subject: Employee Loyalty - Building the Retention Environment [print this page] Employee Loyalty - Building the Retention Environment
Employee loyalty may seem like a think of the past. Has the concept of retaining employees for the lifetime of their careers become an outdated model in today's business strategy?
When trained employees leave your company, they leave behind more than an empty position to fill.A wealth of historical knowledge of your business, operational systems, contacts and customer relationships are just a few of the things they take. That void may not always be easy to patch.
The average time needed to get an employee "up to speed" in any industry is typically two years. Up until that time, the individual is usually being trained in company processes and procedures, cultivating relationships and generally building proficiencies necessary to be effective on the job. If that same employee leaves your organization after several years and you need to return to the labor market to replace them, what you have is a revolving door process with serious bottom line consequences.
Besides the fiscal impact employee turnover creates, a company's reputation with customers can also be adversely affected by an impression of instability brought on by employee turnover. A profitable business depends on mutually beneficial relationships with customers. Customer relationships are sustained by individuals familiar with that customer's needs and preferences. It is difficult to ensure reliable customer service when a changing of the guard is the norm every couple of years. Customer confidence can suffer.
The current worker shortage has created an environment of high mobility. This "Grass is Greener" effect has produced a negative personnel balance in many organizations, requiring HR departments and executives to devote unprecedented hours in the pursuit of a stable workforce. Time spent attracting, training and orienting new recruits is expensive.
Three years is now the typical tenure of newly hired employees. What we used to label as "short-time" has now become the standard length of an employment stay. As we find ourselves competing for that next talented candidate, it may be time to explore a major shift in staffing strategy. Rather than continuing to look outward it may be time to re-focus our energies and begin to look inward.
Companies can protect themselves from a highly volatile labor market and talent raids from other organizations. They can do that by investing in their current employees. Building a Retention Environment is a major shift away from the heavily competitive "loot and recruit" methodology of staffing. The highly competitive nature of the labor market today is creating a de-stabilization that does little to guarantee the success of your latest recruiting efforts. Think about it if your organization is not invested in retention then neither are your employees.
It's never too late to begin the shift toward retention. Learn building blocks for Building a Retention Environment.
