How to Retain the Best Employees (Part 3)
I Am With You.
These are the words your team needs to feel, if not hear from you. Showing you care and support your employees is one of the most powerful things that can foster a positive workplace. It’s also something you actually have control over.
As a manager or leader, you shouldn’t be lording over people barking commands... but rather ask how your workers can be most supported. Ask about their workload, and how it can be made better.
At the very least your workers should know that you support them. Just like we’ve mentioned in the two previous segments, making it known that you care about your employees will give you the edge in retention.
Keep in mind that while creative, none of these three methods costs you more money. It’s not incentivized. Your workers have a lot of options out there today, so you need to focus on why they should stay with you.
This Weeks Take Away
Go up to your team members, and ask them how you can help. At least once this...
How to Retain the Best Employees (Part 2)
Support your employees’ endeavors outside of the office. Far too often as bosses and managers we think of our team members as only focusing on their work. We either forget they have lives outside of the office, or don’t think about what they do with their family, communities, or other professional endeavors.
Forbes recently stated that of all the people currently employed within the United States, over 50% had additional jobs or work outside of their primary job. That’s more than half of people working on a side hustle!
With so many digital tools, apps, and opportunities to make your own business, it’s no wonder that the top performers in the work force are flexing that entrepreneurial muscle on the side. Rather than ignore what the majority of workers are doing, embrace your employees’ endeavors. Ask them about it. Let your team know that you support their goals.
Most people working on side hustles aren’t expecting or planning for it to blow...
How to Retain the Best Employees Part 1
How to Retain the Best Employees (Part 1)
If you’re looking to learn how to retain the best employees for your team, this is the first of a three part series on how some of the great industry leaders are facing the challenge.
Both Microsoft and Shake Shack represent great modern brands within their own sectors. While their day-to-day operation and working environment couldn’t be more different, their leaders stand together on a single point.
Today it’s harder than ever to keep top performing employees. There are so many opportunities, and a lot of competition in terms of salaries. So innovative organizations are looking for more creative ways to retain their talent.
The Four Day Work Week.
The retail resturant chain and corporate office environments that Microsoft and Shake Shack operate have each shown success when implementing a four day work week.
In fact, that extra day of rest for their staff has resulted in a boost in production. More relaxed and rested...
Episode 42 What Does Workplace Collaboration Require?
Want your team to work together well? What’s the one thing that’s necessary to make sure that collaboration in the workplace is successful? Regardless if you run a transactional business or a project-oriented business, you have multiple team members working together… and it’s critical that they can succeed.
Getting a team to work together and work together well can be a challenge.
Create a Culture of Listeners
Listening is absolutely required for collaboration. As leaders, too many of us forget how important it is when working together as a team, and what’s far worse is some of us don’t listen enough ourselves— we aren’t leading by example.
As leaders, we can be the guiltiest of not listening enough. More than any other employee, we are predisposed to skip listening, or not listen all the way through when our team is trying to communicate with us.
We’re so used to applying...
Episode 41 Is Compensation What Your Employees Really Want?
The truth behind employee motivation has less to do with money than most people assume it is. Thematic of a number of our blogs, we’ve mentioned time and time again that the imperial data shows money, compensation, isn’t the primary factor for employee happiness or retention.
I follow HubSpot on Instagram. The company is a CRM and a great business resource that lots of companies use. Recently, they posted some polls on the topic of employee retention, and I found it incredibly fascinating that a lot of those questions had to do with money. Here are some of them;
- What percentage of employees are more likely to stay at a company with benefits, than leave for a company with higher pay and no benefits?
80% of users chose the option of less pay and more benefits - What percentage of employees found that salary alone is the most important factor when choosing to accept a role?
70% of people said that salary wasn’t the only, or most...
Episode 40 Employee Discipline: Reprimand, Correct, and Praise.
How do you discipline your employees effectively?
Sometimes disciplining employees can feel awkward, making us go too far, or not correcting behavior at all out of fear. Having an intentional plan of how to disciple employees, can help make sure that discipline is done well.
Know the Difference Between a Correction and a Reprimand.
One of the most important aspects of disciplining well, is knowing the difference between a correction and a reprimand. A correction can be done on the fly. These are simple adjustments of behavior or procedure that you notice, which you can then correct by asking the individual to modify their behavior.
A correction can be as simple as saying, “Hey, I noticed you phrased it that way on the phone. That was great, but next time I’d like you to adjust it by doing it this way”.
A reprimand is heavier, and it’s more serious in nature. It often involves addressing deeper issues...
Episode 39 What is the Fastest Way to Earn Employee Trust?
Earning trust from your team is incredibly important. It helps bring your team along your side as you are trying to grow your business. When trust is mutual, amazing things can happen.
If you want to earn their trust quickly, the most significant behavioral change you can make, is owning up to your mistakes. All of us make mistakes. While you might find it weak or undermining to confess to mistakes in front on your team, the truth is that doing so makes you relatable.
How can your team trust you with tough information, hard conversations, or come to you with delicate questions that could be a make-or-break moment for the business… if they can’t trust you?
If you’re a person that’s humble enough to own up and apologize when you do make mistakes, then your team will know they can trust you. Humility is one of the greatest traits you can have as a leader, as it makes you a trustworthy person.
Set an Example of Moving...
Episode 38 What Do Smart Bosses Do?
Employee development is important. We want our team to grow in their skills, abilities, and performance. So, what are the smart bosses doing in regard to building their employees up?
They are encouraging mastery.
We have discussed earlier in other blogs, the topic of motivation, and we know that highly motivated employees are beneficial. What drives that motivation? More than money, what each of us as individuals really want is to become a master of a craft— we want to be good at stuff.
Encourage Mastery
There are coal miners that right now, are going down mine shafts to work their shifts. They know that each breath they take, and each hour they spend working is shaving measurable time off of their life. Yet, they don’t leave or try to find alternative careers.
Alternatively, within an office environment, there are plenty of people that know their office is an unhealthy place. They know that their boss isn’t healthy...
Episode 37 A Management Style That Actually Works
There is a virtual cornucopia of management styles out there to choose from- each with their own benefits, strategies, and differences. Currently there is a trend in management that is working really well and generating powerful results.
Behavioral science acknowledges the importance of how we are wired as individuals, how we operate, and how that changes as society evolves and changes. These considerations are also important to managers and leaders in the business world.
Naturally, sometimes the style in which we manage also needs to adapt. Think of the management style an assembly line had. The management set atop an ivory tower, looking down at workers, and the law was do... or else. It was very task driven, and very much socially disengaged.
This style of management has proven not to work any longer in our society- so what’s a management style that does work today?
Being a Coach
This is actually a management style that...
Episode 36 How to Get Mission Minded Employees?
How do you go about getting employees that have a passion, are purpose minded, and are excited to be on mission? Particularly for administrative or task focused people, it can be difficult to get them passionate or focused on the larger mission at hand.
By connecting the purpose or the why of your company, with the actions of those employees, you can transform them into mission minded workers. The best way to accomplish this, is through stories.
Build Purpose Through Storytelling
Mission, purpose, and passion. These are what you want all of your employees to be driven by, but it can be hard to instill in those admin workers that are doing the same thing day after day. To effectively communicate and develop this kind of motivation, you need to connect with your team on an emotional level.
The first step is to have a united purpose for your company… which I have talked about in previous blogs and discussed with detail in my book. Then...
