What are the key factors in good morale?

In my job as a management consultant, I get asked to lead teams that have been through some amount of trauma including management changes, layoffs, missed schedules, etc. I am always asked about their morale and what we can do to improve it. The following is a list of basics:

• Improved sales
• Having a job
• Interesting work
• Communication
• Accomplishable tasks

There is nothing that helps morale more than a company that is doing well. Everyone wants to be on a winning team! If employees can see path to continued employment, R&D expansion and increased remuneration (stock and/or salary) then that is a great incentive. Note that success can be a two way street because there is a natural ebb and flow of employee movement. If a company is doing real well it is unlikely that movement will occur and it will take closer management of your employees to make sure people are not just hanging on.

Following 9/11, many developers were laid-off one or more times. Developers took lower salaries just to have a job. For many engineers this was the first time in their careers that they were out of work for any substantial amount of time. Stability rose as a priority in job seekers. While the environment has gotten brighter recently, the memory has not been forgotten.

Engineers may go to a company or stay at a company for the quality of work. The art and science inspire and compel many high-skilled developers to join or stay with employers. If all you have is maintenance work for your employees, do not assume they will stay even if you incent them. Incentives (bonuses, increased salaries) work for a while but not in the long run.

Employees can put up with a lot of hardship and change if they feel they are part of a team. The first way to make them feel like they are part of a team is to let them know what and why things are happening in a company. Communicate often and make it two-way communication. Solicit employee ideas. Explain rationale. The more you can share the better. Make sure you have a plan or a plan for a plan when you talk to employees -- ambiguity does not inspire confidence.

Finally, the item that is the lynch pin in morale, success, and satisfaction: accomplishment. If employees have impossible goals and they can never make those goals, they will always feel like failures. All good things in a company stem from accomplishment. If engineers can accomplish their tasks, sales has a chance to sell product, the company has a chance to make profit, employees get to make some money and do new exciting work. It ties it all together and it just feels good to accomplish something!

Go out and accomplish something with your team!

More later ...