How can we keep valuable employees?
January 25, 2008
We all know in business that it’s much easier and more cost effective to keep an existing customer than go out and find a new one. It’s the same principle for staff. Recruitment and selection is a costly and time consuming business, and there’s no point having sophisticated recruitment processes that bring in top class employees, only to watch them walk out of the door again within a year. In industries requiring specific technical skills (such as in IT or web-based industries) the market for good candidates is now extremely tight, which means that not only do recruitment strategies need to become more sophisticated, but companies need to do more to keep those valuable highly skilled workers.
A really important part of the HR Professional’s role is to develop strategies for staff retention. This is complicated because, of course, people are hard to please and what helps to retain one person may not appeal to everyone. Diverse workforces bring exceptional benefits to companies, but also a diverse set of needs and desires to be satisfied. A parent of young children may enjoy a fantastic childcare voucher scheme and flexible working hours, whereas other staff may be interested in financial incentives, training and progression opportunities. So what can we do? Here are some of my top retention tips:
- Exit interviews are a great way of finding out exactly why an employee wants to leave the company. You will find a surprising amount of information about issues within the company is forthcoming once someone has decided to leave! Exit interviews also give the employee a feeling of closure, and they are less likely to take away a negative attitude towards the company if they feel they have been listened to, and that their opinions may be taken on board for future employees.
- Find out what your existing workforce thinks. Exit interview information is invaluable, but why wait for someone to resign before you ask them what can be improved in their work experience? Consultation with staff can take many forms, including surveys, representative committees and suggestion boxes. Periodic appraisals and reviews provide an opportunity for line managers to get to know exactly what makes their staff tick, and what the company can do to make them feel happy at work.
- Build strong and trusting relationships with your colleagues. As a HR professional, you need to be visible, available and approachable, so that employees are able to speak to you when they have issues, ideas or suggestions. Building effective working relationships will help you to find out and understand what’s really going on in your workforce.
- Try to offer a set of benefits that will appeal to the widest possible range of your employees, using the knowledge you have gained from consultation and general discussion. This could include financial benefits such as a pension or bonus scheme, but also covers more intangible provisions such as company culture, teamwork, flexibility, communication and autonomy.
Remember, many people will eventually move on, and a small amount of staff turnover can be a positive change, bringing fresh ideas and renewed enthusiasm. You need to understand what is behind the figures, rather than simply taking a percentage turnover and starting to panic if it’s high, or thinking you have nothing to worry about if it’s low. Remember that everything you do in your role could have a positive or negative effect on employee retention.
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