Calling All Business Owners: Your Guide To What Makes Employees Happy

A happy bee is a busy bee.

Without employee happiness, your company will tank. Research shows that happier employees are more productive, less likely to leave your company, and more likely to spread a positive image of your company.

Whereas, on the opposite side, unhappy employees do nothing but hurt your business. They’re likely to leave your company, leaving you with new costs to hire their backfill. And even if they stay, they won’t be nearly as productive as you hope.

So one thing becomes clear: happy employees are crucial. But that triggers the question: what makes employees happy? What is that secret sauce to achieving maximum employee happiness and productivity without falling immediately to money and higher raises?

In this post, we’ll answer that question with five things that make employees happy that you can incorporate into your organization.

Real Work-Life Balance

There’s a difference between saying that your company offers work-life balance, and actually living that. 

The personal importance of what your employees do at work pale in comparison to all they have going on outside their life, be it relationship with friends, kids’ baseball games, or time spent with their spouse.

Understand that your employees may need to take extra time off to take care of those things. Allow them to do so, but hold them accountable to getting done the projects that are on their plate. As long as they’re contributing what they need to, let them take as much time off as they need to take care of family and friends.

Recognition for Their Efforts

Nothing hurts worse in a professional environment than giving your all to a project, seeing it successfully to the end, then watching someone else take and receive the credit for it.

If someone in your company does something that moves the needle forward, make sure they are recognized for that effort. It’s a core human need to receive recognition for a job well done.

Ability to Contribute to the Organization

Happy employees value their contribution to the organization. One easy answer to the question of how to keep employees happy is to make sure that they know how impactful their work is to the organization.

When they can visualize and see how they are moving the company forward, they take pride in their work, which in turn triggers higher productivity and employee happiness. Right from when they receive their new employee onboarding checklist to the end, your employees should know how much they contribute to the organization.

An Exemplary Boss

The old proverb has yet to be proved wrong: “people don’t leave companies, they leave bosses.” Few things can be as much of a cancer to your organization as a crappy boss who harasses his/her team.

An exemplary boss (note the word choice) is just that: exemplary. He or she serves as an example for their employees, someone they want to be like and become in the context of a professional environment.

If you have managers who don’t match that description, you owe it to your employees to rid your organization of them. 

Answer for Yourself: What Makes Employees Happy?

The answer to what makes employees happy is simpler than you might think. At their core, employees are humans who want to fulfill the basic human desires and needs for recognition, time spent with family, and the like. Use these principles to guide your implementation of a strategy to better retain your employees and keep them happy.

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