Good employees are hard to find and sometimes even harder to keep. That’s because highly qualified, competent candidates are in high demand in a variety of industries. As an employer, you’re incentivized to retain your best employees so they can continue supporting your organization.
But what are the best ways to keep these critical workers?
Provide Educational and Growth Opportunities
Employees hate to feel stagnant. This effect is even more powerful among your most ambitious and hardest-working employees, who are intrinsically motivated to excel. If you want to retain these employees, you need to provide them with educational and growth opportunities. They need to feel intellectually and professionally stimulated in ways that fulfill their desire to grow.
As a simple example, you can equip your employees with more opportunities to learn skills and gain certifications. Becoming aerial lift certified online is a relatively short, streamlined process that can give your employees the knowledge and experiences they need to operate aerial lifts, scissor lifts, and similar equipment safely and effectively.
The exact nature of your educational and growth opportunities should depend on the nature of your business and the context of your company culture. That said, there are many options to choose from, including paying for classes, providing mentorships, and even cross-training across different departments within your organization. If you’re unsure what options to offer, ask your employees about various ways they’d like to develop.
Give Monetary Rewards
Though this strategy might be obvious, you should give serious consideration to monetarily rewarding your best employees. Giving them raises and occasional bonuses can reward them for the excellent work they’ve already done and incentivize them to continue doing their best work. This is also a defensive measure, as your best employees may be headhunted by rival organizations willing to offer them more money for the same work.
Obviously, not every business can afford ongoing raises and bonuses, so if you can’t afford to monetarily your best employees, find another way to do it.
Give Non-Monetary Rewards
There are many non-monetary rewards that you can provide your employees with as well, such as:
- Titles. Even if you can’t give a raise alongside it, you can promote your best employees and give them new, fancier titles. It’s not just an exercise in vanity; it’s a symbolic act that shows how much you value them, and it can benefit them on a resume as well.
- Awards. Awards don’t have to be expensive. Presenting an employee with a trophy or certificate for a job well done might be exactly the motivation they need to keep going.
- Benefits/perks. You can reward employees with extra benefits and perks as well. Obviously, some perks are more desired than others, but you can use a combination of different perks to stay within budget and appeal to different people with different perspectives.
- Public recognition and celebrations. Most employees feel especially appreciated when they receive public recognition. When you’re proud of something your best employees have done, consider publicly announcing their achievements and celebrating with a formal event.
Adjust the Culture
Adjusting your company culture can, in some cases, build a stronger organization and retain your best employees at the same time. This is heavily context-dependent, but some organizations benefit from adopting more relaxed, flexible structures, and some organizations benefit from adopting more regimented, disciplined structures. Figure out if there’s a disconnect between your culture and the employees who work for it, then attempt to resolve this dissonance.
Prioritize Wellness and Work-Life Balance
Ideal work-life balance looks a little different to every employee – and every employer as well! However, you can greatly impact retaining your best employees by prioritizing wellness and work-life balance in whichever ways are best for both of you. Implement new perks, benefits, and policies that allow people to destress, spend more time with family, and generally be themselves. If someone is having a tough time, make sure they have access to resources that can help them.
Ask for Feedback – and Act on It!
Finally, talk to your best employees directly and ask for feedback. You can do this in formal interviews or anonymously in the form of surveys. In any case, listen closely to the feedback you receive and try your best to act on it. Your employees will probably be honest about what makes them satisfied in a workplace environment and how you can keep them indefinitely.
Retaining good employees is hard, especially when so many other rival organizations are likely competing for those talented individuals. However, with a combination of rewards, support, and other strategies, you can greatly increase the likelihood of keeping your top talent in-house.
Photo by Christina Morillo: Pexels
