Here, Paul Rowlett from the corporate gift specialists EverythingBranded offers his top tips for maintaining your positive company culture, even when your staff are working from home.
Although the ongoing coronavirus pandemic might have forced your hand when it comes to letting your staff work remotely, you might be thinking about making this more of a long-term arrangement. Perhaps your company has been hit quite hard financially and you’re looking for ways to reduce your overheads, or you might have personally enjoyed working remotely over the last few months.
It’s likely your employees will appreciate more remote working going forward, too. In fact, research by Michael Page has found that 66% of professionals working in banking and financial services would like flexible working hours, and 53% also listed work from home options in their top three desired benefits. Regardless of whether your staff are in the office or working remotely, though, you’ll still want to hold onto your positive company culture. And, here, I’m going to offer my top three tips that should help with that.
Check in with everyone regularly
When you’re trying to achieve or nurture a positive company culture, making your workers feel appreciated and valuable should be your number one priority. A lot of business owners make the mistake of assuming that paying their staff’s wages is all the thanks they need, but you need to remember that your workers could probably find a similar job elsewhere quite easily. It’s the company culture and people that they’ll stay for, so you need to try your best to give them the attention they need, even if they aren’t physically in the office with you.
One of the easiest but most effective ways to make sure your employees feel valued is by checking in with them individually on a regular basis. Give everyone some space in your diary, so you can catch up with them, give them some feedback, and ask if they have any concerns regarding their jobs. This will also give you a chance to ensure you’re catering to everyone’s needs. For example, you might find that a number of your staff members would benefit from their working hours being tweaked, or they might need a particular program or piece of equipment to help them with their job. There are lots of little things your employees might just struggle along with if they aren’t given some one-one-one time with you, so checking in with them will ensure you get the whole picture of how they’re finding their job, and you might find there are some ways in which you can help them out.
Reward their hard work
It’s also important that you reward your staff for their hard work, as this will help to make them feel valued, as well as motived. Obviously, working in the financial sector is particularly difficult at the moment, as so many businesses and markets have been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic. So, it’s worth reaching out to let your employees know that you appreciate things are quite tough right now, and that you’re proud of how they’re handling things. And, if they hit particular targets, or you have a very impressive month, make sure they know that you’ve noticed!
Practical corporate gifts are ideal for showing your gratitude and, if you choose to have them printed with your logo or company name, they’ll also remind your staff of how much your business values them. Choose your presents wisely, though, because you don’t want to send your staff items that will just be left on their desk or forgotten. Think about what they could actually use. Most people working in financial services will often require stationery, a tablet that might need a cover, and possibly even some headphones, so there would make great work presents. A reusable water bottle or coffee cup could also work very well.
Host remote socials
Due to the UK being on lockdown for the last few months, we’ve all had to get a lot more creative when it comes to how we socialise. This means video chats and online pub quizzes have become increasingly popular. So, even if your whole team are working remotely, don’t think that this means you can’t still hold staff socials. These might just have to take place online from now on — especially while social distancing measures are still in place, and if your employees are spread quite far and wide.
If you’re planning to let your staff work remotely for the foreseeable future, consider scheduling a work social every quarter. This will give everyone something to look forward to, and will also help to keep relationships strong among your team. You’ll know that everyone works a lot harder when they’re working with a team they love to achieve a common goal, so it’s still important that your staff have fun together, even though they might not see each other too often. And making it a priority to invite everyone along to remote social events is sure to make all the difference.
If your company and staff have benefitted from working remotely throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, you might be thinking about allowing everyone to continuing working from home. You’ll still want to maintain the positive company culture you’ve fostered, though, and these tips should help you do just that.
