4 Key Things Your Employees Expect From You 

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Your employees represent your business and the first people your clients meet, making them an integral part of your business. Therefore, ensuring they are satisfied with working with you is essential, as it increases their motivation and boosts their productivity. Research indicates that approximately 65% of Americans are happy with their current jobs. Fortunately, you can increase your employees' satisfaction by familiarising yourself with their needs. Here are some essential things your workers expect from you.

Autonomy
Admittedly, you want to ensure that your employees perform their duties efficiently. However, micromanaging their every move can reduce their motivation and confidence levels. You also risk experiencing high turnover rates as they may leave your business for another. Instead, try promoting job autonomy. This way, your team can work efficiently without feeling stifled or pressured. Your employees will repay your trust and confidence in them by being more productive and engaged, leading to business growth. Moreover, you don't have to undergo a tedious rehiring process, as happier workers prefer to stay with your business.

Encouraging job autonomy begins with building a culture of trust in the workplace. This involves you delegating tasks and trusting your workers to tackle them in the way they seem best. Effective communication helps them understand what to do, so keep this in mind. Offer guidance and support when needed, and turn mistakes into teachable moments for improvement. Also, encourage your team to set their schedules or deadlines and acknowledge them when they complete their tasks.

Flexibility
A healthy work-life balance is important to employees, and what better way to achieve this than to promote work flexibility? Indeed, Americans are embracing flexible work, and the trend isn't stopping soon. Not only does it reduce your employees' stress levels and prevent burnout, but it also promotes workplace diversity. It's also easier to attract the right talents to your brand while keeping your employees happy. You can promote workplace flexibility by creating a hybrid workplace, where your workers can decide whether to work from home or in the office to increase productivity. As a tip, ensure that your employees have the necessary technology and tools to make working from home less stressful.

Likewise, consider offering part-time work arrangements to your workers who are parents and need time to care for their kids. You can also be flexible with the time workers wish to work. Flextime and compressed workweek are ideas worth considering, so keep this in mind. Likewise, encourage your team to take breaks to prevent fatigue.

Career growth opportunities
Zavvy's research indicated that approximately 94% of employees would stay longer with employees who offer learning and development opportunities. Employees at a point desire to climb the career ladder. And offering career growth opportunities can help them achieve this. Moreover, you benefit from this by developing and nurturing your internal talents. As a result, you don't have to rehire new talents to fill vacant roles. To get started, help them identify a career in your company and set specific milestones to measure their progress. As a tip, create career development programs and allow them to attend external conferences, workshops, and webinars.

Another idea worth considering is job rotation. This involves switching employees' roles by placing them in different positions or departments. This way, they can gain new skills relevant to their chosen career paths while boosting their confidence. You can also develop a mentorship program where seasoned workers can guide and share their knowledge with newer staff. You can further train employees with high potential for future leadership positions, so feel free to consider this.

Feedback
Feedback is essential to your employees for various reasons. For starters, they can understand where they excel or need to improve. This, in turn, leads to improvement and increased motivation. Feedback can be positive or negative, and how you relay the information is essential. If you need to give negative feedback, ensure that you don't begin with harsh criticisms. Instead, praise the positive things they did before easing into the negatives. As a tip, frame your criticism positively to prevent your workers from feeling embarrassed. Being specific with your feedback can help your workers identify what they did correctly or wrong, so keep this in mind.

You want to avoid basing your judgment on your feelings or subjective information. Instead, focus on the task, and offer the needed feedback based on their performance. You'll also find it helpful to have one-on-one conversations and encourage frequent feedback.

Your employees are instrumental to your business success, and ensuring their satisfaction is key. Hopefully, these tips will yield the appropriate results.