The Great Resignation was not a brief period of employment history; it is a revolution in how employees will engage with employers for the foreseeable future. As a business leader, you need to recognize the importance of providing employees with the compensation and culture they expect, or else you need to resign yourself to high employee turnover rates that cost you money, productivity and success.
Fortunately, catering to employees’ needs does not need to be expensive. Here are a few affordable ways to keep employees happy and engaged without blowing your business budget.
Allow Remote Work
Many workers spent more than a year working from home during the pandemic, and most have become accustomed to the comfort of completing work-related tasks and projects from their home offices. Though all the physical and social restrictions of the pandemic may be lifted, you should consider allowing your staff the option to work from home if they prefer to do so. Employees enjoy having autonomy over where and when they perform their duties; plus, by eliminating geographical limitations on your staff, you can hire the best talent from around the world to help build your business to success.
Compensate Community Outreach
Most people want to do good, but finding the time to volunteer can be difficult when individuals are striving to earn a living wage. A perk that many employers often overlook is that of compensation for community outreach. Different organizations organize this perk in different ways; some have partnered with community causes that keep track of employee participation, and others offer compensation for any type of volunteer activity that workers complete. You might talk to your staff about how they would utilize this perk before you design a similar program for your workplace.
Reimburse Online Tuition
Most workers are eager to advance in their careers, which means they must gain new knowledge, skills and credentials to qualify for the next highest position. Plenty will take it upon themselves to engage in professional development, like acquiring a bachelor’s in business administration — but once they have completed their courses, they might look to other organizations for employment unless you give them a good reason to stay and use their enhanced abilities to boost your business. Education benefits, and specifically tuition assistance like reimbursement, can radically improve employee loyalty and morale, and it does not cost you the extra time, effort and money of developing training programs.
Offer Simple Concierge Services
If your employees are exceedingly committed to their jobs, they might not have much free time outside of work to complete the simple, everyday tasks that make their lives easier and happier. Chores like picking up dry cleaning, washing the car, grocery shopping and paying bills can be outsourced to concierge services that your company might pay for — which will have the effect of allowing your workers to focus on their tasks knowing that many of their home responsibilities are being taken care of. If you have some extra budget, you might consider paying for even more important duties in workers’ personal lives, like childcare.
Provide Better Employee Discounts
Because your employees work to make your products and services as excellent as possible, they deserve to take advantage of those products and services as they desire. You should consider increasing the discounts your employees receive from your business, and you might offer tiers of discounts based on seniority. Another option is to extend employee discounts to workers’ family members and friends or to organize quarterly celebrations when employees can receive even bigger discounts on purchases. Because your employees likely do not make up the majority of your customer audience, offering such discounts should not radically reduce your revenues, but discounts can drastically improve happiness and morale amongst your staff.
Open a Tab for Workplace Connections
Many employees will celebrate the end of a long workday with their coworkers at a local bar or restaurant. In doing so, workers form bonds with one another which make them more effective team members and allow them to develop affinity and loyalty to their workplace. You can encourage such connections by opening a tab at a watering hole your staff often visits. If three or more workers are getting together, they can charge a certain number of drinks and eats to the company tab, and you can deduct those expenses on your business taxes.
It is more important than ever that business leaders like you put in effort to keep their workforce happy. By talking to your staff, you can identify the best perks for your company, and you can develop a corporate culture that reduces employee turnover into the future.