As job opportunities become available, your employees, especially those feeling unchallenged and under-valued, may begin to seek out other options. Do you want your best people to quit? Here are eight ways to ensure that they don’t!
1. Do NOT treat everyone equally. You don’t want all of your employees treated the same. Don’t reward mediocrity. Praise your best performers and take your worst to task.
2. Acknowledge a job well done. Gratitude and appreciation for a valiant effort and stellar product are critically important to employees’ willingness to give it their all. If they get the same feedback for a run of the mill product and a superior product, chances are they are going to put in less time and effort every time and thus feel under-utilized and unimportant. Be thankful for your stellar performers top work.
3. Promote from within. Nothing says “you’re appreciated” like hiring people from the outside when you have a number of employees who are qualified and have been working for years in hopes of potentially being promoted. Make your employees feel like they are working towards something (i.e. a raise, a promotion, a corner office, etc).
4. Don’t be a “fun sponge”. If you want to ensure your employee’s unhappiness and eagerness to leave, suck the fun out of the workplace. If you want to keep your best people around, make the culture at work fun. Make sure work is a place your people look forward to coming to each day.
5. Do NOT Micromanage. No one enjoys being micromanaged. Ask for input from your employees (even the junior level ones). Help your employees to understand why they are being asked to perform the task at hand. Help them to feel a sense of ownership.
6. Be flexible with vacation days. Vacation days are critical to your work force’s morale, wellness, performance and productivity. By making employees feel uncomfortable taking their allotted paid vacation days, not only do you deny them some much needed R&R, but also encourage them to look elsewhere.
7. Have an employee retention strategy. If you don’t care about losing your employees to your competitors, GOOD, because without a retention strategy, that’s exactly what will happen. Make sure to talk to your people individually; come up with strategies to ensure your top performers are content and not looking to “jump ship.” Do not wait until they have another offer to ask them how you could incentivize them to stay.
8. Be competitive. Try and keep up on what your competitor’s are doing to keep their employees happy. When possible, one-up your competitors. You want your employees to feel that your work place is superior to others in the field. It will encourage them to stay and be grateful for the position they have rather than seeking other employers that seem to have more to offer.
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