When employee retention is low, the costs don’t leave with them out the door. It causes huge disruption for your remaining staff, as well as the overall business. That’s why it’s important to recognise the value of good employee retention.
Let’s take a look at what employee retention means, why it’s important, and how to protect it from departures or high turnover.
What is employee retention?
Employee retention is a method used to keep people employed at their workplace.
Many businesses use various processes and incentives to keep high retention of employees. The best ones involve a little ‘give and take’ – employers need something special to keep their staff invested, engaged, and loyal to their business.
For example, some employers use reward programs to celebrate great work achievements stemming from impressive productivity. Others might offer excellent employment benefits that help promote a better work-life balance.
In the end, good retention isn’t about keeping employees all year round. It helps with minimising workplace disruptions, lost revenue, and arguably most importantly – reputational damage.
What Causes Employees to Leave?
There are many reasons why employees leave their jobs, but some of the most common include:
- Personal reasons: This could include things like relocating for a spouse, having a family, changing careers, or health problems.
- Work-life balance: Employees who feel like they're working too many hours or that their work is too demanding may be looking for a job with a better work-life balance.
- Unfit for the role: This could happen if the employee and the employer have different expectations or values. It can also happen if the employee is not a good fit for the job.
- Workplace relationships: Employees who have problems with their managers, co-workers, or organizational leadership may be looking for a job with a better work environment.
- Lack of progression: Employees who feel like they're not being challenged or that there's no room for advancement may be looking for a job with more opportunities.
- Financial reasons: Employees who can get a better salary or benefits elsewhere may be tempted to leave their current job.
What are the benefits of employee retention?
At the heart of employee retention, you’ll find solid engagement, experience, and motivation. These are vital when it comes to cultivating positive work relations with your staff. Let’s take a look at the other advantages of employee retention:
Higher quality of production
It goes without saying, but when employees are engaged with their work duties, they’re more likely to perform better. This leads to a higher level of productivity, as employees are happy to work hard in their current role.
Better quality of work
But it’s not just the volume of productivity that’s high, it’s the quality, too. Employees take pride in their job – working harder to meet the shared goals of the business at large. All this leads to high employee retention, that benefits you and your business.
Stronger workplace morale
Employees who work better in teams, or across departments, often have stronger workplace morale. Their sense of cohesion, comradery, and unity encourage trust between colleagues. When business morale is this strong, so are your levels of employee retention.
Lower recruitment costs
When employees resign, the time and energy spent on hiring replacements is endless. Filling rotas, creating adverts, and screening candidates aren’t easy or cheap. Concentrate on your retention and you’re guaranteed to save yourself hefty recruitment expenses.
Greater customer experiences
Employees who work beyond expectations are impressive to see in action, especially for customers. Greater customer experiences lead to higher sales, loyalty, and recognition. If your employees’ retention rates are high, your customer retention rates will be, too.
How to improve employee retention in your workplace
It doesn’t matter what your business is, or how much money you generate. Without loyal staff, you’re just one person with a cool idea, and no support network. That’s why it’s essential to remember employees are at the heart of all business successes.
Let’s take a look at key factors when managing employee retention in your workplace:
Create a safe and comfortable work environment
Every employer has a legal duty to provide employees with a clean and safe workplace . That doesn’t just mean making sure there’s fresh air circulating or getting rid of trip hazards.
This lawful responsibility extends to your employees’ welfare – including psychological, emotional, and economical. When your staff are comfortable with their work environment, they’re more likely to feel happy and content with their job, in turn promoting a better sense of personal wellbeing.
Why not build an outdoor workspace (if able to), provide free snacks, or create soft-areas to relax in? Steps like these can really boost wellness in employees, engagement, and even performance. In the end, comfortable employees aren’t going to look for work elsewhere.
Invest in their career development
It’s justifiable for employees to want to develop their work experiences, skills, and achievements. If they feel stagnant at their current role, they’ll probably underperform, remain demotivated, or decide to quit.
Every business should provide access to training opportunities and career development. It’s a great way to invest in your employees’ growth, talents, and abilities.
It doesn’t matter if certain individuals move onto different roles in the future. Whilst they’re employed with you, why not help bring out the best in them? This not only enriches their career, it also benefits your business output, income, and success.
Offer work benefits and rewards
Everyone enjoys being praised and appreciated for our hard efforts – and this doesn’t go amiss in the workplace.
A great way to boost employee retention is by offering them work benefits and rewards, especially when it’s well deserved. There are numerous rewards to offer. For example:
- Intrinsic rewards: training programs, work shadowing, or project leadership.
- Extrinsic rewards: corporate gifts, profit shares, or promotions.
- Financial rewards: higher salary, commission pay, or gift card vouchers.
- Non-financial rewards: flexible working, more annual leave, or personal parking spots.
- Wellness-related rewards: pension schemes, retirement plans, healthcare insurance.
Develop feedback procedures
It’s essential to know how an employee feels in their current role and workplace. They may really enjoy particular work benefits, or might have concerns about certain issues.
Whatever the case, it’s important for them to be able to share personal thoughts and opinions – without fear of repercussions. Developing a feedback procedure is a guaranteed way for employees to feel respected, valued and listened to. Communication is key.
Aim to address all feedback that’s provided – good or bad. Present thorough details for each issue. Employees can appreciate your final decisions, or at least acknowledge your reasoning behind them.
Invest in high employee retention with Love2shop
Rewarding loyalty and investment are key factors when it comes to employee retention. It also encourages performance, engagement, and overall output. What better way to reward hard-working employees than through gift cards and vouchers.
At Love2shop, we offer a variety of rewards including employee discount schemes that helps strengthen your employee retention rates.
if you plan on growing your staff numbers, Love2shop has the perfect gift card incentives for you.
Love2shop Gift Cards
Love2shop Gift Cards are accepted in 90+ brands across the UK.
They are the perfect thank you gift for employees or customers.
For orders over £10,000
For orders under £10,000
