Should I Stay or Should I Go?

How progressive companies are retaining quality employees

Author: Karen Richardson

Missed opportunities, a loss of focus and cost-management—these are all reasons why employers are losing quality people in the workplace today.

Is retention still an issue due to our current economy? “Very much so,” says Scott Morris, President and CEO of Results.com Canada, a global business coaching firm based in Calgary, Alberta. He says retention is one of the biggest challenges employers face today.

“I think employers are losing quality people because the focus now, to a large degree, is on cost-cutting, versus taking advantage of growth opportunities and really driving an exciting future in the business,” says Morris.

Employees are certainly nervous about the economy today and some are taking drastic measures. Great employees have options, he says. “They say, ‘Even though they tell me I’m safe, there are no guarantees, and I’m going to start to look around’. People are getting caught up in the doom and gloom. A lot of capable individuals or organizations are losing focus on their core business and they’re missing opportunities.”

Morris gets involved in developing and executing strategic plans for organizations. “Employees are leaving companies when they can’t see beyond the horizon. Organizations that don’t have a vision for the future, especially in these difficult times, and communicate it frequently are likely to lose their key people. Progressive organizations that have an exciting future and engage their employees in the decision-making process are going to attract and retain employees instead.”

There are a number of progressive approaches both companies and employees can take that are effective in ensuring they are well positioned in the current economy.

For employees, Morris advises, “Even if you’re not concerned about your current situation, you still need to be talking to everyone you can to see if there is a better option out there for you.” Being in tune with what’s going on in the market, developing your skills, keeping your resume current and shopping around are all important career-management tactics that all employees should be initiating,” he says.

For employers, he suggests the following strategies on how to retain valuable talent:

1) Top-grading: Make sure you do your top-grading so you’ve got your A-team. A recent survey by Gallup identified that up to 75% of all North American employees are either not engaged or are under-performing. What’s happening is organizations are seeing this as a great time to do a talent review–to look at employees from the top-down and determine who’s critical to the future of the business. They’re better able to assess and focus their efforts on those who are going to be in a position to help with the company growing, and be successful as things turn around.

2) Discover strengths: Talk to key employees about what their strengths are and what they love about their job. Also, what do they loathe or dislike about their job? “The process is to delegate and eliminate the loathing. Create an environment where they can really have the opportunity to do what they do best every day. That will engage your people to a much greater level,” he says, referring to Marcus Buckingham’s book Now, Discover Your Strengths. In the past, organizations spent too much time trying to fix an individual’s weaknesses not realizing that by building on their strengths, and bringing their weaknesses to either a minimal level or trying to work around them, they’re going to get more engagement and productivity from their employees.

3) Training and development: While it may seem basic, the first thing organizations cut when things get a little bit tight is the training budget. This is about the third most important thing employees will look at and that employers will benefit from, especially in difficult times. Employees want the opportunity to develop their skills—they want to do it within their existing organization. The challenge for the organization is to make sure these development dollars are focused on the right people. The results will position them for growth when the economy strengthens. It will also attract new high-performing employees who are looking for a great opportunity, because they’ll quickly see that the organization invests in its people.

What are some other reasons why employees leave a company? While salary is still a key issue, more often than not, we see people leave organizations because they don’t feel valued or appreciated. People leave managers, not companies. Supervisors and managers need to communicate an exciting future for their organization, and frequently share how they believe this can be achieved.

Sometimes supervisors are not in the right roles. In the book, The Three Signs of a Miserable Job, by Patrick Lencioni, one of the signs of a “miserable job” is when your supervisor doesn’t know you personally. He or she doesn’t know you have a wife and kids, doesn’t know you have a hobby. If you really want to engage your employees in your organization you have to get to know them better.

Avoiding layoffs and keeping your employees

Morris works with large, integrated oil and gas companies in Calgary. The companies have been growing crazily over the last number of years, so their biggest challenge is to actually attract and retain the ‘A-Players’. “Rather than laying people off, which is happening at other organizations, what they’ve been doing is acknowledging they’ve spent a great deal of time and effort getting the right people on the bus. They are now going to take the talented workforce they’ve attracted and make sure they are in the right seats on the bus and they’re driving in the right direction. They know the economy is going to turn around–and they don’t want to be in the marketplace competing for talent when they’ve worked so hard to recruit the best people into their organization.”
Some creative options to laying off your employees include the federal government program Work Sharing 2009—where employees work less that a full week and the government picks up 55% of the time off through Employment Insurance. It’s a reduction in costs to the employer, and the employee keeps his or her job with additional time off. Another tactic is a roll-back or a salary freeze over 2009, depending on the organization.

“One more progressive approach, especially in the service side of the energy sector which was hit pretty hard, is to ask employees to take additional unpaid vacation this year. Employees are actually looking at it as a bit of a sabbatical, after they get over the hiccup on their salary.”

So what is the bottom-line when it comes to retaining you’re ‘A-Player’ employees? “We truly believe it all starts with people,” says Morris. “If you don’t have the right people, then nothing else is going to work. To attract and retain the right people you need to treat them as people, not just another number. Deliberately reinforce your unique core values and culture to differentiate your company from others, and give your people a reason to engage.”

Friday afternoon drinks on the company patio, anyone?