Hiring the right people to join your team can transform your company’s performance but persuading them to stay with your firm is just as important. High levels of employee turnover increase business expenditure and can have a negative impact on morale, which is why it’s important to maximise retention however you can. To get started, take a look at these five innovative ways to boost staff retention in your business:
1. Provide More Support to Employees
Staff members should feel able to approach their supervisors, line managers and HR professionals when they need advice or support but don’t wait for staff to reach out to you. By being proactive about offering employees support, you can increase their satisfaction and gain their trust.
For many businesses, time constraints mean that employee support often gets overlooked but using technology to streamline HR processes can give HR professionals more time to focus on high value tasks, like supporting employees. In fact, you get more useful data using HR analytics, and that can be used to improve the identification of trends and patterns that matter.
By using performance management software, for example, HR teams can automate basic tasks and provide enhanced support to staff members. Myhrtoolkit — one of the best performance management software options — integrates with reporting, document management, absence management and health and safety features to provide an end-to-end HR platform. Giving HR professionals the resources they need to maximise staff performance, the right software can form the basis of a new and enhanced company culture.
2. Offer Career Development Opportunities
Most employees will want to enhance their skills, take on more responsibility and increase their earning power as time goes on. So, if you aren’t providing staff with the chance to climb the career ladder, don’t be surprised when they start seeking these opportunities elsewhere.
Regular performance reviews will enable you to establish how employees view their career plan and what they want to achieve. Conversely, employees will have the chance to assess how likely they are to receive in-house promotion and training opportunities. Use this to create bespoke career plans so that employees can plan their professional future with your firm.
3. Introduce Flexible Work Options
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, remote working has increased significantly, and more employees are actively looking for roles that will enable them to work from home on a permanent basis. Depending on the requirements of a role, it may be possible for you to introduce flexible, remote or homeworking options that provide staff with greater control over where they work from.
A cloud-based IT infrastructure will make it easy for employees to log in to your systems from any location, for example, while collaboration platforms will ensure that staff can work effectively with one another, even if they aren’t in the same office. With the potential to reduce the size of your business premises, flexible, hybrid and remote work options can offer financial incentives for businesses too.
4. Build Strong Teams
When employees feel recognised, valued, and integral to a team, they are likely to feel a much higher level of job satisfaction. In turn, this leads to higher productivity rates and reduces staff turnover, which is beneficial for both employers and employees. Building a strong team begins with recruitment, so take the time to consider where skills gaps lie and what type of personalities would be a good fit.
Once you’ve got people on board, implement team building activities and events that will enable employees to forge strong relationships. Adding an element of fun into these occasions can break down barriers, so consider hosting ‘away days’, social events, and informal get-togethers if you want your employees to work well together and develop a sense of affinity to their team.
5. Encourage a Healthy Work-Life Balance
A career is an important component of an employee’s life, but it isn’t the only thing that matters. When you expect your staff to ‘live for work’, employees will quickly feel burnt out, disillusioned and demotivated, which will lead to a higher rate of staff turnover. By recognising how important it is to have a healthy work-life balance and encouraging employees to prioritise commitments outside of work, you can promote well-being and gain your employees’ loyalty.
Provide your employees with a competitive amount of paid holiday and encourage staff to use all of their holiday allowance, for example. Similarly, ensure that employees aren’t contacted outside of working hours, so that they have an opportunity to switch off and relax. Reviewing workloads and focusing on output and performance, rather than presenteeism and hours, can also be another effective way to facilitate a healthy work-life balance for all employees.
Make Your Workplace a Great Place to Be
When your workplace provides a happy, healthy, and fun working environment, employees will naturally be happier and perform better. While it doesn’t necessarily take much to optimise your company culture and work processes, it can have a tremendous impact on staff morale, retention rates and business performance.