Employees are the backbone of any business. So, it’s very important for organizations to retain employees because of its manifold benefits. The best employees of the company ensure customer satisfaction, product sales and more importantly, a peaceful environment. But in case, employees are not happy or unable to do their job properly, company suffers. Employee retention always matters in the large scheme of the things. When an organization hires a new recruit, it invests on training, development, knowledge and other important aspects. So if the employee leaves the company, all the investment made on him goes in waste. For the long term success and growth of the business enterprise, it is essential to retain the best employees.
An employee retention survey shows that most of the staffs that leave the company don’t do that because of money or other benefits. The major reason of leaving behind a secure job is feeling of being unappreciated or finding limited scope of advancement. It is believed that employee retention is perhaps one of the biggest challenges faced by the organizations. It’s always hard to find a suitable talent but it’s even harder to retain him. Arrival of new lucrative opportunities has further increased the employee turnover. Not surprisingly, business organizations are spending considerable time on devising employee retention strategies.
High employee turnover is one major issue faced by a large percentage of organizations. This problem does not work in isolation and no employee decides to leave all of a sudden. The seeds of leaving the job are planted because of several reasons. Some of the most common reasons cited by employees for leaving the job are, dissatisfaction with certain aspect of the company like career growth, pay and benefits, non-acknowledgement of employee performance, corporate culture, leadership issue, inadequate training, absence of feedback, supervisor relations, communication gap and work environment etc. The point to be considered here is what drives away an employee and what attracts him to a new organization.
The answer of these questions is sought from employee satisfaction surveys. These surveys help in determining the exact problem and reasons behind it. The survey is conducted in form of a questionnaire that contains certain questions related to the job. Some of the common issues tackled in the questionnaire are, loyalty, satisfaction levels, morale, roles, duties, pay and benefits, responsibilities of the job, employee productivity, motivation, commitment and other tangible and intangible indicators. Employee retention as well as satisfaction surveys are very effective in disclosing employees’ comfort level with his job and organization. It also helps in determining the exact cause of employee leaving the organization.
To retain its best employees, organizations tend to adopt several effective strategies and methods. It is essential to maintain the consistent level of expectations from the employees and not changing these guidelines too often. There should be a certain quality maintained in the supervision of the employee. Many employees prefer to leave the organization because they don’t find an environment where they can speak freely. Employee must be assured of his talent and skill being properly utilised. Other important retention techniques adopted by management are, providing feeling of fairness and equitable treatment, creating an environment of learning and skill enhancement and recognising and rewarding the contributions made by the employees.