Qlearsite’s Retention Series
Discover the three steps you should take to boost employee retention – from identifying the warning signs and understanding the reasons, to deciding what actions to take.
You’ll learn everything you need to know about employee retention. But more importantly, because every organisation is different, you’ll get practical advice on understanding retention in your workplace. Our platform makes it faster, easier, and more affordable to manage retention effectively.
Blog 1
In the past, hiring new employees wasn’t an ‘always on’ activity. People tended to stick around at the same organisation for decades – earning a few promotions, and retiring 40 years later with a commemorative wristwatch. But things are different now.
These days, your employees are much more likely to chop-and-change careers every couple of years – jumping ship for a more impressive title or payslip. And that means employee retention should be a key concern for business leaders.
The cost of employee turnover
Retention matters, because high employee turnover comes at a price. Although a certain level of turnover is normal, when you see employees leaving in waves then your business faces disruption on two key levels:
- Financial: one employee resigning can cost your business 33% of their annual salary. That includes hiring their replacement, but doesn’t even factor in the cost of onboarding, training, and the loss of profits from lowered productivity as they get up to speed, and other staff have to take time out to train or cover elements of their role
- Cultural: when an employee leaves – especially one that’s integral to the team – it can damage morale for a multitude of reasons. On one level, remaining employees may have lost a friend or a valued team member – and on another, they may be responsible for taking on their old responsibilities and resent this
To avoid the consequences of high employee turnover, and protect your employee retention rate, you need a plan. And that plan begins with assessing your risk level.
Understand the risk of employee turnover: 3 areas to consider
1. The individual level
Spotting ‘flight risk’ employees isn’t always easy, but research has identified a few telltale signs. Some are behavioural – liking doing less work, leaving early more often, being less focused – and others reflected in their attitude – like being more negative, or expressing dissatisfaction.
Though many of these signs may seem obvious, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll spot them. It takes effort to differentiate one bad day from a downwards trend. Analysing each and every employee’s state of mind is a laborious task – so you need an easier way to spot these signs.
2. The organisational level
Spotting one or two ready-to-leave employees is one thing, but how do you judge if your wider organisation is at risk of a wave of resignations? One way is with traditional methods like engagement scores – as a dipping score can indicate a wider problem.
But you can also assume a certain level of risk from certain organisational events. Mergers and acquisitions, company restructures, procedural changes – like limiting your remote work policy, for example – all carry a risk of pushing people out.
3. The societal level
It’s not always all about you. Sometimes a societal shift, major global event, or just a changing population can impact your retention rates. From the pandemic contributing to The Great Resignation, to the fact that there’s more generations in the workforce than ever, means that some changing attitudes to the workplace are out of your control.
You might not be able to anticipate or avoid these societal shifts, but you can learn how to mitigate them. And as with every employee-related challenge, that starts by listening.
How Qlearsite can help you spot retention risks
Doctors wouldn’t start treating a patient without understanding their symptoms. And for an organisation wanting to tackle retention, you need to do the same.
Whether on an individual, organisational or societal level, you need a fast, easy, repeatable way to spot the warning signs – whether that’s a falling engagement score, or commonly discussed topics that indicate negative attitudes are creeping in. And we have the best way to do it.
Our platform helps you listen insightfully to your people, and find actionable insights. Here’s how it works:
- Sign up to our platform, and start using it for free
- Send our Experience survey – it covers ‘rewards & recognition’, ‘daily experience’, ‘HR solutions’ and ‘environment’
- Get results delivered as soon as the survey ends
- See your scores in each area, department/demographic breakdowns, and by viewing the most commonly discussed topics
- Understand whether employee retention is at risk.
Next in the series, we’ll help you understand why employees think about leaving an organisation – and how you can see what’s driving attrition in your business.