Motivate employees with fun

Work is serious, it is how we provide for ourselves, but it doesn't mean it can't be fun as well. In fact, studies have shown that increasing the fun factor at work can also improve or increase productivity. No fun means less motivation, more sick days (when people aren't even sick), more coming in late and leaving early, or shirking responsibilities while at work to play games on the computer or chat online. In fact, a work environment that lacks fun often has an increased amount of discordance in the staff. Thus, lack of fun is not good, fun is. Motivating employees with fun can have a lot of positive outcomes.

When you make the work environment more fun, people work harder, and want to be at work more. No one wants to be somewhere that is not enjoyable. However, by improving the amount of fun in the work environment, you will see an added level of energy and enhanced employee relationships.

Thus, how can you make work fun in order to motivate employees to higher productivity and better office relationships? Consider the following:

First, put someone in charge of it. You can assign someone in your office to come up with some fun activities that the office can be involved in. You can even hold a staff meeting and get input from the staff as a whole. It might surprise you to hear some of the fun ideas people have.

Second, take these ideas and look for ways to implement them into the regular workdays and make them a consistent part of the work experience.

Fun ideas:

• Food- Food is often associated with fun. You could start traditions like Muffin Mondays, or Taco Tuesdays, or just bring donuts in on Fridays, or sporadically. Adding some food to the mix increases the fun factor and helps people feel appreciated.


• Teams- organize tag football, softball or bowling teams, or any other kind of team your employees want to be part of. Participating in a work sponsored team event outside of work can really improve relationships in office. It will lead to greater camaraderie, and can also improve office communication.


• Competitions-Friendly competitions can add a lot of fun to the office, as well as increase productivity. Adding incentive to the competitions is also a great way to get your employees motivated. For example, you could compete for the most sales for the day, or week, the fastest response to a company wide memo, etc.


• Perks-Basically, any perks you can add to the office environment can increase motivation and make people work harder when they are at work. These perks can come in many forms, from food to early off Fridays, to incentives such as gift cards for meeting goals, etc.

How you implement more fun into your office environment is up to you, but it can make a significant difference in how your employees act at work, and how motivated they are. This doesn't mean make it all play and no work, but be sure the work has some fun element.