Tackling the staffing challenge starts with looking after the team you already have
Twenty-seven percent of Australian businesses have difficulty finding suitable staff, according to an Australian
Bureau of Statistics report. The most frequently reported reason was lack of applicants, followed by applicants not
having the required skills, international border closures, and job location.
If your business is facing such challenges, it can often feel like you’re running on an endless hamster wheel. Finding great staff takes time, which eats up energy and resources from other areas of your business, and could even result in current team members getting frustrated and leaving.
The labour shortage in Australia is becoming a real barrier for small businesses to make a profit, expand and invest. While we certainly are calling for migration to be opened up, even with a regular flow of migration, it’s still going to be difficult for small businesses to compete for staff against bigger brands that can offer more.
To combat this, we must be smart, which starts with nurturing the staff we already have.
Show staff you value them
Researchers Adam Grant and Francesca Gino have found what we already innately know to be true: that when people experience gratitude from their manager, they’re more productive. Another researcher recently found that
teams perform tasks better when their members believe that their colleagues respect and appreciate them.
Take the time regularly and genuinely to be in contact with each of your team members and say hello to them as people, and not just in a work context. Asking ‘how are you?’ is meaningful. Remember to celebrate and express concern over important moments in your team’s lives, and make sure you recognise each member as a whole person with a life outside of work.
Showing appreciation is more about action than words, which includes offering flexibility where possible. This is important for attracting and retaining staff, and in a retail context might include parents who want to work school hours that other businesses cannot provide, or students who want hours that can move around their study and sports requirements.
Adopt an online roster creator that staff can also engage with, which not only helps your team remain flexible but also makes creating rosters faster, combined with smart, easy record-keeping.
How to get more from your team
To raise the productivity of your team, they need to feel empowered and confident at work. Make a habit of letting your team know what you value about each of them. This needs to be in a genuine and authentic way – a quick thank you isn’t the same as saying you really appreciate that someone does something so well.
According to Marcus Buckingham, author of Go Put Your Strengths to Work, only 17 percent of the workforce believes they use all their strengths on the job. That means more than four in five people in your business could have unused skills, knowledge and/or experience going to waste.
One way to harness your team’s talents and strengths is to investigate industry courses and resources. In the newsagency and lottery sector we’ve developed, in conjunction with a supplier-led think tank and the Retail Doctor Group, a quick online skills course to help businesses train and empower their employees. The ‘Boost Your Business’ course can help our often time-poor members build profit, increase customers and future proof their business by upskilling their team.
Consider what growth opportunities your existing team members might want. You never know what skills, talents, or interests your team members have hidden away. Don’t be afraid to ask if they would be interested in a different area of the business.
Delegating the right way
Delegation is essential for creating a healthy, independent work culture, but not if team members feel they’re being given a never-ending list of menial tasks. Delegating doesn’t mean overloading the plates of your team members. If there’s a task you can’t get your team to do, such as the less-than-popular job of bookkeeping, for example, then simply outsource it to a freelancer or agency.
You can only build trust in your team by trusting them with more business-critical tasks and showing that you believe they can handle these. With the right training, you’ll be surprised at what even your more junior staff can handle.