management
Empower your employees—and watch your profits grow
STUDIES HAVE SHOWN
that workers who have more say in the running of a company work more
productively. And, as they do, they improve the bottom line, making the
company more profitable overall.
These workers have no interest in aspects of the company in
which they have no experience or expertise. They have no interest in
telling the CEO or president how to run the company. They do not want to
be visionaries and are unconcerned about taking the company in a new
direction.
They are concerned about doing their jobs as best they can, however. They would like to have a say in those aspects of the company in which they have expertise.
Experts suggest, therefore, that senior management in a
company, even in a small business of only a relatively few employees, step back and take a lesser role in
directly running each aspect of the company.
Coordinators, not workers
Small business owners then become as much coordinators as leaders. They can devote more time to what they can do and their employees cannot do, such as taking part in community business activities, attending chamber of commerce meetings or small business breakfasts, for example. They can spend time getting to know other business leaders who can provide services or advice for them.In addition, they can become more like coaches in charge of smaller groups. They will have time to listen to the workers and gather
information from everyone concerned about making good decisions in their
fields of expertise.
Part of the running of the company
They should encourage workers not simply to do what they are
told to do, but to think and act as though they owned that part of the
company.
They should consider such aspects as:
- How they can perform their jobs better?
- How do their jobs affect other people in the company?
- How do their jobs affect the company's financial performance?
At the same time, the workers who succeed in improving their
work performance should be rewarded for being innovative and performing
their jobs better. They can be offered financial incentives. Some employees also can be joint owners of the company with, say 5 percent ownership, depending, of course, on the number of employees your company has. As profits grow, so will their financial investment in the business grow.
