16/09/2024 Marjut Alatalo Toimitusjohtaja, WayUp Oy.
Would you like better productivity, fewer absences, higher engagement, a strong reputation to aid recruitment and customer acquisition, as well as increased innovation and creativity within your company or part of your organization?
If you answered "yes" to even one of these, then you have the reason to stop and read this blog. A productive and well-being-oriented work culture has been proven to improve employee engagement, motivation, and productivity, while also reducing absences and employee turnover. A thriving work community is also a competitive advantage, helping attract and retain the best employees while supporting customer acquisition.
How to Build a Productive and Well-being-Oriented Work Culture?
There are many factors that influence a productive and well-being-oriented culture. If I had to start with one, I would begin with developing communication skills, as a fundamental human need is to feel heard and seen. An open and respectful communication culture directly impacts collaboration among employees, organizational performance, customer relationships, and even decision-making. Here are a few everyday perspectives I’ve encountered:
- When the leadership team doesn’t genuinely engage in discussion, each business area has its own direction and self-interest as a priority. Leadership team meetings become briefings, where others aren’t interested in hearing the “report” from the head of another department, and instead, they multitask and focus on their own matters during the meetings.
- The leader of the leadership team often has an overly rosy view of how committed the team members are to the decisions made. What I mean by this is that there is no discussion within the leadership team about how each person understood the decision and how it will be reflected in action. There is also no follow-up on whether the decisions made are being implemented.
- When there is no open and respectful work culture, it negatively impacts achieving goals. This is mainly due to differing perceptions of the importance of the goals and even their content. When employees are involved in decision-making and can influence their own work, they find their work more meaningful and commit to it more strongly.
- The work done and the prioritizations do not effectively support the implementation of the strategy and goals if the culture of communication doesn’t facilitate this. There needs to be a certain regularity in tracking progress and open discussion and evaluation of what should be increased, reduced, eliminated, or developed. We are good at adding tasks, but we are often poor at reducing or even stopping certain activities. In my experience, most of us have room for improvement in genuinely aligning our actions with the strategy and goals. We often prefer to focus on tasks that inspire us personally rather than those that are most important for achieving the objectives.
Developing communication skills helps prevent some conflicts, facilitates the creation of a shared understanding, and enhances the sense of psychological safety.. Aloita jostain näistä:
- Be Present:Focus on listening to what the other person is saying. It’s easier to concentrate when you don’t think about your response in advance, but instead listen carefully and show interest. One of the basic human needs is to "feel seen and heard."
- Ask:Open-ended questions encourage the other person to speak more and give you a clearer understanding of their views and feelings. For example: "What do you think about this topic?", "Tell me more!" or "How does this affect you?" A leader should not have ready answers to everything, but wisdom lies in allowing others to find "their better answer."
- Speak Clearly:By expressing your thoughts and feelings clearly, you help the other person understand your message. Long introductions and complex sentence structures often hinder the delivery of the message.
- Stay Calm:Give the other person enough time to express their thoughts; this shows appreciation and interest. Avoid interrupting and instead wait patiently until the other person has shared their point or perspective
- Be Open:Ensure authentic and respectful dialogue by listening to different viewpoints and exchanging opinions during the conversation. Genuine and respectful dialogue is not a battle to prove whose idea is better, but rather building on the other person’s thoughts. Saying "Interesting, tell me more" gives you time to organize your own thoughts and consider your response.
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