The labour market is constantly changing and it’s more competitive than ever before. So it’s normal if your organisation is losing staff. But when this turns into a recurring event, you should try to understand why. One method is employee retention surveys – and we’ve got a few options you can try below.
Understanding what your employees value, and being able to measure the impact of high turnover and retention on your business, can help you improve the overallorganisational fitness of your business.
What is employee retention?
Employee retention is linked to the ability of an organisation to keep its employees from leaving, whereas employee turnover represents the total number of people who have left the organisation and have been replaced with new hires.
The average employee turnover rate in the UK is approximately 15%. For your organisation, this number could be lower but also it could be higher which means you need to start looking at different approaches to tackle the problem.
Why does employee retention matter?
People leave their jobs for various reasons and as much as this can be seen as a personal choice and employee’s problem it’s not exactly like that. When many members of the staff make the decision to seek a better opportunity elsewhere it often should be an alarming bell for the senior management that something isn’t quite right in the company.
Employee retention has become one of the biggest challenges for HR and organisations. It’s not only expensive but it also affects productivity, customer service and morale.
It’s not everything bad – there are ways for HR and management to spot if someone is a flight risk. Start with listening to your employees, pay close attention to what they say, how they behave at meetings and if they try to build relationships with colleagues and line managers.
6 benefits of prioritising employee retention
1. Recruitment and training efficiency
Focusing on employee retention is one of the most effective ways for organisations to save from recruiting costs including fees paid to recruiters or job advertisement, not to mention the employee training which also can be costly.
2. Increased productivity
Employee turnover directly impacts productivity. This is because the new hires need time before they feel fully comfortable working with existing customers and taking on new projects. Additionally, the remaining staff might be overwhelmed with extra work which can lower the quality of their performance.
3. Improved employee morale
The key to better company morale is employee engagement. Engaged people are more productive and make an effort to connect with each other which means overall better company culture.
4. Experienced employees
It’s not a surprise that the longer employees stay in the organisation, the more knowledgeable they become. They also have stronger and more valuable relationships with clients and co-workers which once again leads to higher engagement and better work ethics.
5. Improved employee satisfaction and experience
There’s a link between retention and employee satisfaction and happiness. Highly engaged employees are more committed to their work and are more likely to try and deliver better results and better customer service, which can also be the one thing that differentiates your brand from the competitors.
6. Stronger corporate culture
Company culture isn’t something that’s built overnight. It takes time and effort from both management and employees. The core of your company culture is your staff and when there are often people who leave and new are joining the culture may change.
A strong culture is a key to high performance and more satisfied employees so it’s worth putting time into strengthening the corporate ethos.
How Qlearsite can help with improving employee retention
Improving employee retention is challenging but not impossible. It will require a lot of effort and with the right tools, you can make the process not only easier but also impactful.
This is how our survey platform can help you:
Employee Engagement survey
At Qlearsite, we often talk about how important it is to be able to measure employee engagement. Our survey solution covers 4 main areas of engagement: Advocate, Adapt, Persist and Lead.
Focusing on these key areas, and using any open-text feedback, we show you how engaged your people feel and where you should focus:
- Advocate – Advocacy refers to your employees saying positive things about the working environment, culture and morale in the organisation. It’s incredibly important if you are trying to strengthen the company branding and retain people.
- Adapt – Change is inevitable and it’s important that your employees feel motivated to respond to the changing needs of the organisation. This means they are flexible when it’s required and constantly striving for improvement.
- Persist – Again, here, motivation is the key. When we talk about persistence we think about how motivated people are to respond to challenges and to find solutions.
- Lead – What we mean is how proactive employees feel to take charge of a situation without the need of directions and supervision. Giving them the freedom to make decisions and seek solutions to problems will lead to a sense of satisfaction and recognition.
There’s a close link between retention and employee engagement. People who feel engaged and happy at work are less likely to leave and more likely to put effort and show better results.
Pandemic and societal pressures accelerated the worker-employer relationship’s evolution beyond anyone’s anticipation.
Employee experience survey
If you’re seeking to improve retention in your organisation you should be able to understand what experience your employees have. The easiest and best way to do this is by sending them a survey.
Our Experience survey focuses on these 4 main areas: Rewards & Recognition; Daily experience, HR solutions and Environment:
Rewards & Recognition
These are closely linked to motivation and fair pay. Do you know if your employees are willing to go that extra mile and do great work? They might do so if they know that your organisation will recognise the results they achieve and reward them fairly. Not just that, the sense of recognition might help them commit to their work even more and inspire them to perform better next time.
Daily experience
Your employees spend 7-8 hours of their day at work, whether that’s work from home or work from the office. Add to that the hours they spend thinking about work or commuting to the workplace. That’s a lot of time and if they don’t feel happy they might decide to leave. Daily experience is about your people being able to make friends at work, feeling positive and confident they can ask for help when it’s needed. So it’s crucial that your leadership is constantly trying to improve it.
HR solutions
HR is not only about payroll and approving holidays and organising company events. It’s one of the most important departments of an organisation and your employees should be able to trust that people who are part of it can help them resolve issues and support them in their career development.
Environment
When we talk about environment, we take into consideration multiple factors such as space-design and whether or not the office space and furnishing support employees’ physical wellbeing. It’s important that the organisation creates an environment where people feel comfortable spending the day and have enough space and resources to focus on their work.
With Qlearsite, you can make an account and send a survey in under 15 minutes – and the results are analysed for you, to save even more time. Sign up and begin improving your employer branding strategy today!