How to Stay Connected to Your Guards and Cleaners

Three tips for engaging and communicating with your distributed workforce.

Communication with employees is critical for all businesses, especially when your workforce is spread out at sites across cities, states or even countries. Connecting with your cleaners and guards to keep them engaged despite geographical barriers is one of the unique challenges you face as a janitorial or security contractor.

According to Quantum Workplace, employees who don’t feel heard, supported, valued, empowered and connected won’t work as hard or stick around as long as employees who do. If we’ve learned anything from recent labor trends, retention is key and increasing engagement is one way to impact it. So, we’ve compiled three ways to help you communicate with your distributed workforce to keep them connected and engaged.

1.      Use an employee self-service solution

Having access to information they need is a crucial for employees and supervisors. This is especially true when they aren’t in an office every day with easy access to resources like HR or even their manager. For supervisors, an employee self-service solution empowers them to effectively manage their teams. When you use an employee self-service solution, you make any location your guard or cleaner is working from a home office. You give them access to things like schedules, time off requests, benefit information and the all-important paystubs. When employees don’t have to struggle to find out when they’re working or when they’re getting paid, they’re happier and more likely to continue showing up for work.

2.      Set up automated messages

If you work in one office with all your employees, it’s easier to ask simple questions like, “Did you take a lunch today?” or “Did you have a safe work day?” But, when those employees are scattered across dozens or hundreds of sites, it’s not feasible to have those daily, quick conversations. If you use a time and attendance solution that offers automated messages, you can check in with your guards or cleaners at set times during their shifts or at the end of their day. In addition to making sure they’re getting what they need — a safe work environment and regular breaks and lunches — you get the bonus of an audit trail that helps you stay in compliance with labor laws and regulations.

3.      Schedule regular touch points between employees and site supervisors

You can give them access to all the information in the world, but if employees don’t feel heard by their managers, issues can go unseen and turnover can spike. This is critical both during the initial onboarding phase and throughout the course of employment for your guards or cleaners. Have your managers or supervisors engaged with the new hire onboarding process to ensure new employees receive sufficient training. Use a QA solution as an ongoing training mechanism to offer on-the-job training when something doesn’t meet customer expectations. Allow time for them to check in with their employees on a regular basis — not just during annual reviews — so employees know how they’re performing and where there are areas for improvement.

Every employer wants their employees to be engaged and productive in the workplace, whether they are in the home office or representing the company on a job site. And timely communication is a key driver to achieve the results you want and gain commitment across your organization. When you tap into the available technology solutions for managing distributed workforces, you take control of your employee engagement and take the guess work out of communication.