this topic “ways to motivate employees” in the next article.