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What You Need to Know to Retain Your Top Employees
It’s no secret that the current employment landscape is a buyer’s market. The proliferation of digital job hunting channels, as well as the increasing presence of the gig economy, mean that companies can no longer count on retaining every employee that walks through the door.
Shorter tenures may be the norm these days, but you can still use several strategies to hang on to your top performers and keep your workplace productivity high.
Retain Top Employees By Keeping Them Engaged
The most important thing you can do to retain top employees is to make engagement a priority. Engagement is defined as an employee’s personal and professional commitment to your company, as well as how they perceive their role in the organization.
The concept is simple enough, but a staggering number of companies fall short in keeping their teams engaged. Gallup routinely tracks employee engagement rates, with some unfortunate results to share—less than a third of employees are engaged in their jobs. And worse yet, over 16 percent are “actively disengaged.” That’s one out of every seven employees in the average company. Clearly, something out there is going wrong.
On the bright side, this means your organization will be all the more desirable to top talent if you can make engagement a priority. These strategies will get you started:
- Push your company’s values: Engaged employees aren’t just productive workers; they have a passion for their jobs. And if you want them to get excited about their roles, you need to get them on board with your company’s values and mission.
- Leverage collaborative technology that provides information transparency; the most productive employees know what’s expected of them each day and never lack the materials they need to do their jobs.
- Be flexible with your policies. Rigid workflows can be a serious detriment to retaining top employees these days. Give them the freedom to work on their own terms, avoid micromanaging, and don’t be afraid to explore remote working opportunities that help them stay efficient.
- Offer opportunities for professional development: Top performing employees aren’t generally content with resting on their laurels and will welcome the opportunity to build their professional skillsets. Inform them of these opportunities in your onboarding process and accommodate their scheduling needs if they decide to take advantage of the education.
Engagement is key, but it’s only the beginning if you’re trying to retain top employees. To make your organization more appealing than others that may be making them offers, keep the following tips in mind.
Create Effective Onboarding
The way you onboard your new employees signals what kind of experience they’ll have at your organization. Make the process as efficient and streamlined as possible—it’s an investment in your employees that pays dividends over time.
Establish a Friendly Team Culture
It’s been said that employees don’t quit jobs—they quit managers. And if you want to retain your top employees, you can’t have draconian supervisors oppressing them at every turn. Work on your company culture to prioritize friendly communication and fair treatment. Even the best workers may shy away from an otherwise desirable role if your managers give them a hard time.
Leverage Their Talents
Your top employees may have more to offer than their current jobs allow. When employees excel in their roles, work with them one-on-one to identify their unique talents that have allowed them to succeed. Leverage these skills (and their natural enthusiasm) for projects that may fall outside their purview. If they’re truly top-performing employees, they’ll jump at the chance to put their talents to work.
Employee Retention Isn’t About Them—It’s About You
It’s easy to say that today’s workers aren’t as loyal to their jobs as they used to be, but in truth, employee retention is all about you. If you provide a flexible work environment that keeps them focused, engaged, and positive, engagement will come on its own. But if you’re struggling to retain your top employees, give us a call at Urgenci. We’ll be there to help.
Urgenci
