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| Management Tools |
| Management Focus: Ideas for improving productivity |
If your approach toward employee motivation is something akin to “I’m paying you. Do your job!” then a recent address by Jeff Alexander, President & CEO of Alexander’s Digital Printing may shed some light on your company morale problems.
Alexander made the following recommendations for improving morale and increasing productivity:
- Employees want more than money. They want respect, and they want somebody to care about them.”
- What motivates your employees this year may not work next year. Be prepared to change your approach periodically.
- Try “Open Book Management.” Help the employees understand exactly what the company’s financial obligations are. Alexander accomplished this by printing up some bogus “cash” and letting his employees see the actual profit and loss statement. Alexander let his employees see that sometimes the cash was gone before all of the bills were paid. When employees saw the realities of the cash management, and understood that all of their hard work was not just lining their employers’ pockets, they began to see that they had some personal control over helping the company make money.
- Try a “Positive Focus” session. If company goals aren’t met, spend some time discussing what did go right. “It’s very interesting when you try something like that how hard it is for people to think about something positive, because they’re not asked to think that way,” says Alexander.
- Read, read, read. “You may not get a thing from the book you read or the tape you listen to,” says Alexander. “But it can spark your thinking in another area and motivate you to come up with another solution.” Studying is vital.
Recommended Reading:
Case, John. “The Open Book Revolution.” INC Magazine. You can look at this article online at www.inc.com.\incmagazine\archives\06950261.html.
Gitomer, Jeffrey. Customer Satisfaction Is Worthless—Customer Loyalty is Priceless. Bard Press: Austin TX.
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