When budgets are tight and raises aren’t an option, the key to motivating your Finance staff is by making sure they feel a sense of accomplishment and ownership about their work.
Here are two proven ways to do it – courtesy of Rob Markey from the Harvard Business Review:
1. Get front-line managers more involved. Many firms rely on surveys to get the pulse of employees – and keep track of their engagement levels. But instead of distributing the results to the workforce — starting with the CEO — try distributing the employee survey results right to front-line managers, as well as upper management.
Reason: Managers are the folks who can directly help the staffers they’re supervising make changes.
Plus, they’re likely to take a sense of ownership in terms of helping employees achieve the change they listed in the survey.
2. Offer shorter, more frequent surveys. Some firms offer giant annual surveys that take workers a considerable amount of time to complete.
The problem with this is many employees rush through the survey just to get it done. What works better: Sending out shorter (one to questions on a specific subject) more frequently.