In order for your business to succeed, the people involved with the company must be motivated to see it succeed. As the business owner, you obviously have a vested interest in your company, so you will do whatever you can to expand your brand presence and improve your bottom line, but what about all of the other people involved in the process? Does Julie in accounting or Tim in sales as motivated and driven as you are to see your company succeed?

Speaking from my own personal experience, I found that I became very disengaged with some jobs when I felt that I was not being rewarded for my hard work. When employees are paid an hourly wage or a set salary, the paycheque every two weeks will look exactly the same whether they put in 110 percent or just 10 percent. It is important that you ensure your employees feel valued and appreciated.

This doesn’t necessarily have to take on the form of a monetary reward, like performance bonuses of some kind, but there has to be something there that makes them WANT to work harder, smarter, and more efficiently for you. Perhaps a friendly competition in which the top performer, based on a quantitative measure of your choosing, can earn an extra day off or the first pick of the litter when new supplies come in through the door. It’s really up to you.

One strategy that can be quite effective, when implemented correctly, is employee profit sharing. In this way, each and employee will have a vested interest in the success and profitability of the company. If the company makes money, they make money. This way, everyone can understand their contribution to the system and be rewarded appropriately.

What do you do to ensure that your employees stay engaged, motivated, and interested?