feature RETENTION STRATEGY
RETENTION STRATEGY
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Are employers paying lip service to retention, but practicing a different reality? High levels of employee turnover is bad for business - 1 an employee can cost up to 50 percent of their annual salary - but to
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direct attention solely on the numbers means never getting to the heart of the matter, and it really is the heart we’re talking about because for the employees themselves, money is rarely the issue.
ARTICLE BY PENNY DAVENPORT, CAREER COACH - PENNY DAVENPORT EXECUTIVE COACHING
Staff leave when they don’t feel important to the team or the company. They see themselves as a small part of the machine and having very little impact on the products or services delivered overall. If an employee doesn’t feel valued, it’s not hard for them to walk away when someone else comes calling. There is no emotional attachment, and if employees aren’t attached to the company, you, or their fellow workers, consider the impact of that on your culture, both in the company as a whole and in localised teams. Making staff feel important and valued requires an intensely personal touch. Relationships between managers and staff must be purposeful and intentional, and communication should be deliberate and relevant. Vague hellos in the hallway don’t cut it, managers must know their staff and communicate in a personal and meaningful way. And praise should be specific, not; “you’ve
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done an awesome job this month”, but “I recognise how you’ve improved this process and reduced our errors, thank you”. Rewards also can be personalised. Team pizza is always appreciated but if you’ve noticed someone has been putting in extra hours, give them some time off. Notice, care and personalise. Employees leave when they feel they have stopped growing and developing. When you are green you grow and when you’re ripe you rot. This is lethal for employee morale as others start to develop a feeling that there is a ceiling for them too. You’ve invested in many of these staff for years and strong employee retention will help support your productivity. Recruiting and training new employees takes time, and an unfilled position means work is not getting done. And new hires have learning curves, so keeping current workers satisfied with their roles will ensure productivity is not interrupted.
Some employees will certainly run out of room to grow in your firm but on the whole, you should have smart career plans for these valuable assets. Career planning can become a beast of a topic but it doesn’t have to be if you have good managers in place who are empowered to lead their teams. With a strong personal touch, managers can combine the desires and ambitions of their staff with the needs of the company and ensure the future growth of both.
Employees walk because they don’t get the support they need; requests for training are viewed suspiciously and are frequently vetoed, or sometimes using the budget as an excuse but often for no reason at all. When employees ask for better equipment or other investments to improve the way they work, they are often told it’s not a priority, so not supporting an employee sends a clear message to them and their
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