When your business specializes in engineering, mechanics or manufacturing, productivity can be essential. With targets to hit and processes to work through, it’s important that you get the best out of your employees.
From the processes you put in place to the support you provide your employees, your business could make big changes to how it works. This will help improve productivity and make sure your targets and goals are met.
Want to get the best out of your employees? Here are some ideas to help you succeed.
Review your processes
A review of your processes can make it easier to identify areas that need improving. If targets aren’t being met or there are barriers costing you time and money, then it’s important to investigate why.
By reviewing your processes, you can identify areas to make improvements. This can be done through a combination of factors, including consulting with your employees or bringing in an independent viewer to make observations and recommendations. Some areas for improvement will be very easy to identify, others might present themselves over time.
Make improvements to your workforce management
Improving your workforce management is another way to help get the best out of your workforce. Using workforce management tools, you can measure performance, identify gaps in your workforce and create better schedules. Workforce management tools can also help you create more accurate forecasts, which are ideal for business planning and identifying crunch points.
Recruit the best talent
Recruiting the best talent to your company can help ensure you have the best people working for you. But it’s not always as simple as it sounds. While there can be stiff competition for jobs, there can also be competition between companies as potential recruits weigh up their options to find the best employer for them.
To help recruit the best talent, you need to make sure you’re adopting modern recruitment practices, including using tools like LinkedIn and Facebook. You also need to make sure that your company is appealing to potential employees, with a strong program of employee benefits and high job satisfaction to help them come on board.
Prioritize health and safety
Health and safety are important to any business, but it’s especially important for businesses involving machinery and tools. Health and safety policies will depend on the nature of your business, and could include strict procedures and training for operating different types of machinery. Policies need to be communicated clearly, and should be published somewhere where employees can refer to them as needed.
In addition to preventing risks and hazards associated with work, you need to support the general health and safety of your employees. If you want to boost employee wellbeing, you need to consider their mental health as well as their physical health, implementing policies that can help employees feel respected, cared for and supported.
Regular check-ins with your employees can help identify issues at an early stage, helping to keep your workforce at the top of their game.
Ever heard of Paul O’Neill? Well, there was one time when ALCOA – The Aluminium Corporation of America, one of the world’s largest producer of aluminum was on the verge of bankruptcy because of safety concerns. One fine day, a new CEO – Paul, was chosen for improving the conditions of the the company and he declared that there should not be a single casualty/accident in the company no matter what happens. The complete focus was on safety of company employees and the company sky-rocketed its growth! Read The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg to know more about it.
Communicate openly
Communication is essential for any successful business. Many businesses suffer with communications issues, but there are ways to make communication more effective, helping employees feel more in tune with the business, while giving management better insight into what’s going on.
Conduct meetings that are productive, not long, and find alternative (and electronic) methods of communication. Managers should also have open door policies so that their teams can speak to them openly to discuss issues and concerns.
Communication also needs to be positive. Remembering to celebrate achievements and provide positive feedback will help keep employees motivated so that they keep performing to their best level.
Provide training and development opportunities
Keeping your employee turnover low is important for your business, and one way you can do that is to provide employees with different opportunities to develop and enhance their skills. An extensive training program can give plenty of variety to employees, but external training and development should also be provided.
Regular performance meetings should help identify employee aspirations and how they can be achieved. From providing shadowing and mentoring programs to conducting internal development schemes, there are a lot of ways to support your employees’ development and hopefully keep them within the company for the long-haul.
Putting time and resource into developing your workforce will pay off, ensuring you have a skilled team or workers helping to deliver your business’ goals.
There are a lot of industries which train employees in a specific specialized core field. On the other hand, if they require small trainings like MS Excel, Supply chain management, data management etc., the company can arrange them online on sites like Udemy or Coursera and help them financially.
Improve your work environment
If your work environment is looking tired and uninspiring, it’s unlikely to serve as a motivating space for your employees. Making improvements by changing the decor, adding new facilities, etc. can all help make your company a better place to work.
Increasing productivity in the workplace isn’t something that happens overnight, but making changes to the work environment could provide a welcome boost to your employees and could even change the way they work together. Be sure to provide breakout spaces and areas away from desks that will give employees some thinking time to work on new ideas and deliver the best from their projects.
Review things regularly to make continuous improvements
Getting the best out of your workforce will involve a lot more than a single review. Making improvements for the sake of your employees takes time, but their needs will continue to change. Just as your business’ priorities and targets change, you should have a continuous improvements program in place that helps support your employees, while making beneficial changes to the workplace.
Carry out reviews regularly and ask employees for opinions and ideas to help take your business from strength to strength.
A workforce that is motivated, skilled and happy will benefit your business in a lot of ways. By taking steps to care for the people at the heart of your business, you can help achieve the best results. Consider your existing practices carefully and make some improvements to help you get the best from your workforce. I