Do You Have A Fun Workplace?

Happier Work Environment Equals More Production!

When I was in High School, I can recall one class that I can honestly say, was my favorite class. Normally I would pick my favorite subject as my favorite class, but this one class stood out from the rest. English was not my strongest subject, nor is it today haha. However, for some reason this one-year I had a great teacher who made our class fun. I guess it helped because he was very animated and it didn’t hurt he was also the theater/drama teacher as well. But what I realized was, even my least favorite subject became my favorite class and it was all due to a great environment. Imagine if you could replicate this in your business?

5 Things That Will Make Your Workplace Fun & Productive!

1. Friendly competition never hurts. Allow your staff to have some fun by setting some goals, and maybe reward the winners with something special like leaving early on Fridays or paying for their lunch. Our office has several competitions; one of them is with our customer service department. When our clients call our customer service department, after the call is completed the client receives an email that takes a simple survey on how the call was handled. Whichever agent received the best grading wins for the month, and is given a half day off added to their annual allowance for vacation days. Customer service is a huge part of our business and many businesses, why not encourage it by rewarding the staff! 2. Dressing professional, but comfortable. As you can imagine, some professions or industries might not be as fun as other industries. Imagine talking about working capital loans all day, all the numbers and calculations can get a little boring. So keep it interesting, change things up by allowing your staff to dress in comfortable clothes. I’m not suggesting you allow your employees wear sweatpants or pajamas, (though that would be comfortable) but maybe allow casual Fridays. Depending on your industry, you may not have walk in clients and you can allow for your staff to dress casual every day. But being comfortable makes a long workday go by faster! 3. Freedom to use the computer for personal use. We’ve mentioned this before in one of our previous posts about “Personal Use of the Computer at the Office”. Do you allow your staff to check their personal email while at work? This can be damaging to the workplace if not monitored closely. Opening attachments with viruses or even viewing websites that are not workplace friendly. But if you address these issues and enforce them, there should be no reason why your staff couldn’t use the computer for personal use. 4. Company field trips. Just like the competition within the different departments with your staff, you could also have a company wide goal to hit at the end of every month. This will encourage teamwork amongst the staff, and when there’s teamwork to accomplish one goal everyone works together and tasks get accomplished in harmony. Put out a goal, and if the goal is met take the staff out to lunch the following month. 5. Company sporting league. Even though this might not take place at the work place, but putting together a company softball league or any other sport would be a great way to extend the workplace teamwork. Hope these ideas will get your mind going on some other ideas as well. Best wishes to a happy work place!