Are your employees happy? Are they satisfied while working at your organization? Happy employees are extremely important, as they represent the company to the public. Satisfaction isn’t limited to compensation. A salary raise or benefits might improve employee contentment temporarily, but small or inexpensive changes can have a long-term impact. Let’s get to know how.
What is Employee Satisfaction?
Employee satisfaction is the level of contentment or happiness an employee feels for his job. Many measures show that employee satisfaction is a factor in employee motivation, employee goal achievement, employee productivity, customer satisfaction, cost savings, and more in the workplace.
If the employees are not happy and content, it directly impacts the company as they tend to lose their motivation and underperform. Whereas, if employees are happy and satisfied with the management and work culture, they put their best effort into making the company successful.
How to Keep Employee Satisfaction High?
A little bit of effort can lead to efficient, happy, and loyal employees. Here’s listing out a few ways in which employers can keep their employees satisfied:
1. Give employees more control
Today, employees have demanding schedules outside of work, and therefore they appreciate a leader who considers work-life balance. Employers should prioritize giving employees more control over their environment, schedules, and work habits.
Since everybody has different obligations outside of work, customized schedules are a great way to improve employee satisfaction. Employers can offer alternative work schedules such as hybrid working or flexible work time.
2. Provide regular feedback
Feedback is critical for employee satisfaction. Employees need to know how their performance is being evaluated, as lack of employee feedback makes them unsure about their work and effort.
Employers can help others understand what is valued and how they are being evaluated by ensuring that employees at every level feel comfortable giving and receiving feedback. Managers should, therefore, master the tricks of providing feedback as it can build trust, employee satisfaction, keep the employees motivated and reduce turnover.
3. Employee recognition and appreciation
Employees voted for job characteristics that motivated them the most in a survey about employee motivation. The topmost desire was “Full appreciation of the work done.“
This only emphasizes the fact that when employees are rewarded and recognized for their work, it builds employee morale, productivity, and overall job satisfaction. But organizations often miss out on this psychological aspect.
4. Encourage learning
There is always plenty of opportunity for employee education. Employers should consider what skills their organization could benefit from and look for candidates internally who may be interested. Remember, when you give your employees room for developing their skills, it boosts their confidence, skill set and gives them a great sense of job satisfaction.
5. Encourage social interactions
Employers should encourage social relations as interacting with others gives people a boost in mood.
Consider an office arrangement that fosters communication. Arrange workstations so that the employees can see each other and can communicate easily. Employers can also encourage office celebrations for birthdays and holidays.
6. Healthy work environment
The work environment and company culture are vital in keeping the employees motivated. It significantly influences how the employees feel and influences their work life.
A positive and healthy work environment doesn’t only mean the organizational structure. It is the overall experience an employee shares with his supervisors, seniors, and co-workers.
Employers can build a positive work environment by building trust and having open communication. They can also develop healthy work relationships by listening and promoting equal opportunities within their employees.
How to sustain employee satisfaction?
To sustain employee satisfaction, you first need to understand and measure how satisfied they are. Employee satisfaction can be measured in several ways such as customer satisfaction, employee retention, etc. It is also measured internally.
1. Employee Satisfaction Surveys
Employee satisfaction is often measured using anonymous employee satisfaction surveys. The satisfaction survey is nothing but a series of questions that employees answer to inform the employer about how they feel or experience their work environment and culture.
But if an employer decides to use a satisfaction survey, he must ensure to make changes in the work environment based on the employee responses in the survey.
2. Exit Interviews
Another way to assess employee satisfaction is through exit interviews. Employers want to discover why employees choose to leave since satisfied employees rarely want to leave their jobs. The crucial question to ask is what caused the employee to want to start looking for a new job in the first place.
Final Thoughts
Satisfied employees do better work and stay longer. Employers can help motivate employees and provide deeper satisfaction by managing what really inspires people at work – what work they’re doing, why they’re doing it, whom they are working with, and how they’re being evaluated.