6 Innovative Ideas to Motivate Your Employees

It’s been said ad nauseam, but it bears repetition — employees are the lifeblood of any organization. Once your company is past the product-market fit stage, your successes and failures can be attributed directly to the performance of your employees.

This means that it’s in your interests to keep your employees motivated and eager to contribute. They should look forward to their work as an invigorating part of the day and as something that helps fulfill some of their life goals instead of just the monetary ones. According to a recent Gallup survey, engaged employees demonstrate up to 81% less absenteeism and offer 14% more productivity, resulting in companies that are up to 23% more profitable.

So how do you motivate your employees?

Employee incentives and recognition programs are a great way to do this because not only do they help your employees, they show them that you care. These also tend to differ across organizations since every organization is unique. When designing an incentive program, think about what your employees value. Consider a mix of financial and non-financial incentives that will keep your employees upbeat and engaged at work.

Financial Perks

Financial perks and benefits, outside of their regular salaries, can be a huge motivator for employees, especially with the cost of living on an upward trend. Today, workers will often look for these perks as an incentive to retain or change their employers.

There are a host of lifestyle and retail and benefits to choose from. Everything from company cars to commuting allowances, meal deals, coffee coupons, streaming subscriptions, and cinema tickets can make your employees’ lives that little bit better.

As a company, there are also ways for you to rationalize these expenses. Consider partnering with local businesses and services, including restaurants, dentists, and retail outlets that would like some publicity to see if they’re willing to provide complimentary or discounted services. National or regional brands that are looking to expand into your area are another option. Certain service providers will offer you a significant discount anyway, given that you’re an enterprise with lots of potential customers.

Employee Wellbeing Benefits

Employees are at their most productive when they’re mentally and physically healthy. Healthy employees are often in a better frame of mind, allowing them to focus better during work.

Having said that, building healthy habits can be challenging. Here’s where you can come in as an employer to incentivize your workers to take better care of themselves. Employee wellness programs can offer your workers any of a host of benefits, including premium credits for their medical plans, healthy meal plans, gym discounts, mental health days, therapist access, and direct wellness bonuses.

Don’t hesitate to measure their progress across any of a range of indicators, from their Body Mass Index (BMI) to their reported body weight and exercise hours logged on their smartwatches and digital health dashboards.

Offer compliant employees the bonuses and perks which make sense for your company.

Employee Recognition Programs

Not all of your incentives need to be monetary ones. Simply recognizing their work and achievements can be immensely motivational for them.

Consider instituting a structured program or platform that offers your employees a chance to be seen and acknowledged by their peers and senior management. This is especially important given that remote work is much more prevalent than it used to be and there tend to be fewer interactions between a globally distributed workforce.

Ideas include acknowledging employee birthdays and work anniversaries, employee-of-the-month recognitions, lunch with the CEO, and KPI-linked incentives.

Flexible Working Options

In the wake of the pandemic, a number of organizations realized the benefits of permanently allowing their employees some form of flexibility in how they work, whether it’s flexible working hours, remote work, or hybrid collaboration.

For instance, in a recent Gartner survey, 43% of respondents said flexible working hours directly led to greater productivity. It also said that the time employees saved on commuting allowed them to get more out of their work day. Remote collaboration has enabled legions of workers, from parents of newborn kids to differently-abled persons, to be much more productive at work than they would be at 100% on-site companies.

What’s more, flexible working offers your organization significant benefits outside of just increased productivity. Recruiting remote workers allows you to tap into a much larger, global talent pool than companies that are just recruiting locally. It lets you access candidates who may be better qualified and better fit for your organizations than those in your city or country.

Learning and Development Programs

L&D programs can be a powerful catalyst for your employees’ personal and professional growth. Through it, employees can master the additional skills they need to succeed at their job and any potential roles they’re looking to move into.

It’s also a dual-benefit tool in that it promotes individual development of the employee while helping improve their business performance as well. Consider embedding a Learning Management System (LMS) into your employee tech-stack. An e-learning platform will give your employees the freedom to learn at their own pace while working around their professional obligations.

Embed rewards for e-learning into your employee incentives and recognition program to keep your employees progressing.

Equity-Sharing

Finally, if employee retention and engagement is of paramount importance to you, consider offering them equity in your company. This makes your employees feel like they’re a real part of the company with a stake in how well it does beyond their fixed salary.

A lot of startups and scale-ups tend to do this with their key personnel. You might also want to consider this if your company operates in a technical niche where qualified talent is scarce. Offering some of your employees a share of the profits will help prevent poaching by competitor firms.

Remember that incentive programs are a very flexible tool. There are options out there for every budget and type of company. Structure your program to fit your organizational objectives. If you’re unsure of where to begin, consult your employees to understand what kind of benefits they’d like. Consult them anyway from time to time for feedback on how well the program’s working. After all, an employee motivation program is all about keeping your employees happy.