Change – As a business owner you need to drive it.
Whether you’re going through planned change or there’s a sudden shake-up, it can have a lasting impact on how you and your team feel and perform…. And the team or members of the team may not appreciate this.
Take it from us, we’ve been through our fair share of change over the years, and with a growing team, it’s important to keep everyone motivated, engaged and in the know! So here are our top tips on keeping your team motivated through a period of change.
Be transparent, communicate and ask for input
Keep everyone in the know, have regular team meetings and communicate. We can’t stress this enough, keep communicating, don’t go quiet! Even if you’re dealing with sudden change and you’re not 100% sure how you’re going to deal with it, it’s better to inform the team of what you know as it stands. Along with when you’ll be able to properly update them and what you’re doing to address the change, rather than just going silent.
You don’t want anyone to feel like they’re in the dark, so make sure you’re keeping everyone looped in. Take into consideration where your team work from and if everyone can be available at the same time for a catch up. If not make some provisions to do so.
If it’s planned change, during your communications, share the exciting reasons why you’re changing, whether that’s growing the team, moving to a bigger office or revisiting your business values. Ask how everyone feels and if they have any input or questions.
Understand individual motivators
Not everyone is motivated in the same way, so be sure to take the time to understand individual engagement factors as well as the overall motivators of your team.
You can find out what motivates people during regular one to one meetings. We make sure we check in with everyone regularly here at Blu Sky. If you aren’t checking in regularly, how can you know whether or not everyone’s engaged, working to their best ability or whether they have any great ideas?
Know how your team works together
As a business owner, you should have a pretty good idea (or be able to get an idea) of who gels best with who, alongside who has the most energy in your workplace and who likes stepping up and sharing information – so work with everyone’s strengths!
You should know the best way to communicate with your team and what it is that keeps them motivated throughout the day, if you don’t you should spend some time getting to know this.
If you don’t understand how your team works together, you’ll struggle to keep everyone motivated and the business running as effectively as it can.
You should also be able to easily identify any negativity that may be hindering the acceptance of change. Stamp this out quickly, as this can impact on your whole team’s morale!
Create opportunities
Change can seem daunting, challenging, and scary, but that’s why you started a business! Change can bring opportunity for people to implement their suggestions and develop new services or processes. Use the fact that things are changing to create opportunities for your team.
You can ask yourself which team members would be open to taking on additional responsibilities, and which may need to utilise training, learning new skills or planning.
If you create new and exciting opportunities through and during change, you’re much more likely to continue having a motivated and engaged team!
Are things changing for your business?
As well as looking after our own team over the years, we’ve been there for clients throughout it all! Funding, growing, winding things down, launching something new, hiring and firing, we’ve been there. Give us a shout if you’d like to learn how we can support you and your team through change.
