Did you know that the average American spends roughly 90,000 hours or more at work over their lifetime? This places perspective on how our work environment plays a significant role in our life as well as our well-being. Considering that we are spending a rather large amount of time working, it is essential for employers and employees to help create and sustain a healthy work environment. A healthy work environment gives employees and employers the motivation to get out of bed and look forward to working and is also one of the key factors in running a successful business. If you are a manager, you can achieve a healthy work environment easily with some simple employee engagement strategies listed below.

1. R-E-S-P-E-C-T

The late Aretha Franklin would agree that respect is an essential aspect of a healthy work environment. You can demonstrate respect with simple, yet powerful actions like treating people with courtesy, politeness, and kindness. You should also exercise deeply listening to your employees’ concerns thus creating trust.

2. Empower Your Employees

When you encourage your employees to be themselves, they will be prone to embracing an entrepreneurial attitude. Replacing micromanagement with a combination of accountability and trust can, in turn, create a space where employees can confidently show you their capabilities and potential.

3. Focus on Positive Traits

Focusing on positive traits requires that you as a manager be more observant of your employees. When you detect the strong suits of your employees and spend less time being overly critical, this will allow them to flourish.

4. Communicate Clearly

Effective communication gives you the tools to get a better understanding of the needs and goals of your employees. Being actively conscious of your tone of voice, nonverbal communication (body language), and the words you use will help construct a successful message. Be clear and concise with your message, match your actions with your words, and communicate frequently. Also, know that each employee is different, which means that your approach has to be unique for your audience.

5. Encourage Growth

Engagement increases when you place employees in roles of influence and responsibility because they want to feel trusted and valued. Encouraging growth by offering words of affirmation and recognizing good work is also essential. In the end, a little positivity goes a long way.

6. Get to know your Employees

Getting to know your employees is one of the easiest ways to increase engagement. Acknowledging all of your employees and learning about their background, work goals, families and hobbies can strengthen your work connections and the feeling of appreciation.

7. Drive Unity

Having a strong team that is willing to work with each other is very satisfying for all parties. Unity creates a sense of purpose, pride in work, and confidence, all of which are beneficial for organizations. You can drive unity by encouraging corporate team building activities in your community. Volunteering for service projects with Foster Love - Together We Rise can create a sense of unity by way of teamwork.