How to Attract and Retain Employees in 2019
As your entrepreneurial pursuit takes off and your small business blossoms into a big business, recruiting quality staff who stay with you becomes crucial to your long-term success. Having a solid employer branding strategy can turn your staffing nightmare into a dream come true.
What is an Employer Branding Strategy?
Very simply, it’s the steps you take to ensure that potential employees view your company as a safe and exciting place to work. It’s about building a brand that makes your ideal candidate clamour to be a part of your company.
Think of it as attraction marketing for recruitment.
There are many aspects of a sound employer branding strategy but I believe there’s one element that’s more important than all the others. It’s your Employer Value Proposition (EVP).
If you can answer this one question and answer it well, you have an attractive EVP.
Why do your employees love working for you?
Or with you? Do they feel like it’s a collaboration, a conversation or do they feel like they are being told what to do all day?
1. It starts with good leadership
Nowadays staff don’t want to be “managed”, they want to be led.
Leadership is respected, micro-management is detested. Especially if you’ve hired quality staff in the first place.
So take your time to recruit staff who are experienced, self-motivated and eager to learn, get them excited about your overall objectives and give them clear KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators).
And then trust them to do what they promised.
2. Move with the times
Remote working and flexi time are becoming increasingly popular and with good reason. Beating through rush-hour traffic only to be chained to an office all day is old school – and unproductive.
Give your staff cellphones, laptops or tablets and set them free. They will love you for it.
And, interestingly, remote workers often give you more dedicated hours than you expect.
3. Be human
And accept that your staff are human, with children and parents they cherish and value who rely on their support. For many parents, their work doesn’t stop when their working day ends. And their work should not and does not consume all their thoughts.
Create a company culture that says families matter, YOU matter to us, not just as someone who can deliver the goods but as someone we care about with needs outside the work environment.
And this starts in the interview when you show an interest in the whole person.
Arrange Friday afternoon gatherings or weekend events for staff where you invite the whole family along. Make it fun.
4. Show appreciation
When someone gives you their all, make sure you recognise their achievements.
You can do this monetarily, with a bonus or gift voucher or profit share if we are talking big numbers.
Or you could consider a spa voucher, weekend away or “free” time off as rewards.
And remember, it’s vitally important to give public recognition. Call all the staff together for an “emergency’ meeting and make a big show of their success. A certificate or trophy is a nice touch.
This is highly motivating for the staff who receive the award and provides as much (or more) motivation for the staff who haven’t achieved this kind of success (yet). It encourages healthy competition.
For smaller achievements or team achievements, it can be just as meaningful to give a hand-written card and a bar of chocolate.
Important Reminder:
Always praise in public and criticise in private.
If you have a staff member who is slacking, be sure to take them aside and give them a chance to air their grievances before you launch into where they are not making the grade. Criticism is only constructive if it begins with a positive.
Do these four things and you will soon find your company becoming a hot commodity in the recruitment marketplace.
Do you have an employer branding strategy in place? Is your company’s employee value proposition so attractive that candidates are clamouring to join you?
