What keeps people in their roles?
Since early 2021, an increasing number of employees have been resigning from their jobs. This ongoing economic trend has been dubbed ‘The Great Resignation’, and it doesn’t look like there is much chance it is going to slow down any time soon. A recent survey by PwC, has indicated that 18% of workers said they “are very or extremely likely" to switch jobs in a year and 32% have said they are “moderately or slightly likely” to change jobs. So why is this happening? And what can companies do to ensure they that attract and retain the best talent for their businesses at this critical time?
What motivates people to leave?
1) Lack of Career Progression / Learning CurveA lack of career progression or opportunity to grow in a company is one of the primary reasons that drives talent to look elsewhere. They need to have a learning curve, a continual opportunity to grow, your time to listen and a career path that motivates them for the long-term.
2) Company Culture
Research has found that at some stage of their career, 73% of professionals have left a job because they disliked the company culture. Perhaps, they didn’t fit in and they struggled to find their voice. Perhaps, they simply didn’t share the same values as your business. Perhaps their objectives were not aligned with the long-term objectives of the company and so on.
3) Salary
With the Cost-of-Living crisis hitting homes across the UK, employees are more conscious than ever about remuneration. Salary surveys can offer key statistics that help guide you on this (Talent Point actually produces a market report for every role we design) and should be seen as an important investment for businesses to ensure their employee salaries are competitive enough to dissuade them from looking elsewhere.
4) Benefits
The benefits you offer an employee can make a huge difference too. Perhaps unsurprisingly, after two years of navigating the pandemic world, over two-thirds (67%) of the 1,001 employees polled by a Business Leader survey, indicated that Sick Pay was the benefit they valued the most, followed by flexible working hours (57%) and pension contribution matching (46%). Once again, Market Reports can provide you with insights as to the benefits that are commonly offered to employees within your market. Your benefits also mirror your company culture, and you must make sure that you are providing resources for everything you advocate for.
Top tips for candidate attraction and retention
Some of the key decisions that affect candidate retention are actually made during the initial attraction, outreach, interviewing and hiring process.
1) Business need Vs Applicant need
When aligning yourself to the market it is important that you consider (and there are a lot...)...
- Who do you want to hire?
- What is the immediate impact you are hoping this person to have (think 0-6 months)?
- Where are they working?
- What are the reasons why they are leaving?
- Can you address this pain in the opportunity you are putting together?
- What motivates them outside of money?
- What career path are they looking for?
- What L&D or management support is required to achieve this – can you offer this?
You need to put aside your need as a Hiring Manager when creating a role and start thinking about the applicant and their wants. Once you understand these, you can then align the position to satisfy business needs in line with applicant needs.
Once aligned, you need to build the correct interview framework. Ensure that you are very definite about the key competencies that talent must demonstrate. This must be shared and agreed upon with every other member of the interview panel. Likewise, you need to make sure you are very clear with the opportunity you are presenting to talent – career development, learning opportunities, the impact they will have on your business during the first 3, 6, 9 months of their employment. Make sure you feel comfortable really highlighting / selling this to talent as part of the process.
3) You snooze, you lose!
A smooth and quick process makes sure you won’t lose any good candidates, so cut out any unnecessary interview stages and/or technical tests. You also have to make sure to respect their time in other ways (don’t be late!) and let them meet the key people and give them an opportunity to ask any questions they might have. NB – we are not suggesting to remove any testing stage, just make sure that the test you are asking them to perform is relevant to the specific role they are being considered for.
One last word...
Candidate retention is something you constantly have to be thinking about, even before you hire the candidate. In fact, before you even reach out to them for the very first time – it should be at the forefront of your mind.
- Am I offering a competitive package?
- Am I assessing skills objectively?
- Am I asking for more than I really need?
- Am I being honest about my business?
- Will this role appeal to the candidates I want?
- Is there longevity built into the role?
These are all questions you need to be asking yourself before engaging in a hiring process!
For more advice on how to attract and retain the best candidates, visit our Contact Us page!
Sources:
https://www.personneltoday.com/hr/employees-resigning-in-2022/
https://www.recruitment-software.co.uk/7-counter-offer-statistics-every-recruiter-needs-know/