What’s causing your staff retention headache?
How to solve the problem of revolving doors in your business
Do you feel like you’re on a hamster wheel - repeatedly advertising, interviewing, hiring and training new people?
Are you hoping that your next new appointment will be more successful than the last?
You’re not alone! Staff retention is a common, yet entirely preventable, problem suffered in businesses both large and small. It’s expensive, it’s time consuming and it can be morale sapping - for you and your teams.
A good friend of mine works for a large corporate organisation and we’ve noticed a definite revolving door phenomenon going on. Since April 2021 (just 10 months at the time of writing) - they've welcomed five new starters to a single department. Keeping in mind that it’s only a matter of months since they joined, already two have left; while a third was telling anyone who’d listen that they were looking for a new job and recently gave in their notice.
Wowsers! Is it just me that thinks something’s amiss here?
Other than the alarm bells sounding, this kind of staff retention problem raises two lines of inquiry for me.
Is there a problem with the hiring process that means all five hires were wrong from the get-go?
Or, what’s going on in the environment that’s making the new hires leave?
On the basis that I’m somewhat sceptical that the recruitment process can be wholly to blame, my money’s on there being some basic leadership failings going on that have torpedoed the recruits’ success from day one.
Let’s take a look at what that might look like.
How things are done around here…
When a new hire joins an organisation they have left behind the culture of their previous company and need help to adjust to yours.
Every business has its own quirks and foibles. Its own way of doing things. Its own culture - the way things are done.. No matter how experienced your new hire is, they have never worked anywhere quite the same as your organisation. Which means you’ve got a job to do from the minute they walk through your door on their very first day.
How are you helping your new hires understand the way things are done in your organisation?
The answer isn’t as simple as giving them a set of procedures and rules to read…. Well - unless your choice of culture is “every man for himself” of course!
Setting your new hires up for success
Okay - hand on heart time. Can you honestly say every single new hire gets the support they need to be successful in your organisation?
Assuming you’ve nailed the induction process so well that your new people are totally immersed in the culture of the business, how is that reflected in the way you support their skillset and mindset?
I’ve frequently observed that, albeit unintentionally, many organisations over promise but under deliver when it comes to supporting new starters. This is particularly true in stretched organisations where leaders lack the time and headspace to deliver on their ambitions, or promises.
Whilst your newest employees need help accessing and getting to grips with your systems, learning your processes and assimilating into your organisation, the messages they receive from their line managers can often be quite negative - both tacit and explicit.
Have you ever promised a new starter under your line management that your door is always open when, in reality, you’ve been so desperately overstretched that’s been an empty promise?
What about the training you promised when someone joined your team but which you promptly forgot to book when your attentions were diverted elsewhere?
Has there ever been a time when your L&D budgets were cut to the bare bones so that you couldn’t fulfill your promises?
It’s a hard slog for folks to ‘master’ their new role when you’ve effectively tied one hand behind their back through a lack of support. Does mastery of their role matter?
Heck yes!! Take a look at one of my favourite videos by Dan Pink - then tell me what you think!
If your new hires live the experience of broken promises and hollow words they will quickly become disillusioned, feel undervalued and - yep, you guessed it - look for somewhere else to take their talents.
Invest time now to save time later
Despite the honourable intentions of many a business owner or leader to create a great place to work for your teams, all too often those intentions are pushed down the priority list by ‘more important things’.
Your actions, words and even body language give off very clear messages that, whilst you might have said your door is open, you never expected anyone to try and take you up on that offer!
When I look at organisations who are struggling with a revolving door, (lots of new joiners that don't seem to be lasting the year) I encourage leaders to have a bit of a conversation with themselves and to be brutally honest about what’s really happening for their new team members. If you’re a leader with a staff retention problem, maybe ask yourself the following questions:
Am I over promising and under delivering on the learning and development promises I made when new individuals joined?
Am I doing everything in my power to help this individual assimilate into the new environment?
If not, what else could I be doing?
Finally, if you have team leaders managing new employees on your behalf, are they too overstretched or under-resourced to support your new people effectively? Are you holding them to account for that responsibility?
Because one thing’s for sure - you may think you don't have an hour to spend with individuals at the start of their journey with your business. But invariably, line management problems can take somewhere closer to 20 hours or more to fix. Which means that failing to invest an hour now could cost you 20 hours in the future.
Consider too that those 20 hours could end up being disciplinary issues, grievance issues or managing underperformance issues. Worse still, it could actually become “Oh goodness me that person has resigned and I'm going to have to go through the whole recruitment process again”.
Is staff retention giving you a headache?
My advice if you are facing a revolving door in your business, is to encourage the leaders in your organisation to invest time now. It will definitely be worth it and will put the brakes on that revolving door.
If you’d like to improve staff retention and get off the recruitment hamster wheel, book a complimentary call with me here.
