3 ways to increase employee happiness and wellbeing

Employee wellbeing and happiness have been at the forefront of most business leaders’ minds given the dramatic effects of the pandemic on the traditional working environment. Leaders are adapting to providing wellbeing and professional support remotely with fewer indicators to tell if something is wrong with a particular employee or team’s morale.

We’ve all observed how colleagues that are stressed or burned out have less patience and find it harder to empathise with customers. By taking the time to focus on employee wellbeing and happiness you improve the overall service your organisation provides, which is a win for all parties involved.

There are many different ways in which employee happiness can be improved, the most important of which is to talk about the topic, ensuring that your team know that their happiness and wellbeing are important!

Get social

One of the biggest impacts from the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns has been the isolating feeling caused by being disconnected from your physical team. This can affect not only morale and happiness, but also impact individual productivity and group project timelines. Fortunately, with the wide range of video conferencing software and technology available, this can be addressed on an individual and team basis.

Setting up regular team meetings to discuss projects will keep teams feeling connected and able to coordinate workloads and tasks. To recreate the social factor of working as a team, try to create a comfortable and welcoming ‘social space’ at the beginning of any team video conference or call.

Just 5-10 minutes at the beginning of a call or video chat to share a joke, catch up with each other and let off some steam over tricky customers or tasks will help ease tensions and lift spirits allowing people to focus on team objectives and tasks.

Creating team chats around specific projects or topics and actively encouraging participation helps to recreate more frequent and less formal interactions whilst working remotely.

On an individual level, having regular one-on-one meetings between employees and line managers can help increase employee happiness as it allows for easy discussion of workloads or stressful factors, and lets your employees know that their wellbeing is important.

Focus on personal development – reignite their excitement!

During the uncertainty of the Coronavirus situation it might seem hard to think about planning for the future, however it is extremely important for the wellbeing and happiness of your staff. Making it clear that personal development is still a priority for the company will reassure your staff that:

• They are valued for their skills
• You’re invested in their future
• They’re empowered to take control of their future in the organisation

The first step is to pinpoint their individual talents and areas of improvement, then discuss with them the development opportunities available, even when working remotely.  Coaching and mentoring, can work extremely effectively over video and will dramatically improve employee happiness as they work towards your shared futures.

Try digital happiness-measuring tools

Rather a new one on the scene, digital tools that measure happiness through apps have proven effective for forward-thinking organisations in tracking and monitoring employee happiness. Using an app like CheckIn, an intuitive and powerful app that provides visibility of employee happiness – including those working from home – allows management to see in real time the fluctuation of individual employee happiness and address problems as soon as they arise.

Not only will management have a clear view of employee happiness in an easy-to-understand format, but employees will also have the reassurance that the fluctuation of their happiness or wellbeing is just as important as hitting targets and deadlines.

Being able to submit feedback on their feelings and wellbeing will also give employees a level of control in improving workloads or time pressures both for themselves and in redressing the larger attitude of the company towards workloads more generally. Based on staff feedback, employers can adjust their working methods and ease the pressure on employees.

Firms in highly regulated markets often process large amounts of complaints and feedback from customers to improve their satisfaction, so it makes sense that it would also work to boost their employee happiness with the company experience too.

Employee happiness in the ‘next normal’

Finding ways to help keep your employees happy and motivated will help in both the short and long term as profitability and growth are intrinsically linked with good collaboration, problem solving and time management – all skills that are easier to achieve when employees are happy and committed to their roles and the organisation.

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