How to Build Strong Workplace Morale

Workplace morale is the character of the work environment. Many things, including the actions of workers, pay, and appreciation, contribute to it. It may be strong and positive or it may be weak and negative. Yet each person in a work environment contributes to it, and one way he or she does this is by their work ethic.

A work ethic is a pattern of work performance that becomes an indicator of one’s dependability and resourcefulness. It is one's personal leadership with his or her work. A good work ethic is groundwork for achievement. It is where motivation drives us to pursue our highest goals. Yet it is not formed overnight. It comes with years of work experience that began with us cleaning our rooms and doing house chores. But there is no place in the world that a strong work ethic will not carry us. Here are a few principles we develop as we build this ethic.

When we stick with a project through its best and worst times, we learn the value of persistence. It’s easy to work when things are good, but we are often ready to run away from our best lessons when they turn sour. It can be hard to work a job we wish to quit. This is especially true for men because it is difficult for us to tame our tempers or we risk a deflated ego when we feel taken advantage of. Sometimes the work is just embarrassing to us. But quitting is usually not an option, so we have to teach ourselves to overcome situations rather than to be overcome by them.

To be fair, there isn’t always a bad scenario or a job in jeopardy. Your work may be your dream job and wildest ride, yet it’s very demanding. Here persistence is to make your way through to the end. It calls on strength of will and patience. When times become tough we have to encourage ourselves, find support from others, and plan how to remain composed, else we lose our heads and make rash decisions that will dearly cost us.

Persistence, or "stick-to-itiveness", will not only change a person, but it has the potential to change the morale of a job. Keeping with a project builds fortitude and rallies a team spirit.

Stability and steady performance characterize the person who is consistent in his or her work. These people have level heads and sound judgment, and their work is thorough and reliable.

People that are consistent in work and attitude are the kind enduring, successful projects are built upon, and workplace morale can do nothing but rise with these type. Such people will live unguarded from promotion their own credentials may not qualify them for because their energies, all their prowess and affections, can be forecasted.

To commit to a venture means two things on two different levels.

The first is to offer our full support and effort to make a plan work. It is our pledge to do what it takes—phone calls, late nights, monetary support, meetings—to lift a project, like a rocket, from the ground to the sky. The second, deeper level is when we buy into the effort. This is not done with money but with heart. To buy into a thing is to strongly believe in it and to be positively convinced of its worth. This kind of commitment is best expressed in personal relationships, especially when one person has faltered and the other still sides with him. To side with a person doesn’t mean we condone their wrong; rather we don’t vilify them, or turn them into their wrongdoing. We can toss away their mistakes and yet support them.

When we can labor to the point of giving our souls for a cause, our work has become our gift and labor of love. This may sound strange to the average person who gets up each day and goes to a low morale workplace. It’s very easy to see how much we are not paid, the hypocrisy of our bosses, and the underhandedness and misdirection of company policy; but the point stands. Then, many of us truly enjoy what we do. We enjoy serving our clients and customers and believe in the companies and institutions that give us opportunity to excel.

Commitment is the foundation of any worthwhile job ethic and without it or some measure of it a decent workplace morale simply cannot exist.