Rethinking Retention

Rethinking Retention

Most employers have spent the last several years relentlessly focused on talent attraction strategies. Sadly, this has reduced many retention programs to little more than anniversary gift catalogs. With TA leaders now facing record low unemployment numbers, many are shifting considerable resources toward improving employee? retention, and ushering in a new era of “Retention, it’s the new recruiting.” If the current labor market has you rethinking retention, here are a few things to consider.

Set a Budget?

Before jumping straight into building a best-in-class retention program, you need to determine your budget, and in most cases, from where it is coming. This may be as simple as shifting funds from a robust recruiting budget, or as complex as challenging your C-suite executives to consider a mid-year budget increase. Regardless of how this shakes out, make sure to include some discretionary spend to use for firefighting efforts at high turnover locations. Please realize, the current labor market has your competition fighting to capture the heart of your best employees. You need to budget for an effective defense.

A Winning Approach

Successful retention strategy requires two different areas of focus: new hires (employed 90 days or less), and long-term employees (the rest of your employee population).

New Hires:? The churn rate of new employees has skyrocketed in recent years?— particularly, in remote workers.? New employees need to form relationships, find connections, and forge bonds before they realize a long-term commitment to an employer. A winning strategy focuses on building strong ties between new and current employees, and the organization as a whole. Here are a few strategy elements to consider:

• Monthly virtual or in-person new employee networking meetings that include both peers and department heads.
• Birthday, anniversary, or performance recognition celebrations
• Miscellaneous, thoughtful surprises / rewards can go a long way. After identifying a new hire's favorite things (i.e., restaurant, coffee shop, spectator sport, snack food), surprise each new hire by delivering a different favorite periodically during their first 90 days.
• Monthly 1-on-1 meetings with each new employee and a relevant leader within his/her department.?
• Ambassador programs can significantly improve retention. Assign each new hire to a tenured, high-performing employee who serves as a mentor or guide throughout the first 90 days, with regularly scheduled check-ins. Provide ambassadors with incentives based on retention.

Longer-Term Employees: After 90 days, most employees have adjusted to your organization. An effective retention strategy now broadens to include elements which maintain employee / employer alignment, encourage growth, and recognize achievements. Some long-term employee retention strategy elements to consider:

• Never forget important dates. Acknowledge birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, on time (or early) completion of projects, and other important dates.? Whether it's a gift, a bonus, or just a thank you, simple acknowledgment goes a long way.
• Competitions/Goals/Campaigns. The competitive nature of most employees drives innovation and performance. Make sure to reward the winners.
• Family atmosphere may seem cliché, but leaders who establish one effectively reduce turnover, or often eliminate it all together. Never underestimate the importance of relationships.
• The importance of advancement opportunities and wage increases must not be overlooked. While some employees are satisfied with yearly wage increases alone, higher performing employees are always looking for “what’s next for me.” ? Work with high performers to determine long-term advancement goals with performance expectations. Then, follow through when they succeed.

Recruiting the best talent is very important, but retaining the best talent is of at least equal importance. If you want to talk about either, shoot me a message, or give me a call. Don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to The Monday Minute. Have a great week in talent!

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