When customers pull into your service station, they want to be met with a good experience – disengaged, unhelpful staff don’t create a good experience. After just one bad interaction at your service station, 32% of consumers will likely stop shopping there. And when they go, so do their friends and family.
Luckily, there are steps that you can take as an employer to keep this from happening and to make sure your employees stay engaged and satisfied, which will feed into their productivity and quality of service.
What’s Going Wrong
To follow are some issues commonly seen at service stations that can result in unhappy, unproductive staff:
- There aren’t clear rules.
Structure is good. It provides expectations and knowledge to fall back on if a situation escalates out of an employee’s control.
While training can be time-consuming, it’s necessary for the success of your employees and your service station. Find what works best at your place of business, whether it’s a motto or an entire set of rules, and make it known across the board.
- There’s no sense of a team.
When people work in a group and feel connected to one another, they have more fun, they’re more engaged, and they do better work. Those who feel like they’re part of a team have a sense of purpose and rely on each other in the sense of sharing responsibilities and achievements.
You can build this team spirit amongst your employees by encouraging collaboration, team-building activities, and cooperation.
- There’s no official communication channel.
Clear and straightforward communication makes for a streamlined, seamless workplace. If there’s no place where they know their requests have been received and/or accepted, or they cannot communicate with management, your service station will suffer.
- There’s not a positive working culture.
When people work in a negative workplace, they tend to absorb the atmosphere and become unhappy. The hardworking employees leave, and it becomes difficult to hire new people once the word gets out about your negative environment.
Counteract this by encouraging positive culture from the very top. As management, you set the example for your employees to treat everyone with trust, respect, and gratitude.
Changing for the Better
Happy employees are productive employees. If you’ve noticed a slump at your service station, look for these key signs and take the action needed to turn them around.