Payroll HRIS Benefit – Employee Retention

What is Employee Retention?

The definition of Employee Retention actually depends on the the attitude of the company or organization.

If you are a passive company, employee retention simply refers to your company’s ability to retain your employees. In this case, your company’s employee retention ability can be reflected in one simple statistic – the retention rate. This retention rate is the percentage of employees that stay with the company over a certain period (normally one year).

If you are a pro-active company, or if you want to be pro-active, employee retention has a greater meaning. Instead of just being a simple statistic, employee retention now refers to your company’s strategy and efforts to keep and retain the people who are vital to your company.

Using Everything at Work to Practice Effective Employee Retention Strategies

Convincing employees to stay is not just the job of any one person or department. It’s not all about the money either. Employee retention is the cumulative effect of several activities that must be embedded in your company’s psyche and culture.

Effective Onboarding

Your employees’ view and impression of your company is initially formalized during their first few weeks in your company, and will continue for several months. It is during this critical stage that most employees decide if they will stay with your organization long-term or if it will be short stay.

Having an effective onboarding process helps guarantee that employees will stay with your company for a long duration.

It is in the best interest of both the employee and the organization to impart knowledge about the company quickly and effectively to integrate the new employee into the workforce. In addition, providing continual reinforced learning through extended onboarding over the first year can increase new hire retention by 25%. By implementing an effective onboarding process, new hire turnover rates will decrease and productivity will increase.

Personnel Development

If your company has an effective training program, employees will be most likely to stay as they will be satisfied and will know that they will eventually gain the the capabilities for future growth and future possible roles. By having a proper training program, your team will look forward to a guaranteed career development within your organization. Employees who receive more training are more likely to stay with your company than those who don’t.

Timely Performance Appraisals

By scheduling and conducting regular performance appraisals, you can touch base with your staff and identify and address issues and concerns in a timely manner. And by having each person complete an individual development plan, you will gain valuable insight as to the personal goals of each one, as well as how you can work together to achieve those goals.

Exit Interviews

Whenever an employee decides to leave the company, one important activity that should not be neglected or treated lightly is the exit interview.  By conducting a proper exit interview, and more importantly by taking action on what an exit interview might uncover, you can improve employee retention by uncovering what aspects of the company an employee might be unhappy with, and then taking the necessary steps to address those concerns.