Over time, businesses and organisations tend to organically build up the best teams to get the necessary work done. It’s rare that you’ll hire all your ideal employees at the same time, and it’s even more rare that all of your best performers will stay for the long run.
Most people can be replaced, but this tends to be a costly process and can really set the rest of your team back. Long term employees have more specific experience and work more seamlessly with your existing processes, so how can you discourage them from eventually looking elsewhere for work?
1) Have a strong induction process
Research shows that going through a specific introductory program when joining a new employer increases the retention rate for new employees by nearly 60%. Making people less anxious and overwhelmed when they start a new job makes them retain new information more easily and pick up skills faster, so you should plan a consistent method of doing this.
2) Keep the process going
A new employee will not be in the same position as a veteran after just a week, or even a few months. If you really need to improve your retention rate, you need to focus on maintaining and building a connection with new staff for a long time after they first join.
3) Give people new career options
It’s natural for your employees, like everyone else’s, to occasionally feel the desire to go into a completely new area. The best way to combat this is to show people that it’s not necessary to leave your organisation in order to find fulfilment in a new area. Consider a system or resource that asks employees what their career goals are and offers alternative paths within your business that they might be interested in.
4) Communicate and connect
As a leader, manager or HR professional, you may not be able to communicate effectively with every employee using the exact same approach. Long-term employees may need to hear different messages to keep them motivated, as they are looking at things from a different perspective than those who are new to the workforce.
5) Add a sense of fun
Don’t forget that your team should be enjoying themselves at work, including when you’re trying to engage them in self-development and stop them taking their talent elsewhere. You may actually be able to turn self-training into a multiplayer game within your organisation, which gives the whole process a fun edge and keeps players interested. This might be a large investment, but it has proved a hugely successful strategy in some cases.