To build and sustain a successful business, you need to focus on retaining employees. Good employees that add value to your business are the ones that you want to keep. Good, if not excellent, employees are hard (and costly) to replace. Retaining employees and creating the right environment for them is what you must divert your resources to now, but where should you start? Below we explore how to retain your valued employees.
Look at Other Employers
To begin with, you’ll want to start by looking at what you’re already doing, and looking at what competitors are doing too. Are other employees providing better benefits packages for their employees? Are they investing heavily in their development? Are you matching what they’re doing, or are you falling behind? If you’re not providing as much as your competitors are, you’ll find that the competitors find it easy to sway unhappy and discontented employees their way. Try to also put yourself in the position of an employee. Think about what your needs are and also think about what your expectations are. You can then see if they match with what you’re currently offering.
Introduce a Strategy For All
All employees have to be seen as valuable to your business. If they’re not seen as valuable, they’ll end up walking away. Therefore a retention strategy that focuses on all employees, and not just a select few is what you must work on creating. A strategy that outlines what you’re going to do, when, and why is what is going to help you retain all of those valued employees.
Working together with employment specialists may help you see where you can make quick changes. A retention strategy that also focuses on rewarding employees as well as keeping them with your business may also be something you wish to pursue.
Seek Support and Guidance
To promote company benefits and retain those employees, you’re going to need to liaise with other professionals. You may also wish to look at incorporating software that allows you to track employees’ progress, rewards, and pay. Support and guidance on all levels can allow you to focus on the bigger picture of employee retention, and not just on the next few weeks or months.
HR professionals employed within your business, or even outsourced professionals can help you to build employee packages that will retain employees at all levels. Utilizing the expertise and wealth of knowledge that professionals have can allow you to see employee retention in a light that you may not have seen it in before. And, this is what you need. You need to see how you’re approaching things through different eyes and scenarios so that you can make and build change.
Compensate Employees Fairly
One of the quickest and easiest ways to lose employees is to pair them with an unfair wage. Or, to expect them to work above and beyond their duties for minimal pay. When it comes to compensating employees fairly, you need to look at market conditions. You also need to speak to them to establish what their expectations and needs are.
Fair pay — or even excellent pay if you can afford it — will allow employees to feel valued. Furthermore, it will allow them to see a future with your business, which is what you should be aiming for. Looking at government guidelines to establish what fair pay and conditions are, and also looking at what indirect and direct competitors are giving their employees will be beneficial to your efforts. Trying to guess market rates, or just coming up with a figure isn’t going to help you retain those key employees.
Allow Employees to Grow and Flourish
Employees will want to stay within your business if they feel they have room to grow and flourish. If they feel that there’s nowhere they can go, they will move on and start looking elsewhere. To allow employees to flourish and grow, you need to provide opportunities for them. These opportunities may come in the form of personal development. Or, they may fall under the guise of professional development. Liaising with employees and seeing where they want their career or future to go is going to help you develop appropriate opportunities for them.
Engage With Employees
Companies with engaged employees report a 23% higher profit compared to those with disengaged workers. Employees always want to feel that they can have a say at work, and they want to feel engaged. They don’t always want to be sat on the sidelines while others make the decisions. Therefore, it is up to you as an employer to focus on engaging your employees where you can. See how they can contribute to your business, and see what impact they may (or can have) in other areas. Encourage them to speak up, and give them a valid platform to do so. When you see employees as equals and not as numbers, you will find retention is so much simpler.
Seek Feedback
No matter what an employee’s rank or role, you will find that they always have feedback they wish to share with you. This feedback can help you to shape your business for the future. Always allow employees to have their voices heard and validated.
Create a Positive Experience and Environment for Employees
When a workplace environment is positive, and a day starts and ends positively, employees will want to stay. They won’t want to move on to find something a bit better.
Of course, in reality, positivity all the time is unrealistic and unachievable. However, that doesn’t mean that you can’t start working towards this ambition. Look at what you can do within your workplace environment to make things better for everyone (not just the minority). For instance, could you introduce more frequent breaks? Could you have better on-site catering facilities? Could you provide access to a chillout space or room that allows employees to have a few minutes of downtime before they carry on with their day?
Once again, learn what you can from your employees to create what they need. Ask questions and seek feedback.
