How to improve staff retention

Employee retention is essential for any business’ success. While you may be a brilliant businessperson yourself, nobody can run an entire company entirely independently. Your staff are the team you surround yoursef with and will form the backbone of your workplace.

It's their hard work, ideas and collaboration that will see everything run smoothly, so keeping them on board is important. Good staff retention levels can decrease recruitment spending and can reduce disruption to workflow. It can also help to promote a positive working environment and maintain morale in the workplace. But what can you do to attract and retain the best talent in your industry?

Use Comprehensive Hiring Practices

Hiring the right individual for the job the first time around can give you the best possible chances of retaining this person in your workforce. Make sure to know exactly what kind of person you’re looking for before starting your search by defining the key skills, attributes values and behaviours you want to bring into the role and business. You can then read through resumes for individuals that meet the essential criteria and then conduct a thorough interview process that will give insight into whether they are competent and a good fit for your business. When hiring individuals for management roles, you will need to ensure that they have good emotional intelligence. Emotional Intelligence determines how well a person can identify with and manage their own emotions and manage their impact on others. Strong leaders with high levels of emotional intelligence can win the hearts and minds of their staff, authentically, genuinely and with a deep level of connection. We recommend using a professional, reliable and valid emotional intelligence questionnaires to determine whether they are a good fit for a leadership role.

Implement Good Management

A common reason for people leaving their jobs is bad management. Good management can ensure that your employees always feel supported in their roles. It can ensure that they receive a fair workload, are well organised and have someone to turn to when they are experiencing issues or difficulties. Of course, good management takes good leadership. It’s a good idea to enrol managers in your business in an executive leadership coaching programme or a leadership workshop, where they can learn the skills it takes to maintain a happy and well-functioning team around them.

Offer Career Progression

Employees are more likely to stay with organisations that invest in their continual growth and development. Nobody wants to be stuck in a dead-end job. We are all human and want to see progression in what we’re doing. Of course, people will have different motives. Some will want to progress to achieve higher pay and a more comfortable quality of life. Others will want to progress for social status. There are people who simply love to learn and grow. Whatever the reason for your staff wanting to progress, you’re going to need to facilitate this upward movement. When you leave your staff stagnant, you’re going to find that they quickly jump ship to other companies who are happier to offer them the step up they are seeking. Make sure that you, or managers, hold regular one to ones with all staff members to discuss where they’d like to see themselves in one year, three years and five years. This can help you to map out their next steps within your company and can let you know what you need to do to help them achieve these goals. To offer fruitful careers, you should develop actionable metrics that document internal employee mobility to understand the quality of jobs that you are creating and offering.

To learn more about the courses we offer, which can help improve staff retention, don’t hesitate to get in touch. A member of our team will be more than happy to discuss your individual needs further.