Finders Keepers, Losers Weepers: Proven Ways to
Retain Your Best Employees
Imagine--you
have been working late to finish an important project
when your sales manager walks into your office
and tells you she has been offered a better job.
This is the same person you handpicked, trained,
and recently gave a pay raise. As she turns to
depart she says, "There are others thinking
about leaving too."
What
went wrong? How are you going to finish this project?
Who will be next to leave? The dread is starting
to sink in.
Employers
face enormous challenges when they consider the
increasing difficulty of finding skilled people,
a more demanding younger workforce, and a growing
population of older workers heading toward retirement.
In the next 10 years, HR professionals expect three
out of 10 employees in their organization's workforce
to retire.
The
difficulty in finding and keeping talented people
is having a catastrophic impact on many businesses
and industries throughout the world. In addition
to those retiring, surveys show one out of every
three people plan on quitting their jobs this year.
The greatest threat employers face is losing their
best and brightest to the competition. That's a
lot of talent leaving organizations and just the
beginning of what many people have described as
the "perfect storm."
Here
Comes the "Plug and Play" Generation
A
new generation of workers is transforming the landscape.
There are several reasons why. On one end of the
workforce, the Baby Boomer generation is retiring,
leaving fewer skilled people to choose from. On
the other end, a smaller group of younger workers
is entering the workforce who place their needs
for instant gratification first and foremost. The
average tenure of a 20-something is less than 18
months, creating a swinging door and a cycle of
misery for employers.
The
Cost of Turnover
Each
year businesses spend billions of dollars recruiting
and replacing their employees. They assume turnover
is unavoidable and think there is very little they
can do to prevent it. For the most part, organizations
focus on retention after they start experiencing
a turnover problem.
Few
businesses consider the impact of turnover on their
bottom line. It takes $7,000 - $14,000 to replace
a typical employee, and to replace a key manager
costs the same as buying a Lexus. To replace a
critical care nurse can run up to $185,000; and
when a top talented individual in a key role departs,
it can cost millions. In spite of the staggering
cost, the majority of businesses do not have a
formal retention program.
Money
and benefits are important, but studies show most
employees leave for other reasons. Obviously, a
certain degree of turnover is unavoidable, but
with a small amount of effort organizations can
make a major difference. Your retention plan should
address the following key components.
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continues below
Hire
the best and avoid the rest. Cisco CEO John Chambers
said, "A world-class engineer with five peers
can out produce 200 regular engineers." At
Yahoo they would rather leave a position open than
hire the wrong person. Instead of waiting for people
to apply for jobs, top organizations spend time
looking for high-caliber people whether they have
a job opening or not. Redesign your orientation
program for new employees. The old saying, "You
don't get a second chance to make a good first
impression" is true in this case. Organizations
experience the highest level of turnover during
the first 90 days on the job. The purpose of onboarding
is to quickly assimilate the new person into the
organization, so make the first critical days stand
out as a positive experience. This is a great opportunity
to make new hires feel proud to have chosen your
organization.
Provide
flexible work schedules adapted to the needs of
the individual. In today's workplace, flexibility
rules. A one-size-fits-all approach has long since
lost its effectiveness. Workers will migrate to
a company whose benefit packages and schedules
help them meet the demands of their lives, whether
they are single parents, adults who care for aging
parents, older workers, younger workers, part-time
workers, or telecommuters.
Get
rid of the slackers and whiners. Employee retention
does not mean you keep everyone. Employees say
one of the main reasons they stay is because they
like the people they work with. No one wants to
work with people who do not pull their weight.
Those businesses that tolerate poor performance
will drive off the good employees and be stuck
with the bad ones.
Soft
skills are becoming the hard skills. Interpersonal
skills are a critical element of the high-retention
culture. People want to feel management cares and
is concerned for them as individuals. Yet, poor "soft
skills" are one of the biggest factors driving
people away. To build stronger bonds between the
top management and employees, one corporate office
practices something called the 'Employee Scavenger
Hunt.' Once or twice a year, they give every executive
or manager five names of employees. They find each
person, meet them, and learn about them as individuals.
The process builds a better bond, improves communication,
and increases trust within the organization.
If
they can't "move up" they will "move
out." For many people, learning new skills
and advancing their career is just as important
as the money they make. In a study by Linkage,
Inc. more than 40 percent of the respondents said
they would consider leaving their present employer
for another job with the same benefits if that
job provided better career development and greater
challenges.
Create
an early warning detection system. Ask employees
to let you know if they hear of people who are
thinking about quitting. Advance notice will give
you an opportunity to try to prevent the departure.
One practice Applebee's put in place is the "Turnover
Alert Form." It is designed to identify and
prevent discontented managers from quitting. In
those situations, Applebee's brings the managers
in to meet with the CEO and possibly other executives.
They want to identify and repair anything that
might be causing job dissatisfaction.
Create
an alumni program. No matter how good you think
your company is, your employees always think they
can find a better job elsewhere. "The grass
is greener" mentality is alive and well in
organizations across the country. So keep the doors
open for the good ones to come back. Keep in contact
with previous employees, send them newsletters,
keep recruiting and talking to them until they
return. Who knows, they may refer other employees
to you.
Look
for triggers. Focus on individuals going through
some form of change such as marriage, pregnancy,
divorce, a child's graduation, mergers, or other
important events that could influence job satisfaction
and/or persuade or force employees to leave the
organization prematurely.
Re-hire
your employees. An emphasis on hiring new people
can cause "older" employees to dis-engage,
feel ignored, or forgotten. To combat this situation,
consider reinterviewing all of your employees periodically.
During the interview, review their training and
development, ideas and suggestions, identify new
skills acquired, and review their pay and benefits.
Take
the temperature of your workforce. High-retention
workplaces use employee climate assessments to
measure the attitudes and feelings of their workforce.
Every organization should conduct some form of
climate assessment periodically during the year.
Complete
an Individual Retention Plan on your best employees.
You must manage retention one employee at a time.
Focus on the key jobs that have the most impact
on profitability and productivity. Everyone has
a different set of needs and expectations about
their jobs. By conducting an individual retention
profile, managers can quickly identify the employee's
unique motivations, goals, level of job satisfaction,
as well as other expectations.
Focus
on the family. One small company gives their employees'
children a $50 Savings Bond twice a year when they
get straight A's on their report cards. Another
survey of 1,000 companies showed half of them let
workers stay home with mildly ill children without
using vacation or sick days. Two-thirds permit
flextime defined as allowing employees to adjust
work hours on a daily basis.
Identify
and weed out poor managers. The relationship with
the employee's front-line manager is the most common
reason people leave. As part of LaRosa's employee
retention strategy, all workers evaluate their
bosses twice a year using a special report card.
It asks the employees to give their managers a
letter grade from A to D in four categories. Any
score less than a "B" requires a specific
comment from the employee. After it's completed,
they tabulate the comments and design action plans
for improvement.
Adopt
your employees. Starting employees off on the right
track is incredibly important, and maintaining
your hiring initiatives and keeping strategies
fresh and creative is the key. One organization
goes a step further than most--they ADOPT their
employees. After they are hired and complete the
orientation program, the new employee is brought
into a conference room and presented with a set
of "Adoption Papers." The certificate
is printed on parchment paper. The employee also
receives a cupcake and with a lit candle commemorating
this important event.
by
Gregory P. Smith
