An engaged and happy workforce can be a monumental organizational strength, and while outdated ways of thinking used to link higher pay with higher productivity and satisfaction, research shows us that, just like your old Facebook relationship status… it’s complicated.

The language of a Sales Process Consultant is incentives. Like a translator in a foreign land, I try to take the concerns of both employees and executives and locate the gravity wells that are dragging down motivation, satisfaction and consequently, performance in the workplace. While sometimes hard to measure, these drains on satisfaction can be very costly.

I’m usually on the lookout for the following five factors that are commonly found at the root of a lot of satisfaction slumps. If you proactively strive for a workplace culture that is in tune with what your employees are really after and recognize how these factors play a role, you’ll be ahead of the competition.

1. Pay

When satisfaction drops it tends to be the first place we look and when increased, the least likely area to produce long-term happiness. Pay and benefits are what I call an “Oxygen Factor” in that it’s not a problem unless it’s not there.

With the Millennial generation (which happens to dominate the tech industry in general), pay has even less of a motivating effect according to a study by the Brookings Institute as reported by the New York Times, “Almost two-thirds (64 percent) of millennials said they would rather make $40,000 a year at a job they love than $100,000 a year at a job they think is boring.”

The takeaway here is that employees want to be well compensated for their time, but it’s the least reliable predictor of long-term satisfaction.

2. Purpose

Employees want to know that what they do matters, not just to their organization, but to their community at large. You can help facilitate this by adopting a quarterly or yearly community volunteer program.

KPMG, a financial consulting firm with offices in Washington and Oregon, rebranded a community outreach program called “Consulting with a Cause” where interns partnered with Free the Children and the Martin Aboriginal Education Initiative (MAEI). Interns were challenged with finding strategies for measuring, understanding and improving the impact of MAEI’s educational programs for Aboriginal youth across Canada. Krista Alexander, KPMG’s director of talent attraction, said that “What we have recognized is that this generation really wants to be challenged with important work that has meaning.”

Founder and chief engagement officer of Victoria’s Engaged HR Inc. Denise Lloyd commented on this by saying “They want to make a difference…. You need to help them do that, and then they feel amazing about being a part of something. They won’t want to go anywhere because they’re part of something great.”

Employees like to feel aligned with an organization that shares their values and is actively trying to make the world a better place. This goes beyond just your core values statement, but whether or not it’s a demonstrable priority in your organization.

3. Partnership

In a recent client engagement with a large Electronic Manufacturing Service Co. in Washington, we had to look at a $2M shortfall from the year prior. After a little organizational forensics, phrases like “Working with someone in a different department is like working with someone in an entirely different organization!” began to surface. Among other factors, we were hemorrhaging large customers due to a lack of communication between the sales force and the Program Managers who oversee the customer’s project to completion.

It wasn’t that there was any bad blood between departments, just that the path of least resistance was to go it alone. We decided to introduce new centralized communication tools that would keep important customer data and interactions accessible, all in one place and give everyone the same training on how to use it.

A question to ask is, are you providing the time, tools, and resources necessary for employees to effortlessly partner and collaborate for the benefit of your customers?

Without open lines of communication or a culture that incentivizes collaboration, not only does the bottom line suffer but the frustration level of employees spike which can lead to even less trust between coworkers and possible resentment in the future.

4. Personal Development

Probably one of the most valuable things you can offer your employees to keep them happy and engaged. Employees who feel like they have a path for development and an opportunity to expand their skills are among the most satisfied and invested.

A research paper by The University of Wisconsin-Stout including research by the Gallup Organization, the American Society for Training and Development and the Society for Human Resource Management concluded that “training and development increase employee satisfaction and are significant in an employee’s decision to stay with a company.”

Thriving workplace cultures do just that, thrive. This means they don’t just look for ways to improve the product or service they offer but are also constantly on the lookout for opportunities to grow their people.

5. Participation

How connected do your employees feel to the overall goals of the company? Do they know what your strategic push for the year is and how they can directly influence the outcome? Being informed and feeling a sense of ownership of the success and health of your organization provides a tangible sense of meaning to the daily grind.

When we work with organizations on strategic planning, we push them to concentrate the scope of their initiatives so that they are simple enough for everyone in the organization to understand and yet powerful enough that they would terrify the competition if they knew.

By recognizing the effects that Pay, Purpose, Partnership, Personal Development, and Participation have on your company culture, you’ll move beyond ping pong tables in the break room and closer to the heart of what employees are really looking for in a workplace.