Employing staff can be a minefield. You have to review what seems like millions of CVs, interview them (and hope you can see through the messers) and then keep your fingers crossed that when you do find that perfect individual they turn up for the job, can do the task appointed to them and want to stay working for you for as long as possible.
If you've been employing staff for a number of years chances are you have now developed a strategy for weeding out the good and the bad quite rapidly. Yet employing staff extends far beyond the interview and their first day. In my opinion, retaining them long term is one of the most important factors for any business.
Having the right attitude towards your staff can pay dividends. Of course you employ individuals and pay them to do a job for you and if they aren't doing it well enough then quite rightly why should you feel that they deserve to be rewarded with extra incentives? Yet, in my experience, overlooking those who should be rewarded is one of the main issues in companies with high staff turnover. Merely thinking to yourself that an individual has done a job and done it well long term with no fuss or no obvious desire for a pay rise doesn't mean that behind the scenes they aren't wondering if the grass is greener elsewhere. Your reliable, easy to manage, hard workers deserve to be recognised. If they aren't they'll be looking for new opportunities. Which leaves you back where you started. Spending time and money sourcing, interviewing and training new people to pick up where they left off.
Consider the impact of high staff turnover on your client base. A good example are employees who manage client accounts. If your client is subjected to two or three new staff members taking on their account within the space of 12 months they may think that placing their business elsewhere would be more prudent. After all how frustrating would it be if your Account Manager was constantly being updated and you needed to explain to them from scratch how your business works or rely on them being able to do their job as well as the last person? What sort of impression does this create for your company and those you do regular business with?
So what can you do to retain staff long term? Here are my top tips for ensuring loyalty:
1. Appropriate remuneration: this may seem obvious but there is a fine line between paying staff to do a job and paying them what they are worth. Competitive pay within a market place will help you to ensure you attract the very best candidates. If you are looking to employ experienced staff at the very least you should be offering the market equivalent. Offering less than the going rate is not going to tempt a top individual away from an already well paid job.
2. Mutual respect: Put simply this is about treating people how you'd like to be treated yourself. You don't have to be best friends and you don't have to socialise with each other but talking to people like they are responsible adults rather than commodities or a number on a piece of paper will help develop mutual respect.
3. Trust: allow your employees a relative amount of freedom. Don't just assume that they are all going to be browsing the internet for personal reasons or chatting to friends on the telephone as soon as your back is turned. Unfortunately it is a fact of life that there are always going to be a small number of employees who think they can bend the rules but by punishing everyone for the stupidity of a minority can impact on how valued employees feel. It would be better to identify the disrupters and deal with them individually. The rest of your staff will appreciate you more for it.
4. Fulfilling promises: If you employ someone with the promise of giving them a pay rise in six months based on performance and they meet the criteria set for them then make sure you follow your promise through. Don't forget -set a reminder. Don't make excuses. Don't ignore the situation hoping they have forgotten. I can assure you they haven't! One of the many reasons candidates approach me is because they feel that their employer has mislead them or made a promise and didn't deliver. This creates bad feeling, tension and a breakdown in working relationships. Appreciate what your staff do for you and show it. If their best isn't ever going to be good enough why should anyone bother trying harder or retaining standards to an optimum level? If someone has done a great job, tell them so.
5. Effective management: identify valuable assets within individual staff members and capatilise on them. Staff who are being utilised properly and given more responsibility based on their abilities will be happier in the long run. Handle situations accordingly. Don't shy away from dealing with negative or disruptive influences within the office. If an individual is causing problems which aren't being dealt with this can greatly affect the team spirit resulting in demoralisation and lost productivity. If you are seen to deal with problematic issues your employees will feel a lot more confident and respect you for it.
6. Working environment: I don't know about you but dirty, unkempt office space and poor facilities (kitchen and toilets) can make life rather depressing! With the majority of our time spent at work a pleasant environment is essential to productiveness as well as happiness. You don't need to be in the best or most luxurious office space but ensuring the basics are covered is a great start.
7. Incentive schemes: offering schemes to your employees in order to reward top performers should help to encourage everyone to strive to be better as well as pin point those who aren't pulling their weight. These schemes need to be properly executed and operated over a period of time in order to be effective (e.g. measured on a year of performance levels).
8. If your staff do leave don't take it personally! If you have done your best by them but it's genuinely time for them to move on then it's the right thing to let them do. Allow them to leave and be gracious about it. If it is appropriate there is no harm in keeping the door open by saying "we'd always be happy to welcome you back". This says a lot not only to the leaver but also to your remaining staff. I once had a boss who felt that openly branding any leavers "back stabbers" and then calling them this throughout the period of their notice was a way of properly conducting himself. Essentially it was quite embarrassing and did nothing to encourage anyone to feel like they'd either want to return or recommend the business to others as a base of excellent employment or a company to do business with. More importantly it undermined my boss and showed him as insecure and childish. See above point in relation to mutual respect. Your company's
reputation extends far beyond how you treat your clients.
