Boosting staff morale 'essential' to business growth, so get partying!

July 27, 2010

Boosting staff morale is essential for keeping a business running smoothly – Tom Byng, founder of the Byron hamburger business, talks about how important is is to make staff feel appreciated – and there's no better way than a cracking Christmas party.

Three years after opening the first branch of his Byron hamburger restaurant business, Byng has just opened his tenth.

He is very particular about the type of person that he employs, describing them as “quite obsessive, like to have fun, don’t like being corporate and distant and are engaging.”

In an effort to make sure that each of his staff feels valued and appreciated, every general manager is given £100 each quarter in order for them to take their staff out.

There is no stipulation as to what they should do with the money, other than that they spend it. In fact, if they cannot produce the receipt to prove they have spent it at their own appraisal, the money is taken out of the managers’ bonuses.

There are also events in the summer for all staff and a huge Christmas party for which the whole chain closes down so that everybody can attend.

Ninety per cent of the workforce turn up to the Christmas party and 90 per cent of them are still there after the free bar finishes, suggesting that this is evidence that the “work hard, play hard” ethic he is seeking to instil is working.