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Employee welfare and business success are more connected than you may think. An organization full of happy and satisfied employees will definitely see more success than the exact same company with unhappy employees. In general, people work a lot better and are more effective when they’re happy.

It’s a simple fact of life, and you can test it out by looking at yourself. How hard is it to find the motivation to work when you’re not happy or feel unsatisfied? More to the point, remember when you had to go to work and spend hours doing things for your boss? It was hard to work well when you didn’t feel looked after or valued. Your employees will feel the same way unless you show them how much you value their work. The best way to do this is by looking after them, and here’s how you do that:

Offer A Degree Of Flexibility

To kick things off, you should address the main source of employee discontent; long and strict work weeks. People hate working 9-5 every day, and it slowly begins to pile in on them. They stop looking forward to work, which means they start being less effective in their role. To change this, you need to offer a degree of flexibility to your employees.

All this means is that you give them more options with regards to how they work. Instead of strictly working 9-5 each day, you could introduce staggered shifts where they might start later one day and continue working past 5 to make up for it. Or, you allow them to spend a couple of days working from home. Either way, they no longer have such a long and strict working week to look forward to. This makes them much happier at work, more relaxed, more cared for, and miles more productive.

Provide Food & Drink At Work

Food is the quickest way to someone’s heart. How often have you been at work and just wished you could get a quick snack? Or, perhaps you wanted to eat lunch in the office as the weather is horrible and you haven’t got any food? I’m sure this happens to your employees all the time, and issues with food and drink can cause them to get very grouchy and unproductive.

So, why don’t you provide food and drink at work? Depending on your business, you could have a little cantine area where they can all sit and eat lunch. Or, perhaps you just get some vending machines full of snacks and coffee to satisfy them when they get cravings? There are loads of cashless payment solutions you can use to ensure they can just pay using a card or special fob as well, which eliminates situations where someone forgets to bring any change. By doing this, you’re giving your employees an excellent benefit that they’ll appreciate greatly.

Offer Mental Health Counseling

I think this is such a big thing that should be mandatory for all employees. Yes, some companies offer healthcare as a benefit, but all businesses need to have mental health counseling for their staff. This is because we live in a world where stress and mental anxiety are literally big killers. They won’t just ruin your employee’s efficiency, they’ll destroy their lives. To make matters worse, a lot of their mental health issues are probably caused or amplified by work!

For me, you should give them access to mental health counseling or therapy whenever they need it. If anything, you should encourage them to use it if you feel like they’re suffering. To your employees, this shows them how much you care as you’re actually trying to help them out. As a result, they will work harder for you and be more productive. Plus, you can help them get over their mental hang-ups, which will help them be even more useful for the team.

Actually Pay Them Well

Is a business really looking after their employees if they don’t pay them enough to go home and look after themselves? Money is one of the main factors when it comes to employee welfare and satisfaction. A lot of people will leave your company if they’re not paid well or rewarded for their efforts. Anyone that doesn’t leave will probably only stay as they don’t have much choice and can’t risk being out of a job for a few months. So, their heart isn’t in it, and they’re very much absent at work without performing to their peak capacity.

It’s so simple, all you need to do is pay your employees a salary they deserve. Don’t undercut them just to try and save money, and give them bonuses at the end of the year if they’ve done well. It seems like a substantial business expense, but you will 100% make more money with a team of workers that are happy and satisfied with their job. Pay them poorly, and they’ll always do the bare minimum, meaning your company will go nowhere.

Extend Their Holidays

Briefly, I want to touch upon the idea of extending employee holidays. This comes from Scandinavia where countries like Denmark and Sweden offer more holiday allowances for their employees. The aim is to give them more time off so they can be more refreshed throughout the year.

Realistically, this might not be possible for all businesses. However, providing more than the expected holiday time will definitely benefit your employees, so give it some thought.
In conclusion, these ideas will ensure you really look after your employees. As a consequence, you will be surrounded by a happy team of workers that are pleased to work for your company. They’ll have little to complain about, which means they focus on their work and become more productive. From this, you could see an improved output, which may influence sales. On a different – yet equally important – note, you should also reduce your employee turnover. Fewer people will leave, meaning you don’t have to spend money trying to hire new people, which means your business will save cash as well.