How Technology Can Help Improve Warehouse Employee Satisfaction 

In today’s highly competitive labor market, holding on to your employees is critical. Losing quality talent puts a dent in your productivity, and replacing it costs money. In fact, the median cost to hire a warehouse worker is $1,633, according to Zippia. And once you fill a role, it can take months for your new employee to get fully up to speed.   To avoid those costs and maintain continuity, you need to make sure your warehouse employees are satisfied with their jobs. One way to do that is by adopting modern supply chain technology. Before you do that, you need to first understand the common pain points in the warehouse work experience that technology can address.   

What Can Make Warehouse Work Unsatisfying?  

Distributors should consider how the following factors can impact a warehouse employee’s satisfaction:  

• Warehouse work is highly physical and often repetitive. For some, this is part of the appeal of a warehouse job: Rather than sitting at a desk all day, you’re on your feet and using your body. Even people who are drawn to the physical nature of the work don’t want to be pushed to the brink of exhaustion and injury. If an excess of manual tasks makes the job too demanding, your employees will burn out quickly.  

• Low inventory visibility is stressful. If your workers don’t have real-time visibility into inventory, they’ll end up adding to that physical toll by walking all over the warehouse to see if an ordered product is in stock. Meanwhile, they’ll be stressing out about the other orders they need to pick and tasks they need to complete. And if they get there and see that the product is out of stock or not where they expected it to be? The stress increases.   

• Outdated processes are frustrating. Top talent doesn’t want to get stuck in the gears of a ramshackle operation. They want to work at modernized companies with a knack for innovation. When your warehouse processes aren’t streamlined and tech-driven, workers will start to wonder if there are greener pastures elsewhere.    

Using Tech to Improve Work Experiences  

There are many technological solutions available that can help ease the burden on your people in the warehouse. Automation tools like robotic pickers can drastically improve productivity while taking care of much of the literal heavy lifting, freeing workers to solve problems and perform less strenuous (and dangerous) tasks.   

It’s not simply flashy hardware that can improve warehouse work experiences; advanced software can help, too. Platforms like Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central can boost your inventory management capabilities by providing real-time updates on the quantity, location, and status of every item in your warehouse. This will streamline your order fulfillment process and prevent your workers from needing to trek across the floor to gather information, or from going out to pick an item that turns out to be elsewhere or out of stock. Of course, the odds of an item being out of stock will be slim if your ERP platform allows you to optimize inventory levels and stay on top of reorders. With these tedious, crucial tasks already taken care of, your workers will experience less stress and operate under less pressure.  

You can get even more out of a platform like Business Central by optimizing it for distribution. For example, Xcelerate Distribution can tailor its capabilities to your company’s needs and help your team fulfill orders quickly and accurately. Rather than walking around with clipboards and potentially outdated information, they can carry tablets with direct access to all relevant data and the advanced tools in your specialized ERP configuration. When integrated with the rest of the Microsoft 365 suite, including tools like SharePoint for document sharing and version control, such a solution will enable your team to communicate and collaborate more effectively, preventing errors and misunderstandings that can frustrate employees. It’ll also make them feel like they’re part of a company that’s moving forward, not sticking to antiquated practices because they worked in the past.   

Make Your Workers Happier with a Reliable Technology Partner  

At Enavate, we believe that technology should be used to make businesses more efficient and profitable, plus make their employees’ lives better. After all, happier workers are more productive workers. Contact our expert team today to learn more about how we can help you modernize your operations and retain your workers in the process.