13 ways to motivate employees without spending money
In order for businesses to keep succeeding, the teams within the business need to be running at an optimal level. As such, sometimes your team needs a little pick-me-up, but strategies to increase employee motivation can get expensive depending on the chosen outcome to help boost morale and productivity.
The list below offers many other ideas to boost employee performance without sacrificing big chunks of your budget. Use it to guide you in motivating your employees in a cost-effective manner.
1
Offer praise
A little goes a long way. Sometimes, all a team member needs to hear is that they’ve done a good job after working towards something. Even if the project didn’t pan out as expected, don’t forget to acknowledge their hard work and provide credit where credit is due.
2
Improve culture
Creating a community feel within the company helps your team feel as though they are part of something bigger. In-person interaction is the best option but failing that, WhatsApp groups, Zoom coffee breaks or organising a quiz can work wonders to increase team spirit in a short amount of time.
3
Take the time to get to know your team
Showing genuine interest in your team builds a rapport that, in turn, makes the team grow stronger. Find out about their families, pets, hobbies and other interests, and let them know as their leader you’ll aim to help them live a more fulfilling life by taking into account their dynamics outside of work.
4
Actually ask about what helps motivate them
It sounds extremely obvious but many team leaders and their seniors forget that opening up the room to suggestions can help people feel heard and understood at every level. Employees want to know they are being thought about and catered to. A short ideas session or an ‘open door’ is a great platform to begin hearing team members out.
5
Create internal incentive processes
With the help of your team, set out clear goals for each member to work towards. If they’re planning for the next step within the company — be it a training course, mentor scheme, promotion or simply being included on the next big project. By doing so, you are helping to future-proof their career, leading to higher job satisfaction and boosting staff retention in the process.
6
Be flexible
If the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that employees have earned the right to autonomy, flexibility and trust. Being flexible means their work-life balance is acknowledged and improved, helping them feel valued within your team and the wider company.
7
Give employees a bonus holiday day
By incentivising holidays your team will feel extra motivated to come up with something unique while also working towards something bigger with the whole team. For example, leaders can try initiating some friendly rivalry where the best idea for a new project earns an additional holiday day.
8
Make a day of it with ‘Breakfast Mondays’ and ‘Friday treats’
Adopted by many start-ups, tech companies and creative agencies alike, incentives like free breakfast on a Monday or a Friday drinks trolley are already tried and tested. These days offer the opportunity for team members to bond and add an extra spring in their step when it comes to attending work on a given day.
9
Join a perks scheme
To provide a higher level of motivation over other employers, provide new perks that not all professionals are entitled to — for example, holiday pay is not a perk but is standard. Instead, you could join a third party perks provider to give them access to discounts, deals and special offers that those outside your organisation aren’t entitled to.
10
Respect team members and their time
Make out of hours really mean out of hours. While you may work overtime as your stake in the business is high, it’s key to remember that the rest of your team, particularly juniors, are not working for the same reasons that you are. Demonstrate respect for their lives outside of work.
11
Encourage friendly competition
Choosing an employee of the month, quarter or year, for example, is a great way to boost and retain team performance over time. Introduce a system where they vote for each other on certain elements of what you deem ‘good performance’, and announce the winner when the time comes.
12
Hold occasional family-friendly events
While inviting your team’s nearest and dearest to events can sometimes stifle inter-team bonding, inviting loved ones on occasion can be a great motivator. It helps employees realise their management cares about them as a person, providing an opportunity for them to feel both proud of their job and proud of their personal life.
13
Allow volunteer days
While demonstrating you care about more than the corporate world boosts employer brand perceptions, many workers today are purpose-driven. That means they care about more than money as their bottom line, and the opportunity to give back is a brilliant bonus for many.
Another route
Seeking impartial advice on employee motivation strategies
Paying a little for impartial advice is a great alternative to spending money on specific perks or motivators. Taking the time to delve into what makes a business and its people tick, outsourced HR brings in trained professionals who are experts at cutting through the complexities of the business world to hone in on key opportunities for improvement.
By reconnecting business goals with the people driving growth, consultants like ours at Gingko People align the whole business on a path towards success. A lot of the time, taking a holistic approach to employee motivation strategies is more cost-effective for the business in the long run and enables more sustainable growth.
Any team leader searching to boost employee morale and motivation without spending too much money can rely on this list to bring some new ideas to the table.
By using these suggestions, we hope our list helps to support in increasing team performance and the overall success of your company.
For a more bespoke approach to your employee motivation strategy, let’s discuss your work in detail and explore tailored and highly effective team member motivators.
