How do you define talent in your organization? An employee who knows everything? An employee who learns the fastest? Someone with a great deal of potential to develop and understand many different issues? Or an exceptional worker who focuses on a field that is difficult to specialize in? Every organization needs talented employees (or maybe every one of your employees is considered as a talent) and every organization has a different talent management method – so the main question is not who they are but rather how to retain them and prevent them from leaving for your competitors. In other words, what’s the best way to Retain your talents?
- People Seek Significance
Generation Z has become one-third of the workforce in the blink of an eye. Those who want to retain their young and talented employees must embrace the values that best characterize Gen Z, such as diversity, equality, innovation and more. Studies on Gen Z show that the issues they prioritize are work hours and opportunities for personal happiness in the workplace. 72% of them consider a fun office atmosphere as a significant advantage.
Many companies spoil their employees with luxuries such as a fancy dining room or a “Ten Bis / Takeaway Pay” card, a company car, a children’s room, a spa, laundry, a workout room and more. But the enthusiasm surrounding these benefits is quickly disappearing, as they also exist at the next job. All in all, these benefits are dwarfed by conditions that give the employee a sense of significance, added interest or otherwise contribute to his or her personal development.
Netflix, for example, offers its employees a year’s paid maternity leave. Google has set up an internal incubator called Area 120, where employees can develop their own ideas on account of work time.
- Compensation Package
It sounds superficial, but most of us go to work in order to earn a living. compensation package plays an important role in preserving talent and making it last. According to a 2018 study called “Generation Z Goes to Work”, 61% of respondents said high salary is what determines success. In fact, a high salary bypassed all other benefits.
At any given moment, someone may offer your employees a higher salary. Therefore, appropriate reward is only the basis of the conservation challenge. A technological workspace that enables high flexibility in terms of working both in and outside the office contributes to the balance between free time and availability at work and the retention of employees who care about their personal agenda and free time.
With this balance, companies ensure that tasks are completed while simultaneously granting employees more enjoyable free time.
- The Right Training for the Right People
An employee who is aware of his or her value wants to constantly be upgraded also on the level of expertise. A 2016 survey by The American Staffing Association Workforce Monitor shows that 61% of employees believe they will be more effective if they are offered additional training. 60% claimed that many work mistakes are caused due to a lack of proper training. Turning employees into talents is one of the best investments companies can make.
It is not always possible to prevent employee churn but leaving because of boredom can and should be prevented. To do this, it is important to create a long-term employment plan for each employee. 67% of the survey participants preferred receiving training for other positions in the company, while 61% wanted training to upgrade them in their respective field. Inner-mobility is a crucial factor in talents’ decisions on where to work.
Many organizations choose to buy online courses for their employees, but the completion of such courses is particularly low, standing at only 4% to 8%. Field training which is combined with a structured learning system is completed in over 90% of cases, according to Elevation’s data. This difference increases employee effectiveness, contributes to their sense of success and significantly upgrades the organization’s overall knowledge.
Building talents by upgrading their original skills (Upskill) and helping them acquire new skills (Reskill) enables them to become experts in the field that the organization needs in order to be at the forefront of knowledge and capabilities. That is how they grow parallel to the organization and not on two separate paths thanks to ROI-driven training.
In addition to the unique training, it is vital to create an accelerator trajectory within the company for employees – make it clear to them that they were recruited to the organization rather than to a specific position.
- Transparency and the Open-Door Policy
It is impossible to neglect a trend seen over recent years: two-way communication. While organizations are hierarchically structured, a policy of listening to employees is critical to the organization’s image. Beyond the sense of value such openness affords employees, it also creates a culture of open communication that allows one to deal with troubling issues before they become real problems.
The more of an impact employees feel they have on improving their work environment, the more committed they become to the organization. This way, instead of hoping that another company will offer a better-suited atmosphere, the employee will feel that ability to change and shape the work atmosphere is already in his or her hands. In addition, this gives employees the opportunity to influence and offer ideas even if they are beyond their job description.
Transparency is another important component of employee comfort. It reduces friction and feelings of deprivation and contributes to a sense of team unity.
- Employer Branding
A buzz-word you’ve probably heard nonstop in recent years is “employer branding”. The reason everyone is talking about it is because it works. One of the most important factors in employee retention is Internal and external brand pride. If an employee proudly responds without hesitation when asked, ‘Where do you work?’ – you’re on the right track.
The key is to emphasize the characteristics that differentiate your workspace from your competitors’ workspaces. Features such as CSR, sustainability, workplace flexibility, constant career upgrading and more are vital in this process.
Salesforce, for example, went through an employer branding process that led to half of the company’s potential candidates in 2018 coming from employee recommendations (the recommending employees were rewarded, of course).