It is with great excitement that I announce the opening of one of the first child care centres within the Philippines. This has been a process that took around 12 months to bring to fruition and although we’ve had a series of challenges making it a reality, it’s great to see it finally in action.
That’s pretty simple… We get that creating a happy more balanced work environment not only attracts better talent, it also means you attract staff that work for you for the long haul as you’re also supporting their basic needs.
For Affordable Staff that means an environment where people can grow and develop, where staff are well remunerated, and where they feel secure, stable and supported.
From a client’s perspective they notice a difference in their outsourced staffs overall performance, morale and for some, an improvement in attendance. I know this sounds pretty simple but it really does make a big impact.
Overall this translates to a more stable business environment where your clients and staff want to work with you.
This idea like many has been in reaction to handling a problem and really works on the principles of “Continuous Improvement”. Although this has been a big learning curve for all of us within the business, as we continue to grow in size there are always new opportunities to Improve how we are doing what we are doing.
As an example we introduced daily stretch breaks well over a year ago when we noticed lower back and wrist issues increasing. The solution… Find a professional to develop a stretching plan for everyone in the office to have daily stretch breaks at different times of the day. It’s amazing to see the change in people when they take a short break to stretch and reinvigorate.
As the name “Continuous Improvement” suggests, we’re always going to find areas of improvement within the business. From the width of desks, which have now changed 3 times and meant we’ve had to custom make our own desks to ensure we have that “Sweet Spot” for desk widths, to the brightness and types of lights we use in the office, all of which creates a happy workforce.
At the end of the day seeing children play and develop makes every project we’ve tackled to date worth it. It makes some of the challenges we went through to bring the Child Care Centre to fruition a distant memory especially when you see how happy mums are being able to spend lunch with their kids.
As a business I encourage you to do go through the same exercise and find areas of continuous improvement in your business. I know for us it has made a massive difference in our business and makes it feel like we’re making a real difference in the world.
