Speaking about employee retention strategies, if your organization does not have one yet, you are not alone.
One of the biggest concerns facing employers globally is how to retain employees.
According to a recent report by Entrepreneur, more than 50% employers polled in a Watson Wyer survey do not have a formal employee retention strategy. Here is why you need to seriously re-look if you don’t have one in place yet:
Employees are the biggest assets of your organization – customers come second.
If you take good care of your employees they will replicate this feeling to your clients and customers making your organization stand out in the crowd.
Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, TATA and all the other great organizations you can think of have one thing in common – they hire talent and they keep them.
It therefore makes sense to have some strategies in place to retain your best talent.
Here are some winning employee retention strategies to significantly reduce attrition rate:
- Stress on hiring the right fit
The process of employee retention begins much before the actual signing of the work agreement between an employer and an employee.
A lot of organizations, especially those dependent on technical know-how, have a pre placement test for the interviewees.
This lets you understand the adaptability of the talent beforehand. Though these tests might give you a fair idea of the technical capabilities of the individual, only a personality test can help you evaluate whether or not the candidate has the right mental and social aptitude to be a right fit to your organization.
- Handhold New Employees through Orientation and Induction
The first couple of days at a new workplace can be a very overwhelming. A new employee has to understand and absorb how things work at a new place. She is getting introduced to a new culture. Instead of leaving the employee to figure her way around, create a plan for the first week at least to let her sync in to the new milieu. Give her a tour of the workplace, assign a buddy, introduce her to key people he or she might be working with, and introduce her to the ways of the organization. An induction program helps a new employee feel less like an outsider and more like a part of the organization she has just joined.
- Listen to your Employees (Take Feedback)
Keep it informal by embracing the open door policy. Listen to them and encourage them to come up feedback so that you as an organization keep improving. Most organizations mistake feedback to be only a tool of relevant criticism. Instead you can make it a two way communication to improve transparency.
Feedback also achieves another very important goal of letting the employee know that the organization is watching out for her. A feedback makes the employee feel that his work is not going unnoticed. When you let your new team member feel that her work counts, it makes her feel more responsible for it and in turn feel a deeper sense of responsibility towards the organization.
- Employee appreciation goes a long way
An annual appraisal based on employee assessment is sometimes not enough to keep your team member motivated. Everybody loves a pat on the back every now and then. There is a sense of accomplishment when your work is appreciated by your seniors and coworkers. Appreciations can be circulated within the organization with mentions in fortnightly or monthly newsletters. It can be appreciation of an individual or a team. Good work when rewarded results in more good work.
Happy employees will be loyal to the organization. Introduce small but lucrative incentives to encourage a competitive attitude. Make the employee feel that there is more to work than earning his monthly dues.
- Have fun with your team
Take this fun thing very seriously because all work and no play can make the whole team dull. Your organization will only be as good as your employees are. Take your team to offsite, let them pursue their hobbies, let them be who they are, this will not only keep them active but also accountable. Get to know whether your employees to lead a healthy life or not – engage them in yoga and music sessions. Do respect the personal space of your employees but let them know they will be backed up when they need organizational help. Employees tend to stay longer with organization that show respect to employees and have a lot of fun.
- Have a Growth Plan For your Employees
Your employee will love to have a clear career graph charted out in front of her if she keeps on doing everything right. If you have not done it already, do it. Also, plan the role of your employee beyond the current project. Cross mentorship programs are a great way to encourage her to interact with other teams and to also help her understand other verticals within the organization. Employees like to stick to an organization which cares about their individual success.
- Update/change Human Resource Policies
We are living in the communication age hence the policies suitable for industrial era might not be of much use now. You might need an overhaul to your human resource policy. You will have to have an employee centric policy that is dynamic and that adapts to the changing ways of the world. The more rigid it stays the more problems your organization will face retaining talent. Keeping your HR policies updated at all times in accordance with the best practices is a must.
- Communicate with the employees
If you want to build a robust team you need to trust them. Make a transparent mechanism to share any developments within the organization. Being a part of the success story of an organization, increases employee loyalty. Sharing future plans with the employees, helps them see the larger picture and understand their concern help achieve organizational goals faster. It instils in them a sense of responsibility of working towards a larger goal together.
- Introduce Stay Interviews
While Exit interviews are quite the norm, while you get to know the reasons why people leave your organization, stay interviews are more proactive.
Here is a great way to understand what makes your employees stay in your organization and what are the reasons they may not want to continue.
This can be done through asking questions such as :
What’s the most exciting part of your job?
Or
What would you miss the most in your present role, if you went for a role change?
You can also ask them about role change or a suitable department they would want to work in.
The concept of ‘stay interviews’ helps you spot potential damage and gives you enough time to act on it.
Conduct stay interviews periodically.
An organization that respects its employees, keeps them engaged with suitable policies result in higher employee retention.
Taking small steps go a long way in enhancing the success and growth of an organization.
Here is a Quick 10 minute Quiz that will tell you how good you are at retaining your best people.
Would you like to share any of the employee retention strategies that you have successfully used for your organization or may be keen to implement in the future?
Feel free to share with us in the comments
