In Part One of this tip, we discussed finding hourly workers. Different ways they could be found, some ideas on incentivizing your current staff to help you locate them, that type of thing.
In Part Two, let’s take a look at keeping your hourly staff.
Now, I realize hourly staff can be a high area of turnover. But the focus of this tip is to help you keep the ones that are doing well.
The first thing that comes to mind of course is more money. If you’ve got two or ten or a hundred hourly employees and one or more of them really stand out, you could sit down with them and say,
“Bill, we really like your hard work and we’d like to keep you as part of the team. I’d like to increase your pay X. What do you think about that, Bill?”
Bill will normally like that and will feel rewarded.
Now Bill may have been thinking about moving on. He may have seen another job or two that pays more or has better perks, but you’ve cut him off at the pass, so to speak, and he’s happy to hang in there with you.
More pay is of course the simplest path to keeping hourly workers that have demonstrated their competence. But it’s not the only way of doing this.
Most people want to feel a part of something. A group. A team. And yes, even a company.
Do you have weekly staff meetings? If not, this is a good place to start. One obvious use of a staff meeting is to bring up broad issues that you’d like all of your staff to know. But here is another interesting use of the staff meeting:
Bring a few of your hourly staff up to the front and acknowledge them in front of everyone. You could even give them a gift card to a local restaurant or maybe an Amazon gift card, something to let them know you appreciate their value.
Are you going to rub other staff the wrong way by doing this? Maybe, but ideally, they’ll work a bit harder as they may like to have a little validation in front of the group.
Staff meetings are a good way of acknowledging your staff, even your hourly ones, but there’s no need to wait for a staff meeting. If you observe Alice doing a great job as a cashier or Frank is doing a bang up job clearing the dishes every day, let them know.
“Alice, you’re doing a great job here. You handle the customers really well and I’m glad you’re a part of our team.”
“Frank, I know it’s not the most glamorous thing to clear away dishes day in and day out, but I just wanted you to know you’re doing a great job with it. I appreciate your hard work and I’m glad you’re a part of the team.”
Now, those two statements took how long? A minute? Thirty seconds?
You know where I’m going with this. A little acknowledgment goes a long way. People appreciate being appreciated. Do not underestimate the value of that last statement.
The best method to keep good, competent, caring hourly staff is to acknowledge them. More pay if you can. And the not so infrequent: “hey, you’re doing a great job, Sarah. We love having you here” — any method of genuinely acknowledging people is appreciated and will help you keep your key people on board.
As the law varies in each area, please check with an attorney to ensure you are applying these tips within the law.
Our three minute video will help you hire the right people.