Take a close look at the most productive members of your workforce.  Do you see one set of employees turning out work with an accomplished smile, and one set of employees turning out work with knit eyebrows?  That’s the fine line between happy employees working at highly productive levels and super-stressed employees working at highly productive levels.  While it’s optimal for a small business to look to its employees to maximize productivity, it’s also the business’ responsibility to make sure those work goals fall within an achievable level, that doesn’t come at the expense of an employee’s health.  Here’s a hint: you don’t want your employees falling into the knit-eyebrows category.

Stress-induced productivity will fast-track your employees to unhappiness, burnout, and ultimately for you, employee turnover.  Stressed workers may be irritable or confrontational, make more mistakes, miss deadlines, and have more absences.  Leveraging stress to artificially increase productivity may actually result in lost productivity.  This is all bad news for your business’ bottom line.

So what can you do to lower stress, burnout, and attrition?

• Value your employees.  This is one of our favorite things to say here in the YES! Your Human Resources blog, as a golden rule of HR.  Employees who feel valued are happier, more loyal, and more productive than employees who don’t feel valued.  So tell your employees they’re doing a good job, and solicit and implement their feedback.  If employees feel they’re being treated well, they might not mind giving back in the form of working extra hours to meet those increased productivity targets.
• Provide the necessary resources.  You can’t expect your employees to work miracles.  One employee is only capable of accomplishing so much within the workday, so make sure you’re being realistic with your human resources and your expectations from them.  Give employees the tools, research, and staff hours they need to operate at an increased level of productivity.
• Offer flexibility.  Everyone has an optimal work environment in which they will be most productive, and let’s face it—employees like freedom.  Your mission is to seek out and provide those flexible environments as best as possible.  Employees may be motivated by flex hours, telecommuting options, employer-sponsored childcare, massages, donuts, you name it.  Something as simple as encouraging employees to take their rest breaks and vacation time can go a long way in a high-productivity, high-stress environment, as it’s easy for those little comforts to fall by the wayside.

You can expect a high level of productivity from your employees, but make sure you’re being realistic, and that you’re giving back to employees in a way that keeps them positive and energized.  Nobody wants to fight a demoralizing, stressful battle against production goals not rooted in reality.  Your human resources are your business’ most crucial asset, so if you invest in them wisely, you’ll reap great returns!

For more information about YES! Your Human Resources Solution, Orange County’s premier Human Resources consulting firm, visit our website or contact us for a free consultation.