How to Improve Summer Productivity with Your Employee Benefits Plan

Focusing on Overall Benefits Plan Key to Morale in the Warmer Months

Picture this: the sun is shining – you’re on a beach in Hawaii, drink in hand, soaking up the good life.

And then, in a single swoop of an email ping, you’re awoken from your glorious daydream-slumber by – yes indeed! – Linda from HR reminding you oh-so-non-passive-aggressively to FYI: please refrain from using the Keurig machine until further notice, thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Thanks, Linda.

Oh, and you’ve still got 10,000 things to do by Friday.

In the summertime, it’s no secret that your employees’ motivation and productivity dips.

While warm summer weather, vacations, and long weekends can be attributed to the dip in employee productivity, another major trend is lowering expectations in the workplace during the summer as well.

The key for small business owners, then, is to ensure their employee benefits plan incorporates a summer strategy that focuses on boosting morale during the summer months.

Stagger Vacations, Retain Optimal Staff Levels

Poor planning of employee vacations can often lead to less-than-optimal staff levels, causing undue stress on employees stuck in the office to pick up the slack – further reducing summertime morale.

By pre-planning vacations as part of your company’s employee benefits plan, it gives your leadership advanced notice to ensure vacations aren’t all taken around the same time period while also preventing employees from requesting last-minute vacation that cause strain on staffing levels.

Provide Flex Time During the Summer Months

Allowing employees to work when they’re most productive is an easy way to boost productivity.

By introducing flexible summer hours – like allowing employees to take every second Friday off if they accrue enough hours, take certain Fridays off, or even work remotely – you can easily incentivize employees to work harder while they’re in the office while boosting their energy with more time off.

Flexible summer hours are also attractive to parents in the summer in helping accommodate daycare, summer camps, extra-curricular activities, and other seasonal disruptions while school is out.

Introduce Summer Hours, Increased Closures

Along with flex time, you can also consider introducing summer hours and increased business closures.

While it may seem counterintuitive, this strategy is all part of your employee benefits plan – taking care of your employees so they can best take care of their work and your business.

Especially if you operate in an industry where other businesses, clients, or customers are less active during the summer months, closing your business on certain days can have a huge benefit on re-energizing your employees and making them come back to work feeling refreshed.

Hire Summer Students to Inject Energy & Motivation

Besides improving vacation planning and increasing time away for your employees, small business owners can also hire summer students to inject new life in their businesses and regular employees during the dog days of summer.

On top of an improvement in morale and productivity, there are a number of wage subsidies and tax credits small business owners can avail of when hiring a summer student.

Plan Socials and Fun Events for Your Employees

When all else fails (it won’t), it’s time for some good, old-fashioned fun.

If taking care of your employees and ensuring a positive, tight-knit company culture is important to your business, then planning company socials and fun events in the summer should be a big factor into your wider employee benefits plan. From trying out a new sport to tackling an escape room, to team barbeques and weekend retreats, having fun events in the summer is an easy way to bring your team together for a good time and take a breather.

Organize Your Company’s Employee Benefits Plan

Want to organize your company’s employee benefits from beyond summer vacations to health, dental, and more to increase your company’s productivity year-round?

Our experts are ready to help every step of the way. Log in to your PaymentEvolution account and check out the benefits link.

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