You’ve noticed your employees call in sick more frequently. You overhead your accounting manager say her job is so dull she’s thinking of finding a new one. Think about injecting a bit of frolic into your workplace.
Business is supposed to be serious stuff, but too much sobriety harms your workplace and decreases productivity. Here’s what the experts say. Introducing mirth into the workplace increases productivity and boosts job satisfaction.
But how does a small business go about introducing jollies with a limited budget? Keep it simple as fun doesn’t have to be expensive. And technology can lend a hand.
Brain.fm is an app where specific music stimulates focus or relaxation. Encourage employees to choose their favorite music and have a contest each week for the best music to listen to at work.
Workplace collaboration tools such as Slack or Yammer allow for sharing of funny stories or videos in one place. Employees who need a laugh can watch a short cat video. Guidelines for posting need to be created, so that offensive material doesn’t appear.
Casual Friday morphs into ice cream Friday or bagel Friday. Employees find free food a considerable perk, and everyone mingles over the goodies. Sponsor monthly competitions with prizes.
Set aside time to party over company milestones on a regular basis. The party can be a day of play and frivolity at work with team building games or an extended company meeting with lunch and a few quick games. The work time lost at that moment will be paid for by increased productivity later.
Author: Kris Keppeler, writer for Crossing Genres on Medium.com, and Does This Happen to You? on Channillo. Award winning podcast producer. Follow her @KrisKKAria on Twitter or on LinkedIn.
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