Inspire and Motivate One of Your Company’s Greatest Assets: Your Employees

February 3, 2025 | Posted in Bank Blogs

Employees help small businesses succeed. They contribute to their reputation, productivity, and profitability. When motivated, they’re more positive and engaged, happier, committed to giving their best effort, and more likely to stay with your company.

The challenge, though, for many resources-strapped businesses is finding, cost-effective ways to motivate them and ensure they achieve their best. Here are some tips to help you:

• Create open communication Employees want to know that they are valued, appreciated, and heard. Creating open lines of communication will allow them to share their ideas, challenges, and goals. You could, for example, create an employee survey or schedule ongoing one-on-ones to speak with them about the opportunities and challenges they face and your plans for the company.
• Recognize milestones and accomplishments. A formal recognition program not only rewards employees for their hard work but also inspires them to do their best and achieve their goals. It also helps employees understand how important they are to your organization and understand the role they play in the company’s success. Awards, cash incentives, lunches in their honor, or even an extra day or afternoon off can make them feel appreciated.
   
• Be clear about goals and expectations. Employees can be better at what they do when they clearly understand their roles, the company's goals, and how they contribute to its success. Make time to meet with individual employees regularly and clearly outline their roles and responsibilities and how you will measure their performance. Also, provide feedback and coaching along the way to ensure your employees have what they need to meet their goals and responsibilities.
   
• Create career paths. One of the reasons people leave companies is because they may not have opportunities for advancement. You can help counter this by creating clear and tangible career paths for employees. As part of this career development planning, understand their goals, assess their current skills and skills they need for advancement, and provide training and education. You could also create a mentorship program, where they can learn from others.
   
• Offer work/life balance. Managing the responsibilities of home and work life can be challenging for employees. Offering work/life balance can go a long way in helping them. For example, you could allow employees to work from home a day of the week or leave early to attend a child’s game or a school event if they make up the work.

In short, when your employees are motivated to succeed, your business succeeds. That’s great motivation to make them a priority.