As you grow as a company and start to take on more and more staff, it is vital to set a culture that really encourages people to stay. This isn’t through threats and scare tactics, but through a supportive and positive working environment. Finding great staff is hard enough already, but it’s retaining them and giving them a sense of belonging that will transfer into their willingness to do their best to serve your clients.
In Simon Sinek’s book ‘Start With Why’ he explores the idea that your success always comes back down to your employees. If you look after your employees, if you inspire your team, there will be nothing for you to worry about. They will be the drivers of your success, and we couldn’t agree more.
So just how do you provide the best for your employees? You need to know what you can do for them, which means that the best way is to ASK THEM. Finding out what your employees really think about you and your company is scary, but the honest opinions from your own employees’ mouths is second to none.
Honesty is the Best Policy
At Outsourcing Angel, we bit the bullet and did just that. We sent out an anonymous (compulsory) company survey to find out what our staff really think of us. We always hope and work towards building our company up with love and support, but we needed to know if it was really reflecting in our company culture. We created the survey form using an online tool called Wufoo and asked questions such as:
- What did you think of the company before you started?
- What did you think of it once you started?
- What feeling does the company give you?
- What makes you want to stay?
- What can we do to keep you forever?
The vast majority were able to complete it in time, and luckily, we were able to let out a sigh of relief that almost 90% of our staff had raving reviews of our company.
“People are awesome! It’s a family.”
“Outsourcing Angel is a community with an encouraging influence on every member.”
“Nothing (needs to change), cos I’m not planning to leave. I am willing to be part of Outsourcing Angel until the end.”
“Keep doing what you do and lead with a heart and put love in every project so that we all can have a bigger purpose than just making money. Make us proud to part of OA.”
Seeing such positive thoughts and to see that the loving culture that we set out to create is actually being taken on and fostered by our family of staff is heart-warming and incredibly motivating.
But just as important as the good reviews were the minority of negative reviews. It was these reviews that really gave us the guide to grow and improve for our staff.
Thanks to the anonymity of the survey, some staff were able to tell us exactly what they were dissatisfied with. We were even fortunate enough that even these staff members retained enough faith give us constructive feedback that provided room to grow. They spoke about our shortcomings with new staff, and the anxiousness they felt about not having clients immediately.
To be clear, it’s not about listening to the advice to know the feedback, it’s about taking on the advice and taking immediate action. Within days of getting back the results, I addressed it with a FB Live Video to all our staff and clarified some issues and told them our solutions moving forward. I wanted to demonstrate that their voices are important and that we take their feedback seriously.
What About You?
If you’re looking for ways to grow your business, it’s not always about looking far and wide for magic tools. Taking the time to really understand your staff and to invest in them will take you much further than you could imagine.
One important tip from us is that when you approach this feedback activity, make sure you’re giving the opportunity to receive real, unrestrained thoughts. This means that you need to be willing to hear the good, the bad and the ugly without any prejudice, and that they need to feel comfortable telling you everything. We achieved this through anonymous online forms, so if you would like help setting that up, send us a message or speak with our team and we would be more than willing to help.
If you’re willing to take responsibility and take action to give your staff the best, the hard-work and loyalty that they will reward you with is simply immeasurable.
