<p style="text-align: justify;">Whether you&rsquo;re working as part of a sales team, providing customer service or managing a branch of a major corporation, every professional needs motivation to do their best work. Many companies offer incentives to employees to inspire them to achieve more, but it can be challenging to find incentives that will inspire every team member perform at a high level, especially for very large businesses with hierarchical organizational structures.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">To decide if your business should offer a particular incentive, consider the benefits and perks you&rsquo;re already using to incentivize employees, why you&rsquo;re offering them and whether or not they are working.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>1. Understand Them As Individuals And Act Accordingly</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The best way to motivate employees is to understand them as individuals and act accordingly. Incentives motivate some, but not all. It also depends on whether it&rsquo;s a financial, such as a bonus, or a non-financial incentive, such as a flagship project. Leaders, who are often too far removed from individual team members, need to ensure managers are trained and have tools to deploy at an individual level to motivate their teams.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>2. Show Them How Much You Value Elite Performance</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Incentives are a great way for us to motivate our employees by showing them what we stand for. First, offering an incentive means that we value them and their performance. Second, when promised incentives are given, the message is that we stick to our promises and expect our employees to as well. Third, offering stellar incentives to the top 10% sends out a clear message that the organization values world-class, elite performance.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>3. Incorporate Healthy Competition</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The right incentive programs can help drive behaviors that result in improved business outcomes, lower absenteeism and more engaged employees. Incentives are a healthy way to incorporate friendly competition, which is a social proof strategy that may influence employees to improve performance when they see others being recognized for their hard work. Remember, people are the most important asset.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;"><strong>4. Design Thoughtful, Personalized Incentives</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Incentives, depending on what they are, can be a great motivator. The key question is, &ldquo;Is this incentive right for this specific employee?&rdquo; People need different forms of incentives&mdash;money, vacation time, recognition, an interesting opportunity or a promotion, for example&mdash;and each person may find one or more of these exciting. Thoughtlessly designed, standard incentives will rarely motivate everyone.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;"><strong>5. Let Employees Choose Their Own Incentives</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The quality of the incentive matters, as does having a choice. Employees are motivated by incentives in the short term, certainly. To make that motivation last, though, there need to be robust choices as to what and how much is on offer. Letting employees feel as if they have a choice and can control how they are motivated will get them engaged far more than offering generic, run-of-the-mill incentives, which can become expected.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>6. Create Incentives For Reaching Personal Goals</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Incentives must mean something. If you link the incentives to the individual&rsquo;s personal goals, they will; otherwise, they won&rsquo;t. Remember, what gets rewarded gets repeated. If you don&rsquo;t know the personal goals of your direct reports, finding out what they are is your first task. After that, it&rsquo;s easy.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>7. Help Them Feel As If They&rsquo;re Making A Difference</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Incentives, although certainly important in that they may make people feel valued in the short term, are not enough on their own. For the most part, people need to feel they are doing meaningful work that is openly recognized and appreciated. Employees need to feel they are making a difference, whatever their role. I am reminded of the&nbsp;<a class="color-link" title="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carminegallo/2018/10/11/18000-pages-of-nasa-archives-uncovers-jfks-speech-strategy-that-inspired-the-moon-landing/?sh=1652bfc94f7f" href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carminegallo/2018/10/11/18000-pages-of-nasa-archives-uncovers-jfks-speech-strategy-that-inspired-the-moon-landing/?sh=1652bfc94f7f" target="_self" data-ga-track="InternalLink:https://www.forbes.com/sites/carminegallo/2018/10/11/18000-pages-of-nasa-archives-uncovers-jfks-speech-strategy-that-inspired-the-moon-landing/?sh=1652bfc94f7f" aria-label="story">story</a> of a custodian working at NASA who told President Kennedy that he was not mopping floors but &ldquo;putting a man on the moon.&rdquo;&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>8. Offer Meaningful Support To Create Intrinsic Motivation</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Incentives are one tool&mdash;albeit limited in universal effectiveness and sustainability&mdash;for extrinsically motivating a workforce. Intrinsic motivation is far more powerful and lasting. Leaders would be well-served to get to know each of their team members deeply in order to support them in making meaningful and personal connections to their work. Then, watch engagement soar!&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>9. Find Incentives For All, Not Just Higher-Ups</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">You want incentives that you can back and keep in place for many years. They cannot be so unrealistically high that they demotivate others, and they need to be accessible to many. I don&rsquo;t like big, top-heavy monetary incentives for big bosses, who often reap massive amounts of money based on the work of those who serve them. Employees are resigned to this fact, but it tends to hurt people. Try to find incentives for all.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>10. Create Attainable, Highly Valued Incentives</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The term &ldquo;incentives&rdquo; has taken on an expanded meaning today. Once thought to be the ultimate motivator, financial incentives can demotivate employees if they are not based on results they can impact. Highly valued incentives in today&rsquo;s world include remote or hybrid work, no-meeting Fridays, flexible work hours and creative control over the work they do.</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Reference: https://www.forbes.com/</strong></em></p>
</blockquote>

Top 60 Employee Engagement Image43 1200x720

10 Ways To Keep Employees Motivated At A Large Business

<p style="text-align: justify;">It is fairly well established that employee engagement levels across the workforce are at incredibly low levels. It is also well established that an engaged workforce is considerably more valuable than a disengaged workforce. There have also been various attempts to rectify that matter, with Dan Pink arguing as far back as 2009 that the best route towards engagement at work is for the following things to be in place:</p>
<div class="article_paragraph_2" style="text-align: justify;">
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Autonomy - Our desire to be self-directed. It increases engagement over compliance.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Mastery - The urge to get better skills.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Purpose - The desire to do something that has meaning and is important. Businesses that only focus on profits without valuing purpose will end up with poor customer service and unhappy employees.</span></li>
</ul>
<p>A new study from Bath University takes a slightly different approach to try and hone in on what it is that distinguishes an engaged employee from a disengaged one.&nbsp; The research revolves around something known as job demand-resources&nbsp;theory, which suggests that it is the resources we possess that ultimately drives our engagement in any task. These resources do not necessarily mean tangible things, such as high salary or perks of the job, but can also include more intangible things, such as support in doing your work well, meeting your professional goals at work, help in reducing stress, or achieving personal growth.</p>
</div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The paper identifies five things that managers might want to consider to bolster the engagement of their team:</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>1. Organizational support</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As Pink suggested, and various researchers have confirmed in the years since autonomy is fantastically motivating. Giving someone the freedom to work and complete their tasks in the best way they see fit involves a lot of trust in that person. This is not the only way managers can show their support, however, as things such as recognition from one&rsquo;s peers, promotions, access to training and development, or the allocation of plum assignments can all show someone that they are valued and mean a lot to the organization.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This might also involve giving a degree of space and support for their creative and transformative ideas. Managers might consider nominating employees for awards or highlight their work in the media. During stressful times, such as COVID-19, managers might show they value their team by generally caring about their wellbeing and showing support for their entire life, not just their professional life. The general gist is that when people feel that they are valued, they tend to value their employer in return.</p>
<div class="article_paragraph_7">
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>2. Give constructive feedback</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Feedback is something commonly associated with something millennials crave, as their lifelong diet of social media has given them a daily dose of it. In reality, however, it is something that most of us appreciate, and this does not have to just be of the positive variety, as negative feedback can be crucial to our development, providing it is delivered in the right way of course.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">While managers can undoubtedly get better at giving feedback, employees can also get better at receiving it. Sheila Heen and Douglas Stone have identified three triggers that prompt a negative reaction to feedback:</p>
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The truth trigger occurs when we fundamentally disagree with the content of the feedback.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The relationship trigger occurs when we are generally not a fan of the person giving the feedback. They may lack the credibility to give you any feedback, or maybe you just do not like them. Either way, it diminishes your chances of absorbing the feedback successfully.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The identity trigger is invoked when the feedback strikes at something that is key to how we perceive ourselves as people. If we believe we are really great at something, and the feedback suggests otherwise, there is a strong likelihood of the feedback being rejected.</span></li>
</ul>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>3. A fair workplace</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">A desire for fairness is probably something that is hardcoded into us as humans, and there is unlikely to be anything more demotivational than a sense that the odds are stacked against us at work, whether due to favoritism, prejudice, or any number of things that may see us come out second best.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As Victor Hugo famously remarked, however, being just is not easy, and&nbsp;<a class="color-link" title="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24446913" href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24446913" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" data-ga-track="ExternalLink:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24446913" aria-label="research">research</a>&nbsp;has shown that exhibiting fairness at work does come at a cost. Despite that, it is worth the effort.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>4. Job design</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It feels like a long time ago that Amy Wrzesniewski and Jane Dutton, from Yale and the University of Michigan respectively, first aired the concept of job crafting, and yet despite&nbsp;<a class="color-link" title="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2017.07.002" href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2017.07.002" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" data-ga-track="ExternalLink:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2017.07.002" aria-label="research">research</a>&nbsp;showing that it is effective in eliciting higher performance and engagement, it still remains something of a niche activity.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It should probably stand to reason that the way our job is designed has a big impact on our engagement with it, and just as stakeholder buy-in is much higher for projects they have helped to design, so too are jobs that we have helped to craft.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>5. Help to improve</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Everyone wants to get better, and indeed it is probably rare to find an organization that is not suffering from some kind of skills shortage. Despite this seemingly perfect storm, however, support for learning and development often lags woefully behind this evident need.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Whether providing time and money for training, access to mentors, the ability to work across the business, or providing overseas exposure, the availability of development opportunities is a sure-fire way of boosting engagement.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Of course, none of this is particularly new, but one thing that unites all of the above is that they are all taking far longer to grab hold in the workplace than they should be, so it perhaps bears repeating for the umpteenth time.</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Reference: https://www.forbes.com/</strong></em></p>
</blockquote>
</div>

6179a7473854b15e11196ea6 Shutterstock 1389455627

5 Ways To Boost Employee Engagement

<p style="text-align: justify;">Hiring the &nbsp;right employees can make or break your business. Employee recruitment is about managing stress, as you will constantly be judged on your selection, and you obviously cannot please everybody in your organization.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">However, there are certain rules that you can use to hire the right employee for your business every time:</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>1. Look for Someone With a Commitment to Their Career</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">A person committed to his or her career is the candidate you want to hire. You don't want to hire an employee who switches careers or jobs frequently, just to get a higher salary. If a candidate is not loyal to any company, hiring this person could definitely be a problem for your business.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Always check the candidate's previous job duration and if he or she is switching jobs constantly, this is definitely not the right person for the job.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>2. Test for Excellent Learning and Analytical Skills</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Try to use different methodologies to assess the learning and analytical skills of your candidates. Testing candidates might be tricky, but don&rsquo;t evaluate candidates merely on the basis of their resume and their confidence because a resume can contain lies.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">A candidate with confidence is great, but what you really want is a candidate that has the right skills and educational requirements.&nbsp;Satish Bakhda from&nbsp;<a href="http://www.rikvin.com/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener" data-ga-track="ExternalLink:http://www.rikvin.com/" aria-label="Rikvin.com">Rikvin.com</a>&nbsp;believes that a&nbsp;candidate with confidence is great, but what you really want is a candidate that has the right skills and educational requirements.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>3.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Check Compatibility</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">You want to find an employee that will fit in with your&nbsp;<a href="http://www.nationalpeo.com/hiring-firing/whos-a-good-fit-for-your-company-culture/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener" data-ga-track="ExternalLink:http://www.nationalpeo.com/hiring-firing/whos-a-good-fit-for-your-company-culture/" aria-label="company's culture">company's culture</a>. Check whether the candidate has social skills to get along with others, especially with current employees and managers. Ask how he or she is managing current business clients to judge compatibility skills.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Remember, willingness is one of the primary things a candidate must possess to work with you. And if a person cannot get along with his or her current clients or previous bosses, it's not such a great idea to hire that candidate.</p>
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<div class="article-body-image image-embed__placeholder">
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>4.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Keep Improving Your Hiring Process</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Whether you are hiring employees for a big organization or looking for some potential candidates to build your start-up, the hiring process is the first and foremost factor you need to focus on. Make sure you are following these steps in your hiring process:</p>
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Instead of asking magic bullet questions&nbsp;or irrelevant questions, you always need to focus on getting to know the capabilities, knowledge, skills, confidence, attitude, and potential of the candidate.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">When you advertise job vacancies for your company, make sure that all the job requirements such as responsibilities, required education, experience, knowledge, and skills are clearly mentioned. It will help you in evaluating candidates and attracting applicants that fulfill all of your responsibilities and requirements.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">It's also a good idea to involve other people in the evaluation process, since more opinions can lead to finding the right hire.</span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>5.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Don&rsquo;t Forget to Hire Interns</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">People may disagree, but this is one of the best ways to hire the right employee for your business. You know all of their strengths, weaknesses, skills, knowledge, attitudes, behavior, confidence levels, and even practical evidence of work. What else do you need to know?</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">You've already done the hard work in picking an intern, so why not hire from this potential pool when looking to fill permanent positions?</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>6.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Get Social With the Candidates</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Asking personal questions won't get you anywhere, and could be awkward and uncomfortable for both parties. Rather, you or your human resources team should be analyzing the candidates&rsquo; presence on social media. This can be a great strategy, especially if you want to hire employees for tech businesses.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">You'll be surprised what you can find out about a candidate by researching their social presence. Did you know that more than 90 percent of companies prefer to recruit through social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn , and Twitter? If you look at the list of Fortune 500 firms, you'll see that 45 percent of these firms list job openings on social media.&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Reference: https://www.forbes.com/</strong></em></p>
</blockquote>
</div>
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20180717194808 Getty Images 805012084

6 Tips For Hiring The Right Employee

<div class="   mt-4 mb-3 ">
<p class="mt-3 text-base text-gray-600 sm:mt-5 sm:text-lg  sm:max-w-3xl md:mt-5 md:text-xl " style="text-align: justify;">You don't have to always learn the hard way but people seldom forget the lesson when they do.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Failure sucks, but it instructs. While missing the mark never feels good, failure is one of your best teachers when it comes to life and career advancement.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Once you&rsquo;re able to move past the pain of failure you can see failure as an opportunity to learn and grow. That's when you&rsquo;ll be able to forge forward in your career with more perspective and greater strength. In the long run, this can help you advance and achieve in bigger and better ways.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Here are five ways failure can help your career:</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>1. Consider new opportunities.</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As the adage goes, when one door closes, another opens. When you fail, it may&nbsp;be an opportunity in disguise.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Sometimes, you get so lost in the daily shuffle that it&rsquo;s easy to forget what is motivating you in your career, or what you&rsquo;re really working toward. Following a failure is the perfect time to take stock of where you are in your career and to consider your ultimate goals. If you&rsquo;re not working in the direction you truly want to go, this failure can have the silver lining of helping you seek out new opportunities which may be better aligned with where it is you actually want to go.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>2. Get out of a rut.</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Following a routine is a good thing, falling into a rut is not. Often, it's when you're in&nbsp;a rut that you&rsquo;re not performing at your best. This is when the mistakes occur that lead to failure. Failure can jolt&nbsp;you out of your rut and back into the present moment.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Failure is jarring, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. If you&rsquo;re in a rut, failure may propel you to be more mindful and careful in the days and weeks following. Simply put, failure can whip you into shape, which will make you a better and more effective worker. Ultimately, that is what will&nbsp;advance your career.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>3. Catalyst for change.</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Fail is the clearest sign you'll ever get&nbsp;that something you are doing isn&rsquo;t working. This gives you the opportunity to honestly evaluate what didn&rsquo;t work, and use it as a catalyst for change. What could you change to&nbsp;reduce the chance of failing again?</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It could be some&nbsp;minor&nbsp;bad habit that is holding you back. Failure is when you realize you&nbsp;need to eradicate it. Your failure could be a sign of something larger and more fundamental you need to be changed, like the field you work in or the types of roles you take on at work. Either way, failure can bring your attention to what needs to be changed.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Awareness that a change is necessary is a powerful first step. What do you need to change in order to be successful? Armed with this information, you can begin to take further steps needed to make a real and lasting change that can help your career.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>4. Avoid future mistakes.</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Failure isn't final -- if you learn from your mistakes. If you keep making the same mistakes over and over, then clearly you&rsquo;re not learning from your errors.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Once you&rsquo;ve had a chance to lick your wounds following a failure, honestly evaluate what went wrong and what you could do differently. If you truly do take away a lesson from your failure, then it could potentially shield you from future (and potentially bigger) failures. You&rsquo;ll never reach a point where you don&rsquo;t make mistakes, but the idea is to continually make new and different mistakes which you can continue to learn from. Over time, you&rsquo;ll continue growing stronger and learning new things. A willingness to learn is a common trait of the most successful people.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><strong>5. It keeps (or makes) you humble.</strong></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">When you only experience success and upward ascent in your career, you can start to think you&rsquo;re invincible. This can distort your sense of reality. You might start to think that the rules don&rsquo;t apply to you, or that you can&rsquo;t fail. Unfortunately, this lack of failure can give you a really big head.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Failure has the sometimes painful but ultimately positive effect of keeping you humble in your career. When you do experience failure, you appreciate success all the more. Failure in this way can keep you striving for more. You&rsquo;ll remain motivated to learn more and continue improving over time. As a bonus, by remaining humble, you&rsquo;ll probably be a more likable person, which certainly can&rsquo;t hurt your career.</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Reference: https://www.entrepreneur.com/</strong></em></p>
</blockquote>
</div>

Advice

Personal Development

Career

Portfolio Career

5 Ways Failure Can Help Your Career

<p style="text-align: justify;">As we head into the New Year and a new list of resolutions, many of us will make a pact with ourselves to have a better work/life balance. That may come in the form of turning off the screen and walking away from the computer at the end of the workday. And while some may feel guilty about not always being &ldquo;on,&rdquo; a new Korn Ferry survey of professionals shows it could make you more productive overall.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Although more than half of survey respondents say their company should have a rule that prohibits work calls and emails after hours, 88% say they still send emails and take calls past the regular business day.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Nearly three-quarters say they feel obligated to immediately return emails and take work calls, and 69% say they have had a boss who regularly expects them to respond outside of workday hours. Doing so may have the opposite effect of what managers want, as three-quarters of respondents say consistently being expected to work after hours makes them less productive.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Undoubtedly, the issue of working into the night is more pronounced here in the U.S. In other parts of the world, predominantly Europe, countries have or are looking to put in place legislation sometimes called the &ldquo;right to disconnect,&rdquo; which limits manager&rsquo;s abilities to encroach on worker&rsquo;s personal time with nighttime calls and emails, but here in the U.S., such efforts have achieved little traction either at the legislative or company levels. The continued practice of always being connected to work can have unintended detrimental effects like chronic stress, fatigue, and lowered productivity.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">While managers often do not think twice about emailing after hours or on weekends, encouraging employees to stay in constant communication can actually hurt their job performance and contribute to burnout and a lack of job satisfaction. Even though there inevitably will be situations where an issue must be dealt with immediately, our advice to leaders is to really think about whether the topic is critical enough to warrant after-hours communications and if it is, recognize it as such to the employee so they can feel appreciated rather than taken for granted.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">For those managers who depend on non-work hours to catch up on email, let employees know when things can wait until the next day so that they can feel comfortable not responding.&nbsp; With so many nuances to the Great Resignation, this is another area in which leaders can help themselves create a positive culture.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As we head into 2022, it remains unclear how long we will continue to work remotely. While the survey shows the vast majority of professionals say it&rsquo;s harder to unplug when your &ldquo;office&rdquo; is actually in the next room, it&rsquo;s critical to your health, your personal life, and yes, even your productivity.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><strong>Source: https://blog.shrm.org/</strong></em></p>

5 Ways to Boost Productivity 15902868

Unplug Already: Why Stopping Work at the End of The Workday May Make You More Productive

<p><em>Do you feel like your instructions often aren&rsquo;t followed?</em></p>
<p><em>Do you feel like you have policies no one is reading?</em></p>
<p><em>Have you spent the time documenting a procedure only to find the process is ignored?</em></p>
<p>If any of the above statements sound familiar, then maybe you need to take a step back and evaluate your approach to employee policies and procedures. In this article, we&rsquo;ll provide four tips to help you do just that.</p>
<h2>How To Ensure Compliance In The Workplace: 8 Tips</h2>
<h3>1. Documenting policies and procedures is key.</h3>
<p>If something is important to the success of your business, then it should be documented in your employee handbook. The idea of documenting policies&mdash;especially creating them from scratch&mdash;easily overwhelms employers when they try to craft the perfect policy language on the first draft. The fact is, your employee policies and procedures do not have to be sophisticated. The most important aspect is having documentation&mdash;establishing the procedures and policies in writing, and then continually tweaking them over time.</p>
<p>As you&rsquo;re crafting your policies and procedures, consider soliciting input from all levels of your company. Also, keep in mind that you&rsquo;re creating a&nbsp;<em>living</em>&nbsp;document: Whatever procedures and policies you establish need to be maintained regularly. As things change, you should update your handbook. Any document that sits static will inevitably become outdated and irrelevant.</p>
<h3>2. Consistently apply your policies and procedures.</h3>
<p>Your policies and procedures should be implemented from the top down, and&nbsp;<em>everyone</em>&nbsp;in your organization should be expected to adhere to them. You won&rsquo;t get buy-in from your entire team if the rules don&rsquo;t apply equally to everyone, so don&rsquo;t let employees who bring in a lot of revenue off the hook&mdash;they&rsquo;ll take everyone else off track. When you deviate from your policies and procedures, you nullify their importance.</p>
<p>To set the expectation for consistency, review your policies regularly with your entire staff throughout the year. Make this part of your culture by incorporating it into recurring meetings and other standing events.</p>
<h3>3. Remove barriers to compliance.</h3>
<p>Getting staff to take compliance seriously will not happen unless your policies and procedures are easily accessible, so make sure every person on your team has a paper or electronic copy available. Then make sure everyone has time to read it: Allocate some time for them to go through the handbook.</p>
<p>Another way to encourage compliance is to constantly tweak policies or procedures that become outdated (see step #1 above). Keep your policies front of mind and refer to them often.</p>
<p>Finally, reinforce your policies with checklists. If a procedure or a practice requires a certain order of steps, integrating a written checklist into the process helps reinforce the importance of completing the entire process. A termination procedure is a good example of when a checklist is useful, because there are many important steps in the termination process.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-forms/pages/cms_002039.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">You can see an example checklist here.</a></p>
<h3>4. Reinforce with training.</h3>
<p>Reinforce your compliance procedures and policies by making training a regular event. The more familiar your team is with what&rsquo;s expected of them, the less likely they will be to make those mistakes.</p>
<p>You can also remove the stigma of compliance failure by turning negatives into positives through ongoing employee training. For example, employers have many compliance obligations to provide mandated employment notices by certain deadlines each year. If your company misses one of those deadlines, we suggest:</p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Addressing it&mdash;don&rsquo;t brush it under the rug. Send that notice out even though it is late.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Don&rsquo;t waste time blaming the department or team that is responsible. Instead,&nbsp;<strong>train</strong>&nbsp;the team on your procedure and take it one step further;&nbsp;<strong>seek</strong>&nbsp;<strong>input</strong>&nbsp;from them on how to prevent the issue from happening again.</span></li>
</ul>
<p>When you focus on the positive, you may be surprised to find a new, better solution you had not previously considered.</p>
<h3>5. Stay current with ever-changing laws and regulations.</h3>
<p>Compliance doesn&rsquo;t just happen&mdash;it requires the organization, specifically its HR functions, to continually and consistently&nbsp;<strong>review</strong>&nbsp;the current compliance environment;&nbsp;<strong>update</strong>&nbsp;processes and practices based on new and changing laws as well as industry best practices;&nbsp;<strong>implement</strong>&nbsp;policy changes when necessary; and&nbsp;<strong>see those changes through</strong>, which ultimately guarantees compliance.</p>
<h3>6. Make sure all employees are following procedures.</h3>
<p>Ensuring employees comply with policies and procedures is one of the most difficult aspects of running a business, and unfortunately, policies hold no weight if they&rsquo;re not followed by everyone. This is especially true when policies change. We find employees are most likely to ignore a change when it impacts an everyday workflow.</p>
<p><strong>The key to getting staff to follow procedures is to involve HR.&nbsp;</strong>HR can help implement the changes and make sure processes work smoothly for everyone.</p>
<p>Broadly speaking, getting staff buy-in looks like this:</p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">First and foremost, communicate company policies and procedures with everyone in the organization in multiple ways.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Make sure employees understand the &ldquo;why.&rdquo; Explain the reasoning behind the change in procedures, policies, or rules.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Consider a reward system for embracing the changes.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Offer training as needed around the changes.</span></li>
</ul>
<h3>7. Schedule compliance audits regularly.</h3>
<p>Without testing your systems and processes, you&rsquo;ll never know if what you&rsquo;re doing is working. Scheduled compliance audits force your entire organization to make sure its procedures and processes are current and compliant. Furthermore, audits bring to light any gaps or bottlenecks in your compliance plan. We suggest you conduct both announced and unannounced audits at least quarterly for new processes and twice a year otherwise.</p>
<h3>8. Use tools and software to help simplify compliance.</h3>
<p>The right tools can make compliance easier. Manual data entry, paper copies, and copying and pasting are much more likely to introduce errors than using software designed to handle HR, billing, benefits, and compliance paperwork.</p>
<p>Here are two things I recommend as you look for software:</p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Make sure the software you choose is accurate and up-to-date for your locality. For example, if you&rsquo;re located in Massachusetts, your payroll software should be updated with information about Paid Family &amp; Medical Leave (PFML), so it automatically deducts the accurate amount of taxes per employee.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Similarly, your software should be reflective of the most current legislation and policies.</span></li>
</ul>
<p>At Genesis, our suite of software and tools helps you craft policy language and ensures your systems are changing appropriately as needed. Genesis runs payroll, calculates your team&rsquo;s benefits, simplifies your paperwork, and more&mdash;a one-stop shop to protect your entire business.</p>
<p><em><strong>Reference: https://genesishrsolutions.com/</strong></em></p>

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