Any employer can tell you that keeping their employees happy can sometimes seem like an impossible task. However, happy employees equals better productivity which translates to a more profitable organization. Improving your employee’s happiness doesn’t have to be a chore.
Read below to see the Top 5 Reasons Employees Hate Their Jobs and plan on avoiding these pitfalls in your workplace!
1. They Feel Disconnected From Their Boss
To be an effective boss you sometimes have to forgo being your employee’s best friend. This professional distance can sometimes backfire on the well-intending manager. One of the reasons employees dread going to work is having to answer to someone they feel disconnected and awkward around. The most effective way to fix this undesirable situation is to check in with each employee on a weekly basis and convey to them what your experience is like in the workplace. Make a point to tell them how the job they are doing is helping you do your job better. You can connect professionally without compromising professional distance.
2. They Feel Their Job Doesn’t Matter
There is nothing worse for an employee than to feel like the job they are doing everyday doesn’t matter in the workplace. It’s easy to do the same thing over and over and forget that your efforts mean something to the company. As a manager, find a way to convey to the employee how their efforts contribute to what the company is accomplishing on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis. Perhaps do a monthly job highlight where you post on a message board in the workplace how a certain job contributes to the company so the whole staff sees how their co-workers contribute.
3. They Want More Meaning In Their Lives
No matter how good the intentions are of a company, at the end of the day work is work. As human beings, we are constantly seeking meaning and purpose in our lives beyond what we do to pay our bills. An employer is in a very important position in a person’s life because they take up the majority of the person’s waking hours. This fact can be forgotten when a company is worrying about their bottom line, however it is better to be considered and acted on. Programs that allow the employee to engage in charitable activities have shown to be big morale boosters. The key is to make sure the employees can participate during work hours, you don’t want to ask for more of their time because then they are likely to not participate and you lose out on those mood boosting benefits.
4. Their Skills Are Underdeveloped
One of the worst things an employer can do to an employee is not set them up for success in their job. A big way to make this mistake is to not provide the tools necessary to the employee for the purpose of building the skill set they need to be successful in their position. Many bosses take for granted that something they might find simple and obvious would be the same for the person being paid to do the task. This is simply not true if that person has not been properly developed to the role. Keep in mind that an employee may not admit they feel unprepared for a task for fear of being terminated. Make sure you require the employee to participate in on-going paid training. Not only will this show the employee they are valued, it will ensure they feel confident in accomplishing the job at hand.
5. Their Opinion Isn’t Valued
It’s impossible to make everyone happy, but it’s not impossible to make sure everyone is heard. This simple concept, giving your employees a voice, can go a long way in keeping up morale. In the age of modern technology, you can have employees email suggestions to you at a certain time every week so you can make time to read and reply to them. It’s not enough to welcome opinions, you have to address them in a respectful and prompt fashion to make employees feel like they are worth sharing.
Making sure employees are happy doesn’t have to be rocket science, but it does have to be a concern. Investing time and effort into “employee-happiness” now can save you a lot of headaches down the road and make sure you get the very best from your workers.