Every business owner aspires to create a high-performing culture within their organization, and it’s no wonder why. Research has shown that organizations with great cultures outperform their competition in most metrics, including productivity and profitability.

What defines a high-performing culture can be unclear because it evolves constantly. What motivates employees to perform at their best evolves as people change their expectations of what their employer should provide them.

Here are three solid, actionable steps you can take to build a high-performing culture within your organization.

1 - Build employee engagement

Gallup defines employee engagement as "the involvement and enthusiasm of employees in their workplace."

In the worst-case scenario, your employees are actively disengaged—they put little to no serious effort into the work they do, display no care for your company’s objectives, and don’t collaborate well within their teams. In the best-case scenario, your employees are actively engaged and go above and beyond their responsibilities to make an impact.

As a leader, one of the best things you can do to build employee engagement is to listen to your employees. Provide a safe platform for them to candidly express their concerns and opinions, and then absorb what they say purely as information. When you fully understand what your employees need from you, you can take action to provide it and resolve their concerns.

When your employees see that you are truly listening and making an honest effort to address their needs, they are much more likely to be engaged with their work and their team. And actively engaged employees are much more likely to stick around, grow within the company, and have a lasting impact on performance goals.

2 - Resolve conflict the healthy way

Conflict is a given. Even the best leader wouldn’t be able to remove conflict from an environment that involves human collaboration. Some conflict is healthy and is a critical part of creating growth and innovation in your business.

However, personal disputes, petty grudges, and dignity violations are not productive. Many of these conflicts crop up due to a misunderstanding. When you don’t understand somebody’s intent, it’s easy to make the most negative assumption possible and act as if they are attacking you. It’s easy because our brains are wired to negatively think most of the time.

But when people understand others for who they are, understanding intent becomes a process of discovery rather than assumption, and unhealthy conflicts are resolved quickly. This means that your employees can collaborate much more effectively and turn over better results together.

3 - Prioritize the employee experience

These days, creating a great employee experience is non-negotiable. Over the past few years, job seekers and employees have raised the standard of how they expect to be treated by their employers.

Beyond the bare minimum elements like fair compensation, comprehensive benefits, career growth opportunities, and paid time off, today’s workforce is prioritizing organizations that offer a good work-life balance, flexible working options, minimized stress, and an overall attentiveness to their mental health.

When these needs are met, your employees are satisfied, and satisfied employees tend to be contagiously positive. Furthermore, a satisfied employee is much more likely to go above and beyond to achieve their goals, grow and support their company’s strategic objectives.

Building a high-performing culture is something we all aspire to do. The best way to start is to do your research, create a plan, and set specific, time-based objectives to pursue.

Joe Kiedinger is founder and chief executive officer at Dignify. Contact Joe at joek@dignify.com.