People are reviewing what they want from the businesses they work for in 2022. This is a good thing. People should pursue their dreams.
Businesses are seeking new ways to put employees first. It is not enough just to be competitive with compensation or include new perks in response to the current state talent. To stand out, you need to do more. Businesses that deliver for their employees consistently win.
It’s a simple formula of hiring the best people: invest in them, and in turn, they will work hard for your clients and each other. Your success is dependent on the quality of your employees and the quality of your clients’ employees.
Although it sounds simple, how do you create an environment that encourages over-delivering? Every CEO and every business owner needs to be constantly improving in order for their business to grow and thrive in a changing environment. We need to listen to our people, take feedback, and then act on the things that make us and the businesses we lead better. Feeling like you can shape your career and voice your thoughts with peers, management, leaders, and owners is critical to feeling like you belong at a business.
Here are some ways that you can create an employee-driven company and launch yourself to success:
Opportunities for career advancement
Ensuring you hire the best talent allows you to continue to grow your business, and in turn, creates an opportunity for your people. It’s then about investing in training those people to help them grow and take on that opportunity.
It is important to find people who are aligned with your values and high-performing culture. Learning from experts, events, classes, and mentors are important ways for employees to develop, but I’ve also found that setting big ambitious goals and getting uncomfortable is one of the best ways of putting those learnings to the test and growing. Development and growth are what happens in the daily grind. We can probably all agree that there is no course that can prepare you for running a business.
You don’t have to go one way to grow your career. It’s all about allowing people to pursue their passions and achieve their goals. That could be in different roles, different departments– even in different cities. Accessing those opportunities is crucial. It’s important that we continue to work towards transparency and allowing people to apply for them. It is crucial that advancement opportunities are made into roles and are easily achievable. When they are, it should be celebrated.
You can create a sense of belonging.
How can you give your employees a deeper sense of belonging and connection? You can do this by allowing them to connect in meaningful and meaningful ways, giving them career opportunities and autonomy, as well as ensuring that everyone has equal access to these experiences.
It is important to invest in diversity and inclusion. Having a diverse range of thoughts, backgrounds, opinions, and voices– all speaking in a place where everyone feels comfortable in being their whole self– is how we have better conversations, better and more productive disagreements, and, ultimately, how we make better decisions.
But diversity and inclusion don’t just happen. It’s something that everyone has to do. It means being open about the fact that the business is not living up to its potential. This is when you need to make a commitment to change so that your employees feel more connected.
Allow autonomy to show trust.
Intelligent, capable people don’t expect autonomy; they demand it. Trust is a key ingredient to smart, responsible people making the right decisions. Their decisions are what drive extraordinary growth.
There is a reason you hired every employee at your company. It’s up you to let them perform the skills that attracted them to you during the interview process. It can be difficult to trust people, but it is possible to give them clarity about what success looks like and allow them to show you what they can accomplish.
