Written by: Arthur Gluzman, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Hiring employees is difficult, and the same applies to retaining them. Unfortunately, this is very common, especially these days when most workforces are surrounded by Millennial and Gen Z. Survey says that the average retention for this workforce is up to 3 years only. Therefore, that is why company hopping has become common.
Here’s Why You Need to Focus on Your Company’s Retention
If you are not focusing on your employee retention, you are wasting a lot of money. Labor cost is about 50% for service-related businesses, while 30% is for manufacturing businesses. This includes all items on compensation and benefits.
According to the latest business trend, companies spend 6.2 months training a new employee. Imagine if you only retain them for one year; that means you didn’t even hit a fragment of your ROI from the expenses in hiring and training the employees. Plus, your expenses will likely balloon because you’d keep on training.
The level of trust cannot be set. If your employees are always new, you will always have apprehensions, doubts, and worries. This affects the stability of your business.
Once your employees start leaving and it becomes the norm, you will be known for such hence, putting the company’s credibility at stake. This could even lead to labor issues with the government.
With all these at hand, it’s but a requirement (not just a necessity) to give much attention to employee retention programs and measures that you can implement. However, before that, it is essential to know what keeps the employee from leaving.
So, why are the best employees leaving?
There are various reasons why the best employees resign, and these reasons are:
1. No Salary Increase
Employees work to earn money. The money that they need is relative to their expenses. Expenses are not fixed, never stagnant. The amount you needed and spent last year will not be the same as this year and in the years to come. There are many reasons why it is changing (e.g., inflation rate), but the bottom line is that you need to leverage their salaries to the current market trend. It’s only fair to compensate them according to their rendered service.
2. No Job Promotion
The intangible partner of salary increase is job promotion. Sadly, there are still companies these days that don’t have a solid performance management process rolled out. As a result, employees are blinded by how they progress. The danger here is if your employees think that they are already eligible for promotion, and you failed to do it; if there is a performance management process to follow, everybody will be aligned in assessing their performance that will signal their promotion. To make it worse, some companies have this performance management process, but for some reason, they deliberately ignore promoting deserving employees.
3. No Developmental Plans
When you hired them, you gave them the contributor level. However, after five years, the job level is the same because you failed to upgrade them; you could not develop their potential. Then you get frustrated because there’s no show of improvement. In such a case, it could give your employee no option but to leave.
4. Micromanagement
The generations of today often hate micromanagement. However, you need to know that the current generation is composed of self-starters and a passion-driven workforce. Besides, if you hired them because they possess the traits of your ideal employee, why don’t you entrust the workload to them. Instead, if you always give them point-to-point instructions and demand to follow the point-to-point method, they might have no option but to leave.
5. Toxic Office Politics
Whether you admit it or not, this still happens in most workplaces today. There are organizations where company politics are used. In such a case, the weakest links are always left behind. Those favored always get the cake even if they don’t deserve it; No one wants this kind of culture.
If all these five tips are happening in your workplace, it may be ideal for you to leave for a better organization if you are an employee. However, here’s the thing – There’s no such thing as 100% employee retention. A 10% attrition rate is still acceptable. Bottom line, if your employees leave because of these five reasons, you’re doomed.
Arthur Gluzman, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Arthur Gluzman, the founder is the CEO of a million-dollar recruitment company and a career coach. For more than 20 years, Arthur has coached and helped various individuals to get their dream jobs within 30 days. He has also helped top reputable companies recruit the best talent in their organizations. Using his 20 years of recruiting experience, he has helped CEO’s, CFO’s, VP’s, and Talent Acquisition Pros who are looking to hire and retain the best professionals and executives in the known Universe. "I encourage you to take your career to the next level. I believe it’s time for you to receive expert assistance in pinpointing your hidden strengths and passions while building unshakable confidence. Build your brand as an expert in your industry, just like any other leading expert. You will never feel stuck, undervalued, unappreciated, unrecognized, or underpaid ‒ Ever again in your lifetime. So…"
