Part 2 Field Guide

Twelve Ways to Create Happy Employees

Do the math.  Divide your total annual revenue by your total number of customers to calculate the worth of your average customer.  Now divide your total annual revenue by the number of your internal customers (better known as staff) to estimate their average worth.

You will soon discover your average employee is worth more than your average customer.  Do you give them the same attention and courtesy that you give your external customers? 

Begin your daily planner each day with a note to “Catch someone doing something right”.  This simple tip will reverse your natural tendency to reprimand staff and help you focus on being much more productive through rewarding and recognizing customer-friendly behaviors.

“Stuff” rolls downhill, and happy employees will treat your customers better than unhappy employees will.  These tips will help you create a more customer-friendly environment.  

1.) Hire Based on Attitude, Effort, and Honesty: Hire for attitude and will, over aptitude and skill. Skills can be taught; attitudes are hard to change. If the applicant that you are interviewing left their last three jobs because their “boss was a jerk”, the odds are overwhelming that you’ll be a jerk too.

2.) Respect Your “Internal Customers”: The way you treat your staff inevitably results in the way they’ll treat your customers.  Is the staff washroom and lunchroom as attractive as your customer showroom?  Do staff complaints receive the same attention that customer complaints do?  

3.) Lead by Example: As the owner or manager, are you the happiest person in the building? Smiles win hearts and wallets and when it comes from leadership, it sets the pace.

4) Invest in Training: Training pays off on two fronts; one - your customers prefer to do business with well-trained staff, and two - staff respond positively to employers who make an investment in their careers.  

5.) Create a Happy Place:  Some businesses and industries, by nature, aren’t built with “happy in mind”. It doesn’t have to be this way. Create "happy" when and where appropriate. Games, lunches, music, appropriate jokes, all make people smile. Employees that smile are far more productive.

6.) Catch ‘em Doing Something Right: Behaviors that get rewarded get repeated. If you want your staff to exhibit more customer-friendly behaviors, you need to recognize those behaviors.  Begin your daily planner every day with a note to “Catch someone doing something right today”. 

7.) 360 Degree Feedback: Schedule regular performance reviews to highlight the positives as well as the negatives. Most importantly, make them two-way performance reviews, giving the employee the opportunity to tell you how they think you and your company are performing.  

8.) Sell Them: Employees perform better for companies and people they are proud of. Sell them every day on your mission, the merits of your company, your products, and your services. And don’t be afraid to ask for suggestions and input so staffers can tell themselves it was their idea.

9.) Team Players: Develop a team spirit where each player is dedicated to their teammates’ success. Any team is only as strong as its weakest player, and everyone should be encouraged to develop and help their fellow team members.  

10.) Communicate: Make sure your staff hears about new developments within your company from you, not from the rumor mill. And when you are introducing new concepts or processes, introduce them from the staff’s point of view rather than the company’s, i.e. “These new computers will make it easier for you to do your job”, versus, “These new computers will increase our profit margins.”  

11.) Recognition: Recognize individual and team achievements privately and publicly. Even the smallest victory should be recognized and celebrated, and when possible, promotions should come from within rather than hiring from outside, and they should be based upon merit, NOT tenure.  

12.) Empowerment: Try to not micro-manage your people. A little trust goes a long way. Let your staff know they are allowed to make mistakes as long as they learn from those mistakes.  Also, have customer service policies and procedures which empower your staff to resolve most customer complaints themselves rather than having to run to their manager.