Being A Better Boss: 6 Tips To Get Started

Are you a good boss? What exactly does being a good boss entail? Archaic mindsets of employers still feel that being a good and fair boss means employees will walk all over you, and you will lose any authority you once had. But this is no longer true for the masses in a changing landscape. Employees value a better working relationship with their peers and management and a healthier workplace environment over financial compensation.

But it can be hard to shake off the image of the boss you think you should be and change to the boss you need to be for your employees. You no longer need to be the big bad wolf but rather the caring authoritative figure with everyone's needs in mind that wants to support them.

The reality is that employees who do feel valued in their workplace respond by performing better, hitting goals, and taking less time off work. And working towards an efficient workplace has to begin with your employees, right?

So how can you become a better boss and improve employee satisfaction across the board?

Improve Your Communication

You cannot expect people to improve their communication if you aren't looking at how you communicate with others yourself. Take a hard look at how you communicate with others and how others communicate with you compared to each other or other members of the management.

From here, you can take some communication classes, if you wish, to learn more about how you communicate and how you can improve on this. This will allow you to share your efforts with those around you, help everyone communicate better, and reduce crossed wires in the office.

Get to Know Employees

While you might not need to go as far as taking everyone out for dinner individually and getting to know them (unless that is, you want to), you do need to spend some time getting to know their behaviors at work, how they work, when they produce the best results and their relationships within the workplace. Pay attention to their daily interactions, feedback from others, and the type of work they bring to the table.

From here, you can get a better feel for who they are, and you can lean on this when you catch up with them personally. Once you know your employees better, you can then look at how you can best utilize their skills within the workplace. This can be done via redistributing them to a different role or changing their duties so everyone benefits from their skills and they can get stuck into new challenges.

Praise Where Praise Is Due

This circles back to employees feeling valued at what they do and performing better when they feel valued. When you see good work, something you like, or someone has an excellent idea. Instead of brushing it off, make a note to share this feedback publicly. Be it via internal communications to the whole company or directly to the employee themselves.

If you see someone going above and beyond or doing something positive but unexpected, give them a shout-out and let them know you are watching and appreciate what they are doing.

Perks

Nothing screams "I'm a good boss" like some employee perks. While perks cannot make up for poor remuneration on your part, they can support a healthy living wage that is fair for the job they are performing and inline with industry standards, not just minimum wage.

Perks can include a range of things, including but not limited to;

• Generous bonus scheme
• Enhanced sick/parental leave pay
• Flexible working
• Corporate events
• Use of leisure facilities or discounts towards them
• Free staff lunches or food and drink supplies in the office
• Mental health days
• Gym passes
• Access to healthcare and holistic therapies.

While not exhaustive, this list has some suggestions of the type of perks you can offer and how to enhance the employee experience. But remember to look for ways to make these costs effective for your business too. For example, Critical Illness cover for groups of employees means you can pay towards a policy that then pays out on your behalf, should one of the groups need to make a claim. This can be an added perk to their employee package, meaning they don't have to worry about taking time off sick if they are injured or die, develop a health condition they need treatment for and will be unable to work while getting it.

Employee Have Lives

This cannot be stressed enough, but good bosses understand employees have lives, and their life doesn't revolve around their job. Some countries have a strong work ethic where it is collectively considered that they should dedicate their lives to their employer. But this isn't fair to anyone.

People do have lives; that is a fact. These lives will occasionally infringe on someone's ability to do their job or even show up for work. While you need to limit disruption to the workplace, recognizing that this happens will make you a better boss. Not everyone can drop everything to cover a shift at the last minute; people will get sick, children will get sick, and people will experience massive life changes that will impact their ability to function. These things happen, and acknowledging this will work in your favor.

Listen more

You can learn much more about people and what is happening around you by listening to people instead of talking to them all the time. Sure, you might be in charge, but if your company cannot run without employees, you must remember that you are all a team. Things will happen without your knowledge at times, and people will need to use their initiative and stray from the handbook. But by listening to what is happening and how things are being done a certain way, you can get more answers and be privy to more information than simply barking orders.

So before you dive right into a lecture or decide to shake things up, don't talk; listen and pay attention to what is happening around you.

Conclusion

Being a better boss means addressing your behavior towards employees and how you interact with them. Once you have a better understanding of effective communication, you can make other changes that support you being a boss people want to work for rather than one they want to leave.