Employee Retention: How to Retain Your Talent and Staff

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September 6th 2022

In the post-pandemic era of business, we’re seeing a staggering number of resignations among many different groups of people across the world. In a 2021 study by the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, as many as 4 million people quit their jobs that July alone. More specifically, workers in the 30-45 age bracket saw an increase in quitting of 20%. This isn’t just an American issue, however. We can see resignation patterns taking place across the world.

So, what can business owners do to ensure their employees feel secure and engaged enough in their roles to not want to jump ship? Today, we’re going to explore exactly that.

 

Get (and Stay) Connected

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Sometimes employees can feel as if their voices aren’t being heard enough. This may not only come down to simple miscommunication from the higher-ups but can be due to a lack of channels in which they are able to communicate with each other too.

As a business owner, it’s your job to provide your workers with enough ways to get (and stay) connected throughout their time at work. This is especially vital when considering those working from home, or in hybrid working set-ups. Utilise online communication tools beyond simple e-mail, such as Slack or other instant messaging platforms. Incorporate them into their daily routines as a new company standard.

Along with this, you can take further steps by focusing on boosting employee engagement with the business. Increase the number of one-to-one meetings and wider team meetings to check everyone is on the same page. You want your employees to feel like their work has an impact and improving relations with them across the board is a crucial step in retaining them for the long haul.

 

Pay, Rewards and Perks

We’ve all felt that dreaded feeling at work before – ‘Why am I doing this?

It’s an incredibly normal feeling to have if you feel as if the company you work for isn’t providing you with either enough pay or progression to truly satisfy your own life goals.

So, what can you do to sate that need for your own employees? Well, competitive salaries are a fantastic place to start. Beyond this, you can offer employees more in-house benefits, such as rewards for good performance each month, and perks such as trips away, more paid time off or sufficient parental leave programs. These perks also look very enticing to potential new hires, showing them that you, as a business, care about their input and want to reward them accordingly.

Businesses that lack any benefits or ‘extras’ are much more likely to see people walking out the door, as the workforce grows more aware of how critical they are to a business – and wish to be compensated for their efforts and increasing responsibilities.

Incentives can boost employee happiness, creating a positive workplace culture based off hard work and overall achievement – in turn helping them to keep their eye on the ball and not on the door.

 

Training and Development

Another reason why so many people are considering other career options, could be a lack of training and development programs in their current company.

On the whole, employees want to better themselves. They want to pick up new skills or hone the ones they already have. If you as a company can provide enough programs to upskill and reskill the workforce, it will incentivise your employees to continue in their current role, or even shoot for a higher role as they learn and grow with you.

Professional growth is incredibly important in today’s business culture and helping your workers to organically grow their abilities shows an attention to leadership that some competitors may not have. Make time for employees to attend conferences or encourage them to develop their skills through tuition or further education. It will be a small investment now, for a huge pay out later down the line as they stick with you through thick and thin, simply because you helped them to grow professionally.

 

Work-Life Balance

The pandemic really shook things up in the business world. Companies across the world had to move to remote-only working to stay afloat. Now, as regular business and in-office work returns, many people yearn for the freedom and better work-life balance that they had when working from home.

Now, we’re not suggesting that you keep the old working-from-home only model, but have you considered implementing hybrid working or flexi-working into your employees schedules? Hybrid working is where employees work some days in the office, and some days from home. It’s a set-up that has shown amazing success during the pandemic, with no real loss to employee motivation or output.

People are increasingly putting more emphasis on their personal life and mental wellbeing in relation to their work life nowadays, and it’s easy to see how so many workers get burnt out when returning to the office full time – which is when the thoughts of quitting come creeping in.

Why not suggest to your employees about flexible working hours, implement hybrid working policies or remote work as part of their weekly routines? It can enable them to bring their best self to their work each day, create a healthy work-life balance, and ensure that your employee retention numbers are stable.

 

Respect and Care

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We’re going to round out today’s article with a simple one – respect. If employees don’t feel respected at work, it’s highly likely that they’ll already be looking elsewhere.

The concept of respect in the workplace goes beyond telling employees that they’ve done a good job. It’s hidden in the actions and tone of managers, especially during times of high stress and tight deadlines.

Making sure your managers and team leaders are treating their workers with the care and attention they need is vital to building a positive workplace culture and ensuring a legacy of happy and motivated staff. We all have off days, but people will more readily remember how they felt during the bad times as opposed to what was said to them.

Cultivating an atmosphere of respect and appreciation will allow your employees to flourish, unimpeded from any workplace squabbles or idle gossip. They will work harder and want to produce their best for you, and likely won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.

 

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We hope we’ve been able to convince you, as a business owner, that there’s more to employee retention than simply patting them on the back and saying thank you. People are looking for much more in their careers nowadays.

Consider what we’ve discussed today and see if your business passes the litmus test. It’s better to get those training programs up and running and those perks in place sooner rather than later, or you’ll likely be seeing more people out the door than are coming in.

Speaking of doors, if you’re looking to expand your business and need sufficient space to do so, why not head over and take a look at our serviced offices and managed offices in your area today. If you’ve ticked all the boxes of what we’ve discussed in this article, you’ll likely be looking at expansion soon, to accommodate all those shiny new hires!

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