Employee retention is the process by which the organization attempts to make efforts to help the employee stay with the organization for a longer period of time. Employee retention is critical to the long-term success of the organization. Retaining the best performing employees ensures smooth functioning, greater customer satisfaction, increased sales, satisfied employees, effective planning and overall organizational growth.
Employee retention has become a key concern for the corporate these days as the top performers have a tendency to move out of the system. Lucrative salary packages, better working environment, comfortable timings, recognition and growth prospects are some of the major factors to that cause any employee to look for change.
The employers must draw a line of distinction between the low performing employees and the top performers and thus direct all its efforts in order to retain those valuable and contributing employees. Employee turnover is of utmost concern for the employers as it proves to be very costly. There is so much of time, money and efforts involved in hiring and training new employees who don’t stay for long.
Why employees tend to leave?
Good employees leave for many reasons. Following are some of the common concerns due to which top performers decide to leave the system-
Lucrative packages– No matter how much an employee love working in the organization, if he gets a better offer, he will likely to consider exiting the organization. Good compensation plans and additional perks always attract employees.
Workload– Excessive workload takes a major toll on the mental and physical health of the employee and leads to dissatisfaction. Workload coupled with long working hours of the organization may lead to boredom and monotonous routine that act as a reason for the employees to decide to leave and join the organizations with comfortable working hours.
No scope of growth– A lot of good talent leaves the system if they feel being trapped in dead-end positions, seeing no scope of promotions or growth. Employees often tend to hop job from one company to another in order to grow in terms of position and money.
Lack of appreciation– Employees may decide to leave if they feel devalued and unrecognized. The reason behind this feeling may be due to inequality in pay for similar work, not being appreciated or recognized for good performance. The desire to be recognized, praised and considered causes such employees to leave the system.
Irrelevant job profile– It has also become a common and major problem these days. The job significantly varies from the initial description and what was told at the time of interview. The initial job description may lead to unrealistic expectations among the candidates. If the reality differs from the initial description, the employee will soon realize it and may feel trapped and this may cause him to decide to exit the system.
Strategies to retain employees
We can’t retain employees unless we have a plan to make them stay with the organization. The employers can succeed in retaining the employees by successfully adopting the following strategies.
Compensation benefits– The employers must look for compensation plans that fit perfectly with the performance of the employee, his eligibility in terms of knowledge and experience and his expectations.
Hire the right person at the right place– In order to eliminate the chaos generated by the mismatch between the actual and the employee’s uncertain expectations from the job, employers must work on their hiring procedures. The employees should exactly know what the job entails and what is expected from them. The employers must judge the fitness of the employee for the job before going ahead considering the fact that recruiting the right candidate is a time consuming process.
Make them realize that they are important– As quoted by Dale Carnegi, “People work for money, but go the extra mile for recognition, rewards and appreciation.” The employers must simply recognize the performance and appreciate the best performers. A simple note or token of appreciation can also act as a morale builder for the employee. Employers can also design reward or incentive plans for exceptionally good performers.
Provide growth opportunities– Scope of future growth in terms of rise in status and salary hike can help in retaining the best talent of the organization. The employers can organize self-assessment and career growth workshops for employees with support of the concerned managers.
Create healthy work environment– Better working place coupled with comfortable timings serve as one of the major factors that employees generally look for. Employees suffer from stress due to workload and work-life imbalance. Employers can organize outings and other refreshing breaks that work as stress buster for the employees.
Employees are the major assets of any organization. The employers must work hard towards retaining those employees who are really important for the effective functioning of the organization.
Written by :
Manasvi Pandey- manasvipandey27@gmail.com
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