Hiring Wisdom: 10 Ways to Motivate Your Team (and Have Fun, Too)

These are some of the best low (or no) cost ways to encourage peak performance from your workforce:

Don’t forget birthdays and employment anniversaries. (Sheet cakes are cheap.)
Give them business cards.
Give them a new job title.
Create a traveling trophy that goes to a different employee each week.
Take them to lunch.
Have someone wash their car in the parking lot.
Feature them in an employment ad.
Give them a gold star for their name tag, put a nameplate on their desk or door.
Give them time off with pay.
Present them with a “refrigerator letter.” (You know, like the “well done” note your teacher used to send home and your mother would post on the fridge.)

If you want to get really serious about having the “top team in the league,” make up a list of 20 or 30 things you’re willing to give for outstanding performance. During orientation paperwork, include it and ask them to check their 10 favorites. Also ask them to list their favorite restaurants, sodas, candy bar, snack, etc.

Then each reward will be perfectly customized to the person and you’ll be “the best boss ever.”

This was originally published on Mel Kleiman’s Humetrics blog.