Does your organization really understand your talent’s needs?

Last week, I wrote about The Great Resignation and some of the shocking statistics on employee engagement in 2021.?

McKinsey has since released this report looking at potential reasons why employees would consider leaving an organization and what employers think would cause their staff to move on. For me, the report perfectly captures something that I have believed for a long time: employees are screaming out for more empathetic leadership – and organizations still aren’t hearing them.

It was the above graph that particularly interested me. It indicates that while there is some recognition of employee needs, such as having a good work-life balance and feeling engaged with their work, there is a big lack of awareness around the importance of feeling valued, belonging, and seeing a path for advancement.?

In the report, employees list their four most important reasons for leaving an organization. But shockingly, employers only fully recognize one of these and completely disregard two others as ‘unimportant.’?

So, what causes organizations to have a blindspot for self-actualization and the emotional needs of their workforce? Simply put, a lack of empathetic leadership. Organizations need to realize this is costing them talent, and at the end of the day, it is ALWAYS great talent that drives business outcomes.?

So, what can you do to retain and hire great talent??

1. If it is important to your employees, it is important to you. Recognize their emotional and self-actualization needs and intertwine this into your leadership approach.??
2. Instill a culture of understanding, one that is driven by empathetic leadership.
3. Regularly communicate and get feedback from employees to discover if they are feeling more valued.?
4. Make sure your culture and values are central to your employee value proposition.?

It isn’t simple. Becoming a more empathetic leader isn’t like switching on a light – it requires training, new communication systems, building trust with employees and commitment from all leaders in the organization.?

The pandemic reinforced this concept, starkly highlighting how important empathetic leadership and humanity is, both for creating steadfast businesses but also for attracting and retaining talent. It has changed from being a differentiator in an organization, to a bare minimum requirement for most employees and potential candidates. So much so, that prioritizing empathy at this point actually won’t get you ahead of the competition –? it will just ensure you don’t fall even further behind.

We will be discussing the reasons behind The Great Resignation and how organizations can scale up their hiring in our next live talent leadership webinar event: SocialTalent Live: Hiring at Scale during the Great Resignation.?

The event will bring together the Senior VP of HR from Nielsen, the Head of TA from Uber, Celonis and Mambu, and the COO from global RPO, WilsonHCG to share their insights on how to better engage and retain talent as well as scale hiring in this difficult market.?

Find out more information and sign up for free here.?