5 ways to attract and retain a great workforce

A great workforce gives a business an edge. Employees that have a great experience at work are known to go above and beyond for customers. That is why it is important to invest in employee attraction and retention strategies, the one’s the give a business the edge in attracting and retaining the types of employees that make for a great workforce. Let look at five key strategies for attracting and retaining top talent for your business:

1. Effectively plan your workforce

Often misconstrued as a just a numbers game, a quality workforce plan is a holistic process that examines and evaluates a business workforce needs in the current and future state Alongside understand the numbers of people needed in specific roles it involves:

examining the Purpose, Vision and Values of the Business and the desired culture to be shaped for the business and the type of people characteristics and qualities needed to make that a reality;
examining the job and role requirements and the associated skills needed for people to be effective in those roles which this analysis projected forward in anticipation of changes and growth pathways for the business.
organisational arrangements including critical dimensions such as decision making authority and delegation arrangements including hierarchy, levels of collaboration required, team work, customer centricity, decision making authority, need for innovation etc.
remuneration positioning and designing a pay, conditions and perks arrangement that is competitive and on point for the targeted workforce market.
analysing the labour market and designing the right talent acquisition pathways to bring the right people on board, and then once on board giving the right foundational experience so that they every chance of success in their new role.
organisational development plans and pathways to provide the workforce agility and adaptability needed to accommodate the change and growth of the business.

2. Offer the right perks

I have never forgotten the moment an old boss of mine came back from an office meeting with a box of ice-creams, one for each member of the team.

Everyone loves a little extra now and again, it really gives a sense of appreciation. Having great perks, doesn’t mean paying people at the top of the market, actually if money is all that motivates an employee perhaps consider their long-term sustainability in your business. There are many other token gestures such as:

the ability to accrue Time Off in Lieu,
getting access to some paid time to volunteer for a good cause,
movie tickets in recognition of a great job; or
getting a catered lunch on occasion.
Many more.

These little things can make all the difference when building a great place to work they make the difference when you want to show your people how much they are appreciated for the hard work they do.

3. Offer Flexibility

Whether you agree with it or not workforce flexibility is here to stay and employers who don’t embrace it are leaving themselves out as laggards in the employment market. However, embracing it doesn’t mean letting go of control not does it mean loss of productivity. In fact, productivity has been found to improve when flexibility is in place. Options such as telework, flexible hours and job-sharing gives team members options to get better control of their work-life balance and time to focus on work instead of trying to juggle the distractions of personal lives while at work. It also is a great retention tool as it serves as a disincentive to separate.

4. Recognise your high performers

Not all employees are the same and not all employees contribute to a business equally. Employees who put in the extras and get the extras in value adds for a business tend to like being recognised for their efforts and being able to differentiate excellent performance over other levels of performance fairly and effectively, is an important requirement of leaders. High Performers are also typically the ones among the group that should be targeted for retention, development and eventually promotion. There are two parts to this strategy:

Effectively recognising Hi Po Talent – Adopting the right method to identify the High Performers with High Potential. This involves adopting a talent matrix approach that allows you to objectively differentiate your workforce in a way that actually stacks up
Investing in HiPo Development – This is more of a prelude to Succession Planning and involves considering your HiPo talent as part of your business’ succession plan and then investing in their development to help them professionally grow in the right direction.

5. Develop your employees

The need to have a good employee development strategy beyond your HiPo talent is crucial for keeping the general workforce engaged in their work. The desire to learn and grow is an inherent motivational need among team members that make up a modern learning oriented workforce, and if this need isn’t being met, team members will look elsewhere. An employee development strategy doesn’t have to translate to everyone being enrolled in courses or workshops, there are a range of other options such as:

Using e-learning capabilities to give employees free access to self-guided online learning pathways;
Using internal/external secondments which give them exposure to different aspects of work;
Job shadowing other employees in different areas so they can learn new tasks and work.

When it comes to attracting and retaining employees there is no one size fits all solution and what works for one company may not work as well for another due to differences in issues like industry expectations, budget constraints, labour supply. However investing in these options can go a long way to creating a work environment where high performers want to stay put an new talent wants to come on board.

Active HR are specialists in creating great workplaces and can provide you with access to a range of services that help improve the ability of your business to attract and retain great people.