10 Employee Retention Strategies for 2023 & Beyond
Blair Williamson
Employee retention strategies play a pivotal role in ensuring a company's long-term success. In this article, we explore innovative ideas and effective techniques to engage and retain your valuable workforce. From fostering a positive company culture to offering career development opportunities, discover the keys to keeping your employees motivated and committed. Read on to unlock the secrets of employee retention in the ever-evolving business world.
What is employee retention?
Employee retention is a company's ability to keep its top employees and avoid employee turnover. When successful strategies are put in place, the turnover rate (number of employees leaving the company voluntarily) is low.
However, it’s not easy to retain top talent. To keep them on your team, it’s important to have an employee retention plan or strategy that can help reduce employee turnover. By using these employee retention techniques, an organization can retain its best employees and reduce the employee turnover rate.
Five main drivers of employee retention are:
- Motivation – encourage employees to do their job well.
- Progression – a guided career path.
- People – working with a supportive team.
- Compassion – providing a healthy work-life balance.
- Benefits – salary and extras.
It’s a shock to a company to lose skilled talent, especially since this pattern is something that occurs repeatedly. It could indicate that something is going wrong. It may be an issue that is easily fixed, such as poor communication, to something more serious like poor management strategies.
Why is employee retention important?
Employee retention is important for the long-term success and sustainability of any business. There are several reasons that employee retention is important such as cost savings, improved productivity, and improved employee morale. Let's break down some of the reasons retention is important to the success of a business.
- Cost Savings: High turnover rates can be incredibly expensive. The cost of recruiting, onboarding, and training new employees can far exceed the expenses of retaining existing ones. Moreover, lost productivity during the transition period can be detrimental to a company's bottom line.
- Knowledge and Expertise: Experienced employees possess valuable institutional knowledge and expertise. Losing them means losing a significant part of your organization's intellectual capital. Retaining them ensures continuity in processes and workflows.
- Improved Productivity: Long-term employees tend to be more productive as they become well-versed in their roles. They require less supervision, make fewer errors, and contribute positively to the company's overall performance.
- Company Culture: Consistent retention promotes a stable and positive company culture. Employees who stay with a company for a longer duration often become strong cultural ambassadors, helping to reinforce core values and beliefs among their peers.
Employee retention is not just about reducing turnover; it's about fostering a culture of engagement and commitment that benefits the organization's financial health, productivity, and long-term success. Investing in employee retention strategies is an investment in the future of the company.
Top 10 Employee Retention Strategies
1. Encourage Open Communication with an Intranet
When budgets are tight and it's hard to give out bonuses or raises, many companies are choosing to invest in an employee intranet. An employee intranet is a powerful tool for retaining employees because it helps facilitate internal communication and creates community among coworkers.
A modern employee intranet is a place where employees can access information they need to do their job, and encourages them to engage and communicate across teams.
When employees are given the right tools to do their work, they perform better and achieve job satisfaction. Employee happiness means people are more likely to stay with the company.
An intranet also crosses borders, which is essential for global business. If employees can contact their colleagues on the other side of the world with ease, company goals are achievable by international teams. Encourage your company leaders to be active on the intranet and create regular updates to help workers feel informed.
A well-built intranet can assist employees in so many ways: online learning, messaging, social media, company information, and reward systems. Integrate other platforms such as Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace and you have an intranet that will boost employee engagement and retention.
2. Create an employee recognition program
Employee recognition is essential for fostering a positive workplace culture and boosting employee morale. Recognizing and appreciating employees' contributions not only motivates them but also strengthens their commitment to the organization. An employee recognition program formalizes this process, making it systematic and inclusive.
The LumApps intranet includes a space for virtual employee recognition where managers can send awards to employees. Co workers can also send virtual thanks to colleagues. These awards will remain on the employee's profile for long-lasting visibility of team contribution.
Employee recognition programs can increase satisfaction in the workplace, improve employee retention, and enhance overall productivity. By acknowledging and rewarding exceptional performance, whether through verbal praise, awards, or other incentives, employers create a supportive environment where employees feel valued, leading to a more engaged and dedicated workforce. In sum, employee recognition programs are a powerful tool for nurturing a thriving, motivated, and loyal workforce.
To create an effective employee recognition program, start with the following steps:
- Define clear objectives and criteria for recognition, ensuring alignment with company values and goals.
- Involve employees in program design to gather their input and preferences.
- Develop a variety of recognition methods, including verbal praise, certificates, awards, or even monetary incentives, tailored to individual and team accomplishments.
- Establish a consistent and transparent process for nomination and evaluation, and consider implementing peer-to-peer recognition.
- Promote the program actively, ensuring everyone knows how it works and why it's important.
- Review the program regularly and adjust in order to keep it fresh for changing employee needs and performance expectations.
3. Invest in Training for your Existing Talent
Once you’ve hired the best candidates available, you have to keep them. Skilled employees with a love for their work want a challenge. They want to know where their career path is going and how they’re going to get there.
To empower them to reach their goals, employers should care for and develop their people. One way to empower your existing employees is to invest in training and continuing education.
Training can be a series of short courses that take a few hours. These kinds of courses can be easily installed on an internal intranet for employees to access during designated work hours.
Here are some simple ways you can invest in training from within your LumApps intranet:
- Create a video learning library within your intranet
- Create a streamlined onboarding plan using employee journeys
- Design employee email campaigns after key moments in an employee lifecycle
Nurturing talent also includes paying for formal education if the organization can afford it. This knowledge development can benefit both the employer and the employee.
Training does not always have to be job-specific. Build your talent pool by offering courses on First Aid, health and safety, social media, creative writing, or even catering.
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4. Give Positive Feedback to the Team
This is more than telling people they’re doing a great job. It’s about recognizing if someone is working in a challenging situation, is doing more than their normal workload, or is working extra hours. In any situation praise is important, but when an employee goes beyond their job description it should be acknowledged.
Giving this kind of feedback should be a core part of every manager and supervisor’s day. Get into the habit of being positive instead of jumping on the things that go wrong. A useful strategy to build employee morale is to try to praise team members a certain number of times each day. If people do make mistakes (which they will) remain professional and look at how the employee can learn from the error.
This behavior commands respect and is far more likely to encourage employees to stay with a company rather than being the manager that yells every time there is a crisis.
5. Managers Should be Approachable
Another one of the key successful employee retention ideas is for managers to be available to listen and offer solutions.
Often managers are busy and can appear unapproachable. If time management is difficult, try setting a time each day or week when staff can ask questions, either individually or at a team-building meeting. This avoids interruptions that can break a manager’s chain of thought working through a long To-Do list.
If employees work from home or remotely, this listening time could be a chat room conversation on the intranet, either individually or with the entire team.
When employees see they can approach their manager they’ll feel confident about asking questions. This simple communication strategy can help retention and builds trust between employees, managers, and organizations. A survey by the Harvard Business Review reported that people who trust the company they work for are 50% more productive than those who do not.
6. Encourage Open Communication
Communication is at the heart of successful employee retention. Spread the news of successes such as increased performance figures, new products, strategies, and plans. It’s just as important to communicate if things are not going so well since gossip can spread like wild-fire and damage the company’s reputation. If a merger is being planned or the company is thinking of downsizing, be as open and honest as you can. Employees will appreciate this and are more likely to stay with a company that tells them the truth.
Keep the lines of communication open through group chats, news bulletins, surveys, and social media. It’s easy to install apps for these on the company intranet to keep everyone up-to-date. Ensure teams communicate about projects that may affect other departments. The organization should gel and work as one for successful retention.
One-on-one communication also boosts retention. For example, if there’s a performance issue deal with it immediately. Employees who wish to develop will appreciate constructive criticism.
7. Address the Needs of Employees of Different Ages
How an employee feels about their job and the organization they work for may depend on their generation.
- Millennials (age 26-40) have grown up with technology, are comfortable with it, and use it for both work and leisure. A strategy to retain them is to be the modern company that everyone wants to work for. Use media they are familiar with such as likes, comments, and images for feedback on projects or ideas. This can easily be created with a state-of-the-art company intranet.
- Gen Xers (age 41-55) are at the peak of their careers and are possibly the hardest group to retain. They’ve gained knowledge and experience and are still ambitious. They want to learn more and offer their skills to a company that values them.
- Baby Boomers (age 56-76) are nearing retirement and are more likely to stay with a company. However, they still need to be motivated and feel part of the company culture. Their skills can be invaluable and professional development is important to them.
Employee Engagement
Time to start or overhaul an engagement strategy? Capitalize on Employee Engagement Opportunities.
8. Be Flexible
When looking at what factors affect employee retention you should consider flexibility. Employers who want to retain employees should be fair and operate with a culture of understanding that people cannot be expected to work 24/7. They need time off to recharge their batteries and enjoy time with their family.
Employees who work for an employer who understands life carries on outside work are much happier. They know they can ask if they need to take some time off. They don´t feel guilty about switching their cell phone off on weekends or when on vacation.
Don´t take employees for granted — well-rested and relaxed workers will do a better job. Be the employer that considers working from home or flexible hours. Allow employees to propose what works best for them and the organization and reach a compromise. This will foster employee satisfaction and motivation, and encourage them to stay.
Employee Engagement
Time to start or overhaul an engagement strategy? Capitalize on Employee Engagement Opportunities.
9. Offer an Attractive Benefits Plan
Staying in a job is not always about money. Many employees favor the all-round package as a reason to stay with their employer. Often organizations will offer a free lunch or chill-out zones to benefit employees. What can you tempt employees with that’s different? One of the objectives of employee retention strategies is to offer benefits outside of the working environment.
When setting budgets it’s crucial to include employee perks that will make your organization unique. Employees who work for a company that offers holidays or discounts on items such as cars as a reward are those who will stay. If your budget can’t stretch to high-ticket perks, there are still things like extra paid time off, free child-care, insurance, health care, and shopping discounts that can help you keep your employees.
Consider what your competitors are offering. If you pay less than similar employers in your field and offer fewer attractive benefits, employee retention is likely to drop. Invest in your employees and they are more likely to reward it with loyalty and dedication to your company.
10. Listen to your Employees
Listening is essential to retain employees. This applies to current employees and those who leave. It’s even important to listen to happy employees as they can give valuable insight into the ambiance of the organization and what makes people happy or unhappy.
A great way to find out people’s opinions is to run surveys. These can be short, three-minute opportunities to gather feedback on the intranet by checking boxes to more in-depth questionnaires. It is important to show employees you’ve listened and will take action. For example, staff may wish to leave because of management style or lack of communication from the top down. These situations can be easily fixed and showing you listen and respond can reduce employee turnover.
This policy also applies to exit interviews. There can be many reasons for an employee to leave, from dissatisfaction with the salary to a lack of career development or personality clashes with colleagues. The key is to prevent these situations before they arise.
Employee retention refers to a company’s ability to keep its top employees. When successful strategies are put in place, the turnover rate (number of employees leaving the company voluntarily) is low.
- Invest in the Right People
- Nurture your Existing Talent
- Managers Should be Approachable
- Encourage Open Communication
- Use the right internal communication tools
- Analyze retention figures
- Hold exit interviews
- Monitor
