Recruitment is a pretty self-explanatory problem. If you can’t hire the best, your company can’t be the best. It’s a simple correlation that drives recruitment to be a billion-dollar industry driven at searching for the cream of the crop.
But despite the importance of recruitment, there’s an even bigger problem that faces employers – retention.
When you think about it, that makes sense because it’s also true for anything. It’s difficult to draft a star player to your sports team, but if the team isn’t winning, say goodbye to your MVP. It’s difficult to find a good person while dating, but it’s more difficult to let go of old trust issues and keep the relationship healthy. And it’s 100% the case for working environments as well.
A survey with HR professionals revealed that employee retention was a significantly bigger challenge than recruitment, with almost half of HR employees saying keeping people at the company is the most difficult thing in terms of employment. And the fact that higher pay tends to await those who quit their jobs doesn’t help in keeping everybody around.
So, what are you to do? Of course, increasing the entire staff’s salary isn’t the most feasible option, but salary isn’t the only factor that keeps people motivated and working. Today, I want to dissect those factors and give you five ways you can keep the top talents at your company.
1) Paths to Growth
If you think salary is the only reason people look for places elsewhere, you’re failing to see that sometimes, other companies provide better paths to growth.
A good example is when Kevin Durant infamously left the Oklahoma City Thunder to join the rival Golden State Warriors. Thunder was actually capable of offering Durant the more expensive contract. Yet, Durant revealed recently that he joined the Warriors because he felt he wasn’t growing as a player, and wanted more opportunities to improve his efficiency, get open shots, and win championships.
Similarly, if your company doesn’t have a clear path towards promotion, workers might tend to feel like they’re just going to be stuck in a dead end job forever. And yes, while there are people who prefer comfort and cushiness, most people need new environments and tasks to fight off stagnation. And companies that have more training opportunities, networking connections, and paths to promotion are the ones that will end up claiming employees that are proactive and curious.
So, if your company has the opportunity to help upskill the workforce, it should! Offer better learning and development programs – things like digital degrees and corporate learning should be presented to your best employees, so they can gain skills, beef up their resume, and satisfy their love for learning—all while working for you.
2) Don’t Overload
Burnout is a real thing. That should go without saying, but it’s kind of become too commonplace that it’s essentially turn into a buzz phrase at this point. But in reality, burnout and mental stress is a real thing, at the very least, because it drives so many people out of their work places.
Because of how mental health and emotional stress discourse has improved so much over the last decade, people are beginning to become firmer and more respectful of themselves and their stress, and are a lot more willing to let go of jobs that are ruining their health. And that’s a good thing that instead of trying to fight, we employers should lean into.
Don’t sacrifice morale at the expense of completing short term projects. Give your employees days off, and free them of the worry that their vacation leaves won’t overload their work in the future. You can also spread out task delegation better so that each employee has a plate that’s perfectly sized for them.
3) More Flexible Work
In a similar vein, make sure that your workplace is flexible. Don’t expect your employees to be on call 24/7, especially now during the pandemic, when compartmentalising work life and home life has become harder.
Simple ways to keep jobs flexible is by honouring weekends, and never instituting unpaid overtimes. These things should be a given, but you’d be surprised that most places of employment don’t stick to them. And if your office is one of them, and is suffering the problem of low employee retention, then maybe it’s time to rethink your office’s flexibility.
4) Keep Higher Ups in Check
Listen, I love The Office too, but let’s be real, if Michael Scott were a real boss, the employee retention rate would be massively low. The same thing goes for a place like Kitchen Nightmares – yes, the kitchen is a high-pressure environment where Gordon Ramsay needs to shout, but I’m willing to bet that your office probably isn’t a kitchen. So, there’s no need to emulate unprofessional and aloof bosses like Michael Scott or hard-nosed authoritarians like Gordon Ramsay. And if you’re anywhere on that spectrum, you might be the very reason your employees are leaving.
Now if you’re not like that, and you’re a chill boss, there might be people under you who are stressful superiors to their subordinates. Those are the people you want to be leading to make sure that they’re not the reason your employees are driven away.
5) Make Onboarding Easier
Lastly, if you’re reading this, I’m guessing low employee retention is an actual problem for you. In that case, think about how quickly your employees quit. If most of your employees quit within the first few months, then it’s definitely easy to blame generational factors on it. “Gen Z’s can never commit to anything; they always leave within the first few months” is a common sweeping statement that’s become a maxim for hiring nowadays. But in truth, it might actually be your onboarding process that’s difficult.
If many employees are quitting within the first few months, it means that the system for working itself isn’t conducive to adjusting. Perhaps there’s too much information to take in, or new workers are left on their own too quickly. Whatever the case may be, check with your employees for an honest assessment of their onboarding. Learning those things is how you can address those problems and maximise the eagerness and curiosity that new hires tend to have.
To your success,
Mario
[Visit www.mariosingh.com now to enjoy a FREE e-book of my latest “37 Essential Principles for Massive Success” when you subscribe!]
