Many entrepreneurs become small business owners in order to make themselves happier and feel more satisfied with their job. They didn’t enjoy working for a boss who didn’t appreciate them, and so decide to work for themselves instead. It makes a lot of sense, but what doesn’t make sense is to then start hiring employees and become the boss you dreaded to see every morning. As you should know from experience, unhappy employees are unproductive employees, which means that you should do what you can to make sure that your staff never feel like you did. Here are some tips to help you with that.

Help Them Settle In

Your job starts from the moment each of your employees walks through the door for the first time. If you are to be happy at work, you need to feel like you really belong there and that there are people around you that have your back. This means that you need to take the time to help your employees settle in and introduce them to all of the other members of staff. It also makes sense to assign them a “buddy” for the first few days, so that they have someone to ask for help.

Recognise And Reward Progress

When you’re working your very hardest and hitting all of the goals you need to be, it’s difficult to be happy when you get no recognition for this work. To keep your employees happy and productive, it’s essential that you take a moment to recognise the work they’re doing and reward them for it. Sometimes a simple “thank you” is enough reward, but if an employee has done a particularly good job, then you might want to think of other ways to thank them.

See The Fun Side

If your employees feel as though they can’t have a laugh and a joke at work, then they’re going to hate coming in, which could lead to many serious problems. If you take a look at these creative office spaces, you’ll see one with a football table, one with a nail bar, and one with a cinema, which are all things that could really liven an office up and make it an enjoyable place to go. Of course, you don’t need these things for a fun office, but they certainly wouldn’t hurt.

Actually Talk To Them

Employees need to feel like their boss really cares about them, and this isn’t going to happen if you only interact with your employees when you need to talk about the business. You need to take an interest in who your employees really are, which means that you need to talk to them about their families, hobbies, and everything else that makes them who they are. If you do this, they’ll care about you too, and will be much more engaged, as they won’t want to let you down.

Without your employees, your business wouldn’t survive five minutes, so it’s essential that they’re happy at work. It isn’t always obvious how to keep your employees happy, but hopefully, these tips will help.