Employees are People Too

I was asked if I had any ideas on how businesses can treat their employees better. Oh my goodness do I. One of the things I specialized in when I was a Human Resource manager was this very subject. It's one of my favorite rants.

Can we start with respect? No I don't mean the bowing and scraping kind, I mean the plain old fashioned kind. The kind your Mother taught you. My former employer who I have just left is the perfect bad example.

My manager, a early 50 something, constantly and publicly made disparaging remarks about his 'older' employees , that included me, to any and all his staff, especially to the younger ones. He called us slow, he made fun of us when we got hurt on the job, he would tell his staff that we were 'slipping' when we made a mistake. Can you imagine how this makes you feel? For every day of the 'exact to the day year' that I worked there I felt embarrassed and humiliated.

It could of been so easy. Simple common sense respect would have made all the difference. A smile, a hello, a pleasant word, none of these take much time or effort. But they make all the difference in an employees attitude. To publicly disparage your employees should never be tolerated behavior.

It takes so little to make an employee feel good, no matter what the age. A small comment about an extra effort they made, or how they handled a difficult customer or situation, or just how nice it is to see a friendly smile when you walk in the door can make someones day. It doesn't have to be constant praise or heaven forbid phony, just recognition that they matter to the whole scheme of the business. Appreciate your employees and let them know that they're important to the business's success and then stand aside and watch them shine.

This is just a start. I have a few more ideas for another day.

Thanks for listening,
Lindy