Why keeping your agency motivated is like having a healthy cash flow
As any good agency owner knows, your employees are the most valuable asset you have. If you want your business to thrive, surrounding yourself with a team of reliable staff is essential.
Of course, to ensure they’re working at maximum effectiveness, it’s important to keep them properly motivated. This can sometimes be tricky, and it may be tempting to fall back on tired old strategies for encouragement.
If you’re struggling to find ways to keep your team motivated, it can be useful to think of it like managing a cash flow. Read on to find out why, as well as three useful tips for motivating your employees.
Properly motivated employees can be much more productive than unmotivated ones
As a manager, making sure that your employees are motivated can be one of your most important jobs.
If your team aren’t properly focused, they won’t work as efficiently as they could be, which may severely affect your company’s work output. This could cause significant reputational damage and lead to you missing important deadlines for clients.
In a worst-case scenario, if an employee feels especially demotivated, they may be tempted to leave your company entirely. As we discussed in a previous blog on the “great resignation”, many Brits have expressed an interest in changing jobs in the near future.
Despite how important this task can be, many managers struggle to address it. If you don’t know how, it can be easy to rely on unimaginative methods, such as a large annual staff party, to bolster employees’ happiness and satisfaction.
Of course, no matter how many stops you pull out for this event, it may not always be enough when there are other factors at play. If you’re struggling to find the right way to motivate your team, it could help to reassess how you think about the challenge.
Several smaller affirmations throughout the year can help to boost employees’ motivation
A useful analogy for maintaining your employees’ happiness is managing your business’s cash flow.
Each of your staff has an inner reservoir of motivation, in the same way that your company may keep cash reserves. When the employee feels appreciated and valued, that’s the equivalent of an income source. Conversely, daily inconveniences that can drain their morale are like expenses.
When there is more of the former than the latter, all is well, but a problem can arise when this is reversed.
Like with managing your business’s finances, it isn’t enough to simply have one major inflow each month when your outgoings are constant. When an employee’s reserves of motivation are low, they may work less effectively, or might even look for a new job entirely.
If you want to avoid this, it’s important to ensure that your inflows are always greater than your outflows.
This is why, while a large staff party is always appreciated, it can be wise to supplement it with several smaller affirmations throughout the year. This can help to keep your employees’ motivation high, even during particularly taxing periods.
Speak to your employees about what you can do to help them
If you want to bolster your teams’ motivation but aren’t sure how, there are a few easy ways that you can do so:
Offer flexible perks
One useful way to motivate your employees can be to offer a flexible package of perks on top of their regular salary. According to a report published by This is Money, more than half of Brits said they’d be willing to sacrifice some of their pay in exchange for benefits.
The survey noted that the most highly-desired perks were better parental leave, medical cover, and flexible working hours.
Make sure they have a healthy work-life balance
In recent months, many people have had the option to do their jobs remotely. While this can often be a good thing, one unfortunate side-effect is that it can blur the distinction between work and home life.
This can quickly lead to burnout. So, if you want to avoid this problem, it’s important to take care of your staff’s wellbeing and ensure they have a healthy work-life balance.
Encouraging them to take regular breaks can be a good start, as this can enable them to recharge their batteries. It can also be helpful to implement a policy that your employees shouldn’t answer emails or internal messages after they are done with their hours for the day.
Ask them what they want
Finally, when it comes to managing your employees’ wellbeing, it can be important to ask them directly how you can help. This will often provide you with a plethora of useful suggestions for how to boost their happiness and, as a result, their productivity.
On top of this, simply being asked for their opinion can often go a long way to make employees feel appreciated and heard.
Get in touch
While looking after the wellbeing of your employees is a key part of running an agency, it’s also important to look after your own. This is where having the right protection for your needs can help.
To find out more, email creative@eggarforrester.com or use our contact form to request a callback from our team.
