It's easy to see how an employee who sells a lot of your product helps your business's financial bottom line, whereas an employee who misses important deadlines hurts your company's profitability.

But what about the employees who fall somewhere in between? They aren't performing badly, but they aren't excelling either. How do those folks fit in? They aren't costing you anything, right? Think again.

An employee who is not satisfied with the job can cost you plenty without either of you knowing it. Just because an employee isn't making serious errors in a job or missing deadlines doesn't mean that he or she doesn't cost you anything. An employee who is becoming dissatisfied can cost your business money in the following ways:

• low productivity
• high turnover
• decreasing loyalty
• high absenteeism

Once you know which types of problems low employee morale can cause, you'll want to make sure that you know what motivates employees and what you can do to improve morale.