Page 76 - Anne Bruce - Building A HIgh Morale Workplace (2002)

56 Building a High Morale Workplace

but a wider variety of tasks that keep the job more interesting.
This beats having several health-care workers all performing just
one or two tasks for a multiple of people over and over again,

which could quickly become repetitive and mundane.

Detail the purpose and pride associated with the job. As the
manager, it’s important that you convey to your work group the
larger purpose of their efforts. If that’s not evident upfront,
employees may never see the greater purpose of their work.

One way to do this is to stress the true significance of a job and
its specific impact on the lives of others, whether those are peo-
ple within or outside the organization. Of course this can be
easier to accomplish if your workers are assembling wheelchairs

or are on the assembly line filling vials for an asthma medica-
tion. It’s clear in these circumstances just how much the recipi-
ents of these efforts will greatly benefit and, as a result, be able
to live more productive lives.
However, if your workers are doing something that isn’t as

easy to assign social and life-saving significance to, then you or
someone else will have to explain it to them. Perhaps the great-
est significance is in producing a higher quality product, meet-
ing stakeholders’ needs, or maintaining greater profits for the
company so that workers can continue to receive better benefits

or donate time and money to the company cause. Whatever the
reason, look for and explain the purpose and pride behind the
work to all of your employees. People want to know that their
contributions, no matter how large or small, mean something.

Give people more responsibility, not just more work. Let
employees take more responsibility for setting their own work
schedules, coming up with their own work methods, deciding
on standards of excellence, and then determining when they’ve
achieved them. Give them the right to decide when to take
breaks and even when to start and stop work. The objective

here is to enrich their work with empowerment and authority.
It’s not about handing off more tasks. Responsibility enriches
jobs and builds employee morale.