How to motivate and inspire your staff? The NetProspex, a software-as-a-service company, knows exactly how to achieve this. Recently, it scored high in surveys about the best places to work. Many of its new employees come from referrals by existing ones. That is, according to the CEO Michael Bird, a truly notable achievement. The inc.com website completely agrees. How did this company gain its enthusiastic employees with such a high level of engagement? What are the lessons to be learned?
1. Hire great hires
Although it is difficult, don’t settle for less than an amazing candidate. It is true that not meeting your hiring plan can slow down your business, but having a wrong person is more costly than having three empty seats. Such a person will drain your time and energy. The other half of the effort is to mix hires together as soon as they start working.
2. Perks are not everything
Providing food in the form of sweet candies may be popular, but it is not enough. It simply is obligatory and expected, which is also the case of beer on Fridays and yoga class once a week. However the most important form of motivation is respect for employees’ ideas and contributions.
3. Meet your employees
Mr. Bird likes MBWA (managing by wandering around). He even didn’t have a private office for a long time, and even now he shares his office with the CFO. By wandering around the offices, and meeting people in different workspaces, he is more accessible to all employees. He even wears a step tracker to check his goal of reaching 10,000 steps within the office every day.
4. Balance goals collaboratively
Of course, some goals mainly in finance or products are required by investors and have to be imposed from above. But where possible, set the goals collaboratively with the team. An advantage in this is the goals will have just the right level of attainability. They should not too difficult but are still a bit of stretch.
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