Employee Retention Strategies that Actually Work

They say good help is hard to find. Well, it’s also hard to keep.

Hiring can be a time-consuming (and therefore costly) process, but hopefully, your hard work in hiring lands you a great employee. 

Now, how do you keep them around?

After all, as hard as hiring is, turnover is even harder. Once you’ve hired someone (a huge feat in and of itself), you put a ton of time and resources toward onboarding and training. The last thing you want is for that employee to be ready to jump ship after a short amount of time. 

Deliberate employee retention is important, but it does take some strategy on your part. Here are a few employee retention strategies that actually work. 

Stay competitive.

At the end of the day, employees need to make enough money and receive enough benefits to make working for you worth it. If they can easily get more money or significantly better benefits elsewhere, they’ll do it. You should definitely do some research ahead of time to make sure you’re offering a fair salary to begin with, but you should also stay on top of marketplace trends to help you make decisions about benefits and raises. Employees who are compensated well are more likely to stay.

Focus on culture.

In the modern workplace, company culture is huge. People want to work somewhere where they feel welcomed and significant. They want to feel like they’re part of something, that as a member of this team, they’re contributing to creating change in the industry. Be deliberate about your company culture, and work to improve and maintain it. A better culture is going to lead to better retention. 

Have a well-thought-out onboarding process.

All turnover is frustrating, but it’s even more difficult when an employee hasn’t been working for you for very long. A lot of times, newer employees leave because they were never properly trained and don’t feel very confident performing their daily duties at work. To fight against this, make sure your onboarding processes set new employees up for success. If they can get off to a strong start, they’ll be more likely to stick around for longer.

Recognize when they do something well.

Celebrating wins is important for keeping employees engaged and motivated. Find a way to recognize and/or reward employees for exceptional performance. Everyone wants to feel seen and appreciated, and a little recognition can go a long way.

Keep lines of communication open.

In a healthy company environment, open and honest communication is key. This communication needs to go both ways—from manager to employee, and from employee to manager. Employees should feel as though they have a safe place to express their opinions, ask their questions, and air their grievances. Without this open communication, resentment builds, and people start looking for new jobs.

Related: EDI Announces New Finance and Accounting Staffing Services

Finding employee retention strategies that work for your company is important, so don’t overlook it! Find some areas you could improve on and make whatever changes you need to to keep your best people on your payroll.