Workers continue to quit their manufacturing and light industrial jobs at high rates. Sometimes, these individuals even leave their jobs for positions in industries that offer lower wages. Why are workers making counterintuitive career moves? And how can companies make their workplaces more attractive to improve employee retention?
Through various focus groups, The Ōnin Group conducted, we found one primary, and possibly surprising, reason people left their jobs: poor work relationships. Almost every employee who quit their job was dealing with a negative relationship at work. That negative relationship was likely to be with their direct leader, but quit-worthy bad relationships could extend to feeling disrespected by co-workers or feeling like the work environment at large was cold and hostile.
Ultimately, people are social creatures who process the world, and the workplace, through an emotional lens. Yes, we have the ability to think rationally, but we’re ultimately wired to feel safe and happy when we form positive connections with others and to feel anxious or angry when people don’t seem to like us. When our work teams make us feel like a “part of the tribe” we naturally work better together, and when we feel like disrespected outcasts, we tend to leave in search of a place where we can feel like a part of the tribe.
This is especially true for workers who have limited resources in their personal lives. When financial security isn’t a stable resource, relationships are everything. As Ruth K. Weirich put it in her article Avoiding Workforce Instability by Attracting and Retaining Employees, “In the environment of daily instability, when your car breaks down, AAA is not an option; Uncle Ray is the option.”
The fact of the matter is many workers in the manufacturing industry are considered low-wage workers; these individuals are struggling financially, especially in a high-inflation economy. These workers need extra relational support to win in the workplace.
So, how can you help workers build healthy work relationships that will lead to improved retention? Here are a few ideas:
Regardless of the activity you choose, these exercises will help members of a team positively interact with one another. What’s more, giving workers time to build productive relationships can not only inspire comradery but also allow workers to feel comfortable enough to share
resources like carpooling and childcare recommendations that will help them maintain their employment and reduce employee turnover.
1. Empower Team Leaders to Coach
Workers want to feel that their direct leader is rooting for them and has their best interests at heart. In contrast, workers feel distressed when they perceive that their leader doesn’t respect them or, worse, actively dislikes them.
Workers tend to perform best when their leaders fulfill the role of a coach — someone who supports their best efforts and helps them push through difficulties to achieve their goals.
Helping team leaders fulfill the role of a coach isn’t easy, though. Many supervisors and managers have a deep technical understanding of their job but have a hard time relating to their team members, especially struggling team members, with empathy and encouragement.
Supervisors and team leaders will need support from their leaders to transform into coaches.
Helping workers connect with the company’s goals builds goodwill between employees and the organization. Likewise, a company can build easy goodwill with its employees by doing small things to celebrate employee wins.
Consider brainstorming team-level goals and overarching company goals that your company can celebrate.
Communicate the goals and the reward, which could be anything from having a special meal together to an event. You can also be thoughtful about celebrating the personal wins team members have. Consider gifting small tokens of celebration for employees when they celebrate life milestones in their careers and in their personal lives. Receiving a simple card and present from the company can mean a lot to employees and helps them build a relationship with the company that is more meaningful than their paycheck.
2. Help Team Members Connect
Everyone is busy in a manufacturing setting, but providing time for people to have positive interactions, especially as a team, is important. To help workers connect, consider carving out time for a brief team activity once a week. This could be something as simple as having an uplifting team meeting.
You could also consider setting aside time once a quarter for an after-work event. Activities can be anything from playing an organized sport together after work or taking part in a company-sponsored outing on the weekend — whatever works best for your particular group of people.
3. Celebrate Wins
Helping workers connect with the company’s goals builds goodwill between employees and the organization. Likewise, a company can build easy goodwill with its employees by doing small things to celebrate employee wins.
Consider brainstorming team-level goals and overarching company goals that your company can celebrate. Communicate the goals and the reward, which could be anything from having a special meal together to an event. You can also be thoughtful about celebrating the personal wins team members have. Consider gifting small tokens of celebration for employees when they celebrate life milestones in their careers and in their personal lives.
Receiving a simple card and present from the company can mean a lot to employees and helps them build a relationship with the company that is more meaningful than their paycheck.
