Your retail associate locks the front doors as your last satisfied customer leaves past closing time. The rest of your store looks pretty clean until you walk past the shoe department, where some pairs are placed in the wrong size section.
You check your team’s assigned job duties and notice that the associate who closed shop was responsible for that task. Though their shift is over, you find them stressed and hurrying over to the shoe department.
As their supervisor, you need to make sure your team does the job correctly and on time. But you also want to ensure they have an excellent work-life balance. Read on to discover how you can spot an unhealthy balance and tips to help your team prioritize their personal time.
Why it’s important
Your team’s work-life balance can influence how well you retain them and how much they contribute to your workplace. Allowing your team to focus on their personal relationships, family and hobbies can help them achieve more at work, which can also benefit your business.
Here are three ways work-life balances can enhance a healthy workplace.
Prevents burnout. If your employees have time to focus on all of their priorities at work and at home, they’re less likely to burn out. The less they feel stressed at work, the more they’ll be productive at work.
Boosts engagement. With staff knowing how much you pay attention to their time and commitments, they’ll be more likely to want to communicate and engage with you.
Eliminates staff turnover. Giving your employees schedules that don’t stress them out is an easy way to make them more content at work. If your staff is happy with your support, they’ll want to stay with all their workplace’s benefits. You also won’t need to hire as much, which will save you time in the long run too.
Why you need to promote it
Without a healthy work-life balance, your baristas can tire out even before the morning rush of customers. Your retail associates can lose sight of the great foundation of communication they had companywide. Your servers can accidentally take down the wrong order to too many diners.
Read on to learn three other signs of an unhealthy or lacking work-life balance.
Bad morale. Seeing your employees unhappy at work can mean many things, and one of them can be that they’re unhappy about how much of their life is spent taking inventory or sanitizing every counter at the cafe. If you notice a pattern of tasks that makes some of your employees feel disengaged or overworked, it may be because they’re taking on duties that they can’t complete during the length of their shift.
Lack of communication. Your baristas used to be cheery and smiling when working with each other during the morning rush. And, even during your busiest mornings, they would constantly check in with each other to make sure every order was perfect. Now, they don’t really talk with each other and it seems like they’re too busy to chat.
Less productivity. You promoted your team captain knowing that they would be able to make your front-of-house team deliver the best customer service. But you hired two new waiters under them and now they hardly engage with their team.
If you’re spotting these signs throughout your workplace, it can make you feel like you’re not doing your best job as a manager. Don’t lose hope. There are still ways you can improve your staff’s work-life balance.
What you can do
Supporting your team can take a lot of work. But with that work comes plenty of benefits for you, your team, and your business. Think about what they may be lacking at work and review your employee handbook to see if you need to revise any break or time off policies.
Here are three tips to help you get started on improving your team’s work-life balance.
Foster a flexible work environment. Some of your team may get stressed over working longer hours, especially if they’re a college student or parent. Talk with them and discuss how you can work on giving them a flexible schedule that aligns with their bigger priorities. That way, they can have as much time as they need to focus on what could become very stressful factors outside of work.
Improve means of communication. Use accessible communication tools that are easy for your whole staff to use. With a central platform, your employees will be able to check in with each other frequently without any hassle. If they’re having difficulty with any assigned tasks, they can ask their coworkers for help.
Make sure everyone has time off. Your employees can focus on themselves and realign their priorities when they take a vacation. And they’ll return to work feeling refreshed instead of fatigued. If a staff member needs to take time off, make sure you can get their shifts covered. You can even swap their shifts with employees who have availability during their vacation to make sure they’re covered before they leave.
Step up your support
You want your workplace to feel like home, but you don’t want them to stay at work for too long. Making work-life balance a priority for your team is one of the best ways to retain them, engage with them, and increase their productivity.
To learn more ways about fostering a healthy workplace, sign up for a free trial of Deputy.
