Five Tips for Retaining Great Employees

Recently, the folks at Accolo, an Orion Talent company, discussed with us five strategies for retaining employees over the long term. As we all know, finding the right talent and avoiding toxic employees can often be a battle in-and-of-itself. But you can’t stop there, or you may lose that employee down the line. The experts at Accolo tell us that following the five steps laid out below will lead to consistent, highly effective staff.

 

1. Create an employer brand - An employer brand represents your business’s work culture, mission, and values. The employer brand should entice candidates and current employees to want to work for your company.

 

In TA Trendsetters - Winning Strategies from Talent Acquisition Leaders, Katy Theroux, CHRO and EVP of Corporate Marketing for NCI Building Systems, now Cornerstone Building Brands, delves into this topic saying, “For our organization, we have one message to the marketplace about who we are and what value we bring. Those values get translated into a set of behaviors and how we work with each other….That voice is what ties us all together, defines who we are together and what that means to our customers, our employees and our NCI brand.”

 

2. Practice open communication - You need to be accessible to both candidates and employees. Cameron suggests offering three ways they can get in touch with you. And, just as you wouldn’t want to create a bad hiring experience, you should keep the employee experience positive.

By earning a bad employer reputation, you lose out on referrals and make the recruitment and retention of staff even more difficult for your company. Referrals are often long-term employees, and they usually stay at their jobs at more than twice the rate of job board candidates.

3. Be reliable - This is a simple tip. If you expect your candidates and employees to be punctual and reliable, you need to be, as well.

 

4. Encourage growth - As the Accolo experts point out, the time when employees stayed at a job for decades and earned a Rolex are over. The average employee tenure is now only 4.2 years.

 

According to Mike Starich, CEO of Orion Talent, writing for Recruiting Daily, it is important to take into consideration the training opportunities you offer. “According to a recent survey from McKinsey & Company, executives now see ‘investing in retraining and ‘upskilling’ existing workers as an urgent business priority that companies, not governments, must lead on,’” writes Starich, “On-the-job training and team development not only safeguard your ability to stay competitive as a business, it sends the message that you are dedicated to helping your employees achieve meaningful careers.

 

5. Measure performance - High-performing workers want quantifiable goals and useful feedback. Managers should not only maintain metrics on that employee, but then measure them up against the business as a whole for a bigger picture. Illustrating the valuable role each employee plays in the company's larger mission can be rewarding to the employee. Indeed, Mike Starich reminds us in his article “not to underestimate the role that meaningful work plays in retention.

 

You didn’t just happen upon the great team you work with -- you worked hard to recruit the right people for the job. Don’t let attrition chip away at your hard work. Follow these five tips by developing an employer brand, openly communicating, being reliable, providing upskilling opportunities, and putting performance in context, and you will be on your way to keeping that team around.