3 Strategies to Improve Your Workplace Culture—No Pingpong Table Required
In the late 2000’s ping pong tables became one of the most infamous indicators of company culture. If you were a startup or tech company without a ping pong table there obviously was something wrong and your culture was lacking. But the ping pong table culture quickly fell. Employees quickly recognized that even though pingpong tables are fun, that fun doesn’t last forever and it definitely doesn’t pay the mortgage.
Today’s modern workforce is demanding more. The facade has been lifted and top talent know there is more to a great company than a pingpong table on the sales floor.
Here are 3 strategies to improve your workplace culture, attract top talent, and retain your key contributors.
1. Offer Paid Family Leave
There is a misconception that family leave is maternity leave and hence only benefits mothers. While having a baby does fall under a reason to take family leave, so does needing to take time off to care for an elderly parent, a child, or partner. There are many reasons why someone may need to take family leave and often employees are unable to take time off unless they have PTO. The government mandated family leave, FMLA, provides job protection for up to 12 weeks but is unpaid, and many employees of small businesses or who work part time are not covered.
Offering paid leave, even if it isn’t fully paid, shows employees their employer cares, appreciates, and supports them. Qualities any employee would stay long-term for or look for when job searching.
Culture improvement: employees feel appreciated and supported
Business ROI: Attract top talent, retain key contributors, increase productivity
2. Be wage transparent
Research shows that wage transparency makes the gender wage gap disappear. Organizations who believe men and women are equal (that should be everyone), take note. The research doesn’t indicate wage transparency merely helps close the wage gap. It closes it.
Currently women make 80 cents for every dollar a man makes, which adds up to a woman earning $406,760 less than a man over a 40 year career. And in a recent report by The World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index states “at the current rate of change, the gender inequality gap won’t close in the U.S. for another 208 years.” A change our great great great great great grandchildren might see.
Call us crazy, but we think we collectively can and should do better.
But even if you are doubtful of the relationship between wage transparency and the gender wage gap, it’s hard to ignore the demands of the modern post-COVID workplace. “As the war for talent becomes more fierce and salary information increasingly easier to obtain, business executives, HR leaders and compensation professionals have to prepare for a future where pay transparency and pay equity are an expected part of progressive work cultures,” states the wage transparency report by PayScale.
Culture improvement: increased job satisfaction, and trust with and within the organization
Business ROI: Attract top talent, retain key contributors, increase employee commitment
3. Celebrate employees from the top down
Society has told us for generations to keep your personal life personal and avoid showing emotion at work. The workforce of today is pushing back and we think it is creating a positive ripple through company culture. When an employee brings their whole selves to work (they are LGBTQ+, a mom, love knitting) and this is celebrated, research shows those employees are more engaged and committed to their work. Why would a new mom that had access to a beautiful mother’s room or a trans person who heads up the company’s thriving LGBTQ+ book club leave their job? Hint: they are way less likely to than at a company where employees are expected to adhere to old school cultural norms and ignore their identity 40+ hours a week.
The key in getting employees to celebrate beginning their whole selves to work is encouraging leadership to do the same. When a CEO puts pictures of their kids on their desk, takes parental leave when their child is born, joins the company run club, or pumps at work they are setting an example for the whole company, showing that this behavior is not just tolerated, but celebrated.
Culture improvement: employees feel appreciated and supported
Business ROI: Attract top talent, retain key contributors, increase employee commitment
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Not sure where to start when it comes to improving your workplace culture? The Park can help you create a paid lave plan that works with your budget, initiate a wage transparency initiative, and even develop strategies to celebrate your employees. Contact us here.
