5 Tactics for Building a Healthy Work Culture in 2023
Building a healthy work culture should be the goal of business owners heading into 2023. A strong work culture is one that 88% of employees believe is the key to success. When you build an organization around these concepts, it can:
- Increase productivity
- Boost employee engagement
- Improve profitability
However, even though 94% of executives also believe in creating a great workplace culture, it takes time, dedication, and the right approach to implement.
5 Tips to Building a Healthy Work Culture
1. Create Clarity in the Organization
Role clarity alone can improve performance by 25%. It’s the responsibility of the business owner and leaders to ensure that there’s no confusion within the organization. Instead, you want to ensure that everyone knows their:
- Importance to the business
- Role in the business
- How to align their work to help the business reach its goals
You can even create clarity in your business processes. From the moment someone is hired, you should take steps to reinforce clarity in the role they’ll be in, what’s expected of them, and how their work will be crucial to reaching business goals.
Clearly defined roles alleviate confusion in the organization, which will lead to better performance results.
Everyone needs to understand their role and how it impacts the business. When everyone is “rowing in the same direction,” you can then refine some of the other key points below.
2. Revisit Your Communication Strategy
Is your communication strategy as effective as it could be? Often, as a business grows, there’s a loss of communication that becomes difficult to overcome. It’s up to business leaders to revisit how they communicate to ensure:
- Open and clear communication exists
- Communication attacks problems, not people
- Difficult conversations are still presented even when they’re uncomfortable
Healthy dialogue is one of the most important parts of business development and growth. Leaders must take it upon themselves to have healthy dialogue in the organization, even when this dialogue may be uncomfortable.
Open communication is optimal because it can lead to better business decisions.
On the other hand, if communication isn’t given the importance and attention that it deserves, it will be difficult for the business to make the best decisions. A lack of communication can also lead to employee goals misaligning.
3. Place Trust in Your Team
Do you trust your team? Do they know that you trust them? If you lack trust, you’re hindering the growth and potential of your business’s operations. You need to trust your team so that you’re:
- Open and honest with them
- Able to have conversations around ideas
- Confident everyone can work together to reach your goals
Work culture is based on trust. If you don’t trust your team, it can negatively impact productivity and lead to missing growth milestones.
When hiring employees, you need to vet them to ensure that they’re all leaders in their own right.
Building trust with your team is an ongoing process. If you lack trust, it may be time to incorporate team-building workshops into your business’s schedule. Trusting your team will allow you to take on more risk and reach for higher goals because you trust the team around you.
Furthermore, your team needs to trust you and one another, too. Show your team that you have their back and are willing to go in the trenches with them. If your team occasionally asks for assistance, help them in any way that you can. Be proactive in helping team members build trust with one another too. Holding team bonding activities and facilitating conversations that improve communication amongst team members is essential.
Finding good people is hard, but when you build the right team, they’ll be a major factor in your success or failure.
4. Start Holding Employees Accountable
One report found that 91% of employees believe that the top development needs in their company are effectively holding others accountable. Workers need to know that they’re all working toward a similar goal and giving it their all.
Building a healthy work culture means leading by example and holding everyone accountable for their actions, from the owner to the new hire.
In fact, go a step further and ensure that all parts of the team can confidently hold one another accountable. If your team can hold others accountable, it will:
- Build morale
- Strengthen the team to reach its goal
However, leaders cannot be held off of the accountability list either. A strong leader must lead by example. If a leader’s mistake causes a team to miss their goals, it’s up to the leader to take responsibility rather than deflecting blame.
It’s better to say, “I messed up, and this is how I’m going to fix it,” than to demoralize a team by not keeping yourself accountable.
Leaders lead by example and must be willing to do what they ask their employees to do – and more. Even the business owner needs to be in the trenches occasionally to meet deadlines and goals and help the team understand that everyone is working toward the same goal together.
5. Remain Fair – Even as an Owner
Being in the trenches deserves even more attention than what we touched upon above. For example, if a boss states that this weekend is mandatory overtime and spends the weekend out of the office on the beach, this will negatively impact the work culture.
In fact, a major part of the workforce will feel demoralized and even angry in the above example.
Leaders must show their commitment to the business and at times sacrifice alongside the employees to reach goals. It’s a powerful statement when an owner demands a lot from their workers but is also putting in extra effort.
Always evaluate fairness to ensure that the business’s leaders work as hard as everyone else and make similar sacrifices to reach the company’s goals.
Building a healthy work culture takes a lot of time and refinement. Business leaders and owners must revisit many of their core policies to ensure everyone is treated fairly and understands their role in the business.
Furthermore, these leaders should be careful if they’re asking more from their workers than they’re willing to do themselves.
If you spend the time to create the strong work culture that your team desires, people will feel invigorated to come to work, and productivity will likely soar as a result.
Want to learn more about building a strong work culture? Schedule an appointment with us today!