Everybody knows that motivation is key to doing good work. Company culture has become a popular term among corporate leaders; more and more companies are focusing on creating a culture that fosters motivation in their workforce and you know the saying: happy workers are effective workers. Thanks to an increasing body of research, we’re learning a lot about what it takes to build and maintain a high-performance culture within an organization.

In a great culture, people contribute to their fullest. Unfortunately, most organizations leverage only about 70% of an individual’s contributions. The remaining 30% — what the company doesn’t get — is the high performance.

In a study from Bain and Company, 90% of executives believed that organizational culture is as important as strategy for their business success. Fewer than 10% of companies will succeed at building a high performance organization culture. One of the main reasons is that they are not sure how to create one. For many leaders, the topic of culture is often seen as being too warm and fuzzy to deal with and in some cases they just can not see value in pursuing it.

How to get your company to have a high performance culture? Well here are some of the ways you can achieve that.

Invest in employee growth

Investing in employee growth has many concrete benefits for companies. On-the-job learning is not limited to the entry-level employee. It includes every member of the company, up to and including the CEO.

In addition to building necessary skills in your workforce, an employee you’ve invested in is more prepared and can start taking on more and more responsibility within the company. Such employees also tend to be more loyal and that is very important for a successful company.

The cost of employee turnover can be high, but it is better for a company to invest in existing employees rather than find new ones. Investing in your employees also increases their engagement, makes them feel more valued, motivates them to work harder to prove themselves and pay respect for all you’ve done for them.

Nurture good managers and strong leaders

Creating a high-performance culture composed of individuals eager to outperform requires strong leaders that can build loyalty and inspire people to work hard to fulfill their job duties.

Leaders need to engage, align, inspire, and mobilize individuals and teams to create a high performance culture. With that being said, having a good management team that will improve organizational development process is a must for a high-performance company.

Give everyone a voice

Autonomy in the workplace drives engagement, so why not make it easy for all employees to contribute and share their ideas? Giving employees a voice in your organization will generate deeper engagement and satisfaction.

Keep a transparent communication

Having an open communication with your employees plays a major role in making your company to be a high-performance one. Creating a culture of transparency, openness, and trust by encouraging the free flow of information at all time can give companies a powerful competitive edge. This happens when individuals share knowledge and ideas and mutual feedback.

It’s also important to encourage open and honest debates and urge people to report errors or concerns without fear. Feedback is also of crucial matter. Once you establish an honest and open communication with your employees, they will be glad to take your feedback as constructive criticism and use that feedback to perform better in their job.

Create an enjoyable workplace

To get the most out of your employees, you have to create a positive work environment for the entire team. When people feel encouraged, accepted and happy, they become more motivated and perform better. When you make the effort to connect with your team members in person, individually and as a group, you’re establishing a position of caring that motivates your employees.

One of the biggest complaints from employees is that they don’t feel appreciated. The second someone gives us a nice job or you made a difference on this project, we feel like we matter in a way that gives our work a sense of purpose. Also making some fun activities for your employees will make them bond and work better together as a team and will create a an enjoyable workplace.

Making a sports event for them after a project lunch or even taking a brief pause in the afternoon to tell stories and share a few laughs over topics that have nothing to do with work will make them relax and rest their minds so they can be in their full productivity state until the end of the workday.

Creating and maintaining a high-performance culture can be challenging, but it can be done. Ultimately, the specifics of a high-performance culture are unique to each company and it’s up to you to reach your desired goals.

About the author: Ian Pearson is a business consultant and passionate blogger. Aside from primary area of interest and expertise in business consulting, Ian could be tagged also as a passionate sports fan, nature, and photography enthusiast, always trying to keep up to date with HR innovations and development.