Increasing Employee Motivation with Technology

Some places I worked at while still a student and others were following my graduation. These places were generally similar: restaurants, warehouses, and customer service.

It was while I was helping to build Agendrix and exploring the possibilities of what can be done with cloud based scheduling that I realized how much I could have used such a tool back then.

You know as well as I do that technology is now a major part of our lives and is integrated in just about everybody’s daily routines.

How Is This Connected to Business?

Every manager is faced with the challenge of keeping their employees motivated; motivation is synonymous with productivity.

Mobile technology is sometimes demonized in the workplace, because it seems like a distraction. In my opinion, that’s a mistake, because the advantages of integrating these technologies into your business are too vast to ignore.

I can totally understand the hesitations that some employers have about granting unrestricted access to computers and mobile devices to their employees.

However, it’s just a question of properly framing what and how much use is acceptable.

Using the Channels That Are Already on Hand

The majority of your employees are already using forms of communication based on these new technologies. Email, mobile messaging, Facebook and other such applications are only a few of them. For some employees, this may even be the only way that they communicate.

Which begs the question: Why are more businesses not taking advantage of these channels of communication?

Imagine the following: at work, you normally use a bulletin board in the break room to put up important messages. This is an almost universal system of communication for managers to communicate with staff. However, this method has some unavoidable problems:

• Your employees are not necessarily aware that you have put up a new message.
• The message may be missed.
• You have no record of who has and has not seen the message.

Now imagine that you have to put out an important announcement concerning the new dress-code. This time, you make use of communication technology and the situation now plays out like this:

• You write the message to announce the new policy just as you would with the paper version.
• You request employees confirm that they have received the message.
• As each of the employees see’s the message, your records are updated and you can know exactly who has and hasn’t seen the message, as well as confirmed it.

All this is done through already existing communication channels.

Your employees receive a notification on their mobile devices, emails, or even Facebook, that tells them that a new policy has been put in place. They can consult it through their mobile device or web-browser and respond with a single click. It is simple, efficient and modern!

The Drive to Innovate

It’s more and more common to have a web or mobile platform for our business. Mobile technology is always on hand, and web browsers are just as common.

Now is our opportunity to make schedules and communications accessible through these platforms. Your employees will be thrilled to be able to access their up-to-date schedules through their phones at all times.

As well, the instant speed of modern technology allows employees to be directly notified when there is a schedule change which affects them.

There is an enormous potential to increase staff engagement as well as a considerable amount of time that can be saved for your employees.

Perfect Planning

Some factors are beyond your control, but integrating the needs and demands of your employees (availability, leave requests, etc.) when making a schedule is up to you.

However, the more employees you have, the more arduous this task becomes. Worse yet, the possibility of forgetting something or making a mistake grows exponentially!

Luckily, technology gives us access to data collection tools which can, almost effortlessly, bring together the information about our employees.

When it comes to making schedules, technology can be like a personal assistant by:

• Displaying employee availability, even directly within the schedule planner.
• Showing how many hours employees want to have scheduled (minimum and maximum per week).
• Searching and sorting employees by name, position, seniority, etc.
• Applying leave requests directly to the schedule.

Not respecting employee availability is a major factor in the loss of motivation among staff. It can also result in a deterioration of work relations. This demonstrates the importance of having tools that are efficient and effective to help you with this task.

The Next Step

It’s when I see just how much Agendrix can help the daily work of managers and business owners that my motivation is at its peak.

Every week, our team bands together to make this platform an essential and indispensable tool for helping businesses run smoothly.

I think back upon my old supervisors who sometimes had to chase after their employees to remind them to hand in their availabilities or that there was a group reservation tomorrow evening.

Then I imagine how those situations would be completely different if they had had access to Agendrix.