Employee Retention Playbook: 20 Winning Strategies

Noticing a wave of dissatisfaction among your employees? Afraid of losing the top talented employees? Well, here are 20 tried and tested employee retention strategies to implement.

Losing employees is damaging for businesses. When a company starts seeing a significant loss of employees, it not only costs the company time and money but might also influence other employees to call it quits. Employee retention is a big issue globally. It is not only about preventing your employees from quitting but also about keeping your best talent and people around for as long as possible. 

The average employee exit costs 33% of their annual salary.

Whether a small business or an MNC, employing workforce retention strategies is vital to build an effective workforce. If businesses want their employees to stay committed to their jobs and organisations, listed below are 20 tried and tested ways to increase employee retention.

Why is It Important To Retain Employees?

Your company’s success depends on keeping talented employees around because it lowers the cost of hiring and recruiting new hires. Additionally, it encourages efficient knowledge transfer within the company. Long-term employees are more familiar with the company’s culture and have the skills necessary to deal with projects. They can impart this important knowledge to newly hired employees.

When you take steps to keep your employees and express your gratitude, they will typically be happier and more satisfied in return. This often translates to high work performance, more sales and better client satisfaction.

20 Ways to Employee Retention Successfully

Here are 20 ways companies can retain their talented workforce. 

1. Conduct Mentorship Programs

Mentorship programs are initiatives where mentees (new joiners) are paired with experienced individuals (mentors) to receive guidance, support, and knowledge transfer. An effective mentorship program can greatly improve employee turnover by allowing employees to find guidance.

One-third of new employees quit after about 6 months.

Ensure your mentorship programs create structured employee pairing based on experience, job role, or specific goals. Set up regular check-ins to evaluate the growth and progress. With mentorship, you can accelerate the employees’ professional development and keep them oriented toward the organisation’s goals.

2. Leverage Technology in Workplace

Technology is essential to modern businesses, and choosing the proper tools can increase employee retention. You can improve workplace productivity and job satisfaction with the correct solution, whether it’s work scheduling or time off management.

With employee management software like TrackoField, managers can allocate tasks effortlessly on the basis of employee availability, bandwidth and skill set greatly enhancing work-life balance. This data could be further leveraged to detect overworked or underworked staff and take relevant action.

TrackoField is a cloud-based attendance management software with strong shift scheduling capabilities. It enables managers to track employees’ attendance and productivity to pinpoint issues. In order to ensure that workers can efficiently manage their workloads, it helps to optimise and streamline daily chores and procedures.

Moreover, employees should be equipped with the appropriate tools for the job, such as industry-specific software, communication tools, or project management software. It enhances their general productivity and well-being and helps them work more effectively.

3. Encourage Work-Life Balance

Work-life balance is a balanced mix of personal and professional duties, allowing employees to maintain a healthy lifestyle and avoid burnout. A well-balanced work life has a number of positive effects, such as an increase in job satisfaction, good mental health, and heightened engagement, which all lead to employee retention.

It’s proven that when employees feel supported in achieving work-life balance, they will be more engaged in their work. This will make them more productive, improve workplace morale, and be more loyal to the company.

Some Interesting Employee Retention Facts! 95% of HR leaders admit employee burnout is sabotaging workforce retention. Employees who rate their work-life balance highly are 10% more likely to stay at their company. 94% of employees think work-life balance is important. 78% of people believe they have a good work-life balance. 61% of workers wouldn’t accept a job that disrupts their work-life equilibrium. 56% of people claim no amount of money would make them sacrifice their work-life balance.

4. Open Communication

Having an open door policy has proven to provide outrageous benefits for both the employees and the organisation in multiple aspects. Open door policy implies that supervisors and managers are open to employees’ questions, queries, complaints, and suggestions. This makes employees feel secure and acknowledged in the workplace.

This makes them feel that they and their opinions and thoughts are valued by the higher management, which leads to a rise in confidence and engagement to level up. Resulting in motivated and productive employees.

5. Growth and Development

When organisations invest in improving employees’ personal career growth, you can make them feel valued as individuals. Conducting workshops and offering skill development courses lets them know that the company cares about their career growth.

This benefits not only the employees but also organisations as they are investing in their own employees, who, in turn, are turning into highly skilled professionals. They can be promoted to a higher level. Adjustment time is spared since they are already diffused with the work culture.

6. Increase Employee Engagement

It is reported that 43% of employees are bored at their current jobs. These employees feel that the company is underutilising their skills and talents, and the company lacks opportunities for them to hone their skills. Once the employees start feeling disengaged, they are more likely to seek other employment.

Companies must focus on increasing employee engagement through development opportunities to retain top talent. Employees must be provided with opportunities to utilise their skills and talent.

7. Rewards and Recognise Good work

According to research, 44% of employees switch jobs because of not getting adequate recognition for their efforts, and 67% of employees said that better rewards would encourage them to stay at a job longer.

Express your gratitude to your staff for their efforts. Acknowledge their worth in public. You can express your gratitude with a heartfelt card or email that explains how their efforts benefit the company. Here’s a tip to help you choose a worthy reward: Your employees’ emotional needs should be met by the awards you give them.

Other than receiving money, there are plenty of other choices such as a company party, a gift card, an extra day off, for instance. All this can boost employee morale and enhance the workplace culture. Even on a small team, recognition programmes can be established on a shoestring budget.

8. Give Consistent Feedback

Subpar work can lead to employee turnover and demotivation among your staff. For this reason, you need to give your staff regular, helpful feedback on how they’re doing.

Conducting one-on-one meetings or regular performance reviews can assist staff in understanding their areas of weakness. Always thank those who do well; praising their accomplishments in public can raise staff morale. It will inspire them to stick around and succeed.

9. Allow Flexible Working Arrangements

Nearly 80% of employees want a flexible work schedule. These arrangements may include allowing flexible scheduling or providing additional time off. Offering the option to work from home alone can cut turnover rates by 25%.

Businesses that are unable to finance remote work options can still provide flexibility to their staff by allowing them to wear casual attire or listen to music while working. Businesses should examine their internal policies to identify areas where they can relax restrictions and provide their employees with greater freedom.

10. Foster a Culture of Teamwork

Employee supporting employees will boost spirits, resulting in higher retention rates and improved job satisfaction. Additionally, teamwork fosters creativity, increases output, and gives workers a feeling of community.

According to 37% of workers, “working with a great team” is the primary factor keeping them at their current employer. 54% of workers acknowledged that the strong sense of community and teamwork at their companies caused them to stay longer than they should have.

11. Earn Employee Trust Through Transparency

Employees must be assured that their employer won’t arbitrarily fire them or make careless business decisions. People’s main desire is to feel safe, and open and transparent communication is the first step towards achieving that.

For the modern employee, trust is crucial: 46% of workers consider quitting their job due to a lack of transparent communication.

An organisation must prioritise gaining the trust of its workforce if it hopes to maximise retention. Executives should promote honest communication at all levels and communicate the company’s goals as clearly as possible because this starts at the top.

12. Implement Gradual Changes Instead of Hasty Ones

Bringing changes is a good thing, but it’s best to do so gradually instead of going all in. An abrupt shift can even have a negative impact on morale and might cause veteran employees to call it quits.

13. Ask for Feedback about Supervisors and Executives

50% of workers quit due to their supervisor. A single incompetent leader has the potential to cause excessive turnover. Unfortunately, identifying problem-oriented leaders can be difficult. When facing their superiors, underperforming managers frequently act very differently from how they do when facing their subordinates.

For this reason, businesses ought to routinely request anonymous employee input about supervisors from their workforce. Nonetheless, businesses must ensure that they are prepared to receive and use employee feedback. It is more detrimental to not listen to their people than it is to not ask in the first place and can reduce overall confidence in the leadership of the organisation.

14. Make Rest and Time-off Compulsory

Burnout is inevitable if employees are constantly working without a break. For instance, a third of employees do not even take lunch breaks; instead prefer eating at their desks and continuing to work. This hustle mentality can be harmful not only to the employees but also to the company’s culture.

To avoid this from occurring, companies must make time off a must. Organisations must urge people to:

• Take time off for a certain duration
• Eat lunch away from the desk,
• Do not respond to emails during the break or after-hours (unless urgent)

15. Equip Your Company with Good Leaders

Effective leadership plays a crucial role in retaining employees and keeping them motivated. Leaders who demonstrate empathy, respect, and fairness can foster a positive work environment that encourages employees to stay with the company. They can also inspire employees to perform at their best, boosting their motivation and productivity. On the contrary, poor leadership can lead to high employee turnover and low morale, as employees may feel undervalued and unappreciated.

Leadership styles can also impact employee retention and motivation. For instance, transformational leaders who inspire and challenge their employees can foster a sense of purpose and commitment, leading to higher job satisfaction and lower turnover rates.

16. Alter Work Responsibility

Employees, when working on the same tasks on repeated occasions, can become pretty bored and super unproductive. Moreover, they won’t grow some competent skills much-needed to compete in a dynamic work environment. This will also restrain them from making creative decisions. Your employees have the opportunity to broaden their skill set when you move their work responsibilities from one position to another. Enhancing experience will increase their sense of involvement in their work, and giving them opportunities to perform various tasks will raise employee engagement.

Employees can be placed in different departments for a month or two to gain new skills. These improved abilities will enable them to lead themselves and their team members to accomplish goals more effectively and impartially.

17. Conduct Exit Responsibility

Although the addition of this point seems illogical to you at this point, it does make sense. There are numerous situations in which you must fire an employee, or they might have to leave the organisation. This unavoidable circumstance may also provide you with the most important knowledge that will prevent you from encountering a similar circumstance later on.

The best way for you to find out why the employee had to leave your company is to conduct an exit interview. In this interview, you will learn about the conflicting strategies or not-so-favourable management that forced people to make decisions that reduced employee engagement.

The information provided by the leaving employee will help you take corrective measures and increase employee engagement by eliminating the factors and situations that are changing the employees’ minds.

18. Continue Using Monetary Benefits

Employees still find financial benefits appealing as long as they receive a healthy salary and various other strategies. To make sure you are competitive in what you offer, be sure to look into typical pay scales for the industry in which your business operates. You can draw quality talent even if you have a shoestring-size budget. Given this, you just need to provide added benefits, a flexible work environment, and a platform to nurture skills.

19. Recruit the Right People

When recruiting, it is vital for companies to hire people who have the required skill, their interests and goals align with their designation and the company’s goals, interests and targets.

Strictly avoid painting unrealistic pictures in order to attract employees with starkly different on-ground realities.

• Revisit job description
• Be clear of employee requirements
• Advertise ‘Openings’ in the right places
• Try to seek referrals

20. Make the Onboarding Process as Smooth as Possible

Provide adequate guidance and support to employees during the onboarding process. Setting the right tone from the very beginning is an important step. With correct onboarding and orientation, you can improve employees’ experience and ensure a comfortable journey in the company.

Start with structure training, introducing company policies, culture and job-specific tasks. It will do good to pair a new employee  retention with an experienced one who can guide them and not feel alienated during the period.

Employees are 23% more likely to stay if their manager clearly explains their roles and responsibilities

Wrapping Up!

For an organisation, keeping employees is just as important as hiring them. Employees may be tempted to switch jobs frequently in today’s competitive market in search of a position that offers better work benefits and a higher salary.

The employee retention strategies we’ve discussed above are not a magic bullet; rather, they’re part of a bigger movement to help and take care of workers, which many businesses are not doing enough of. Many workers now recognise the value of their time and energy because of the pandemic, so it’s critical for your business to demonstrate that it values its employees’ time and energy appropriately.