April 1998

Even though the cost to replace highly trained or longtime employees is staggering, the only time many managers give serious thought to employee retention is when a valued employee hands in their resignation.

At that point, frantic to avoid having to hire and train someone new, most bosses try, generally unsuccessfully, to talk the departing employee into staying. Even if the boss can convince the unhappy employee to stay, they frequently leave within 6-9 months, anyway.

With unemployment at record lows, companies and managers need to do everything they can to keep quality employees. And to be successful, the commitment to employee retention must come from the top down. One way to make that commitment clear is to tie each manager’s success to his or her retention level. When keeping good employees becomes a company-wide goal and the boss is held responsible for keeping good workers on the payroll, she must take a long hard look at what’s going to trigger turnover.

Unfortunately, most bosses today view turnover as the company’s or employee’s fault, never realizing that mismanagement, not por “fit,” in the job, is the leading cause of unwanted turnover. Nobody wants to mismanage employees, so why does it happen?

Not knowing who each employee is or what really motivates them is why so many bosses accidentally mismanage direct reports. Because the boss is motivated by advancement or money or both, she erroneously assumes her subordinates are, too, which frequently backfires.

Here’s how:

In an effort to boost productivity in the Customer Service Department, the manager introduces a lucrative incentive plan. For her more competitive Customer Service Reps, bonuses linked to productivity will, indeed, prove a powerful motivator. However, the more cautious and conservative CSR’s, who are uncomfortable with competition and risk of any kind, are likely to find the plan scary, perhaps enough to start looking for another job.

Likewise, some employees don’t want to climb the corporate ladder, while others need to. Knowing who needs safety and security and who needs challenge is absolutely critical to improving retention. The more aggressive, competitive and proactive the employee, the greater his need for advancement. Ignoring this or failing to provide him with the opportunity to move up will quickly send him in search of greener pastures, while pushing more cautious and less ambitious employees up the org chart will make them, however reluctantly, begin to look for a “safer” job with lower expectations.

Knowing whether opportunity or security motivates an employee, though, isn’t enough to prevent unwanted turnover. Sure, it will help create a compensation package and career track that meet the employee’s needs, but to retain productive employees, the boss must communicate in a way the employee “hears” and “understands,” provide the right level and type of management and understand the employee’s need for stability or change.

But how do you do any of that without spending years getting to know the employee? What can a smart but busy manager do, fairly quickly, to keep from accidentally mismanaging good employees? Having each employee complete an Omnia Profile every two years is a good place to start. Not only does it tell you who the employee is, it also tells you what he wants and needs to reach his maximum potential.

For example, the people-based boss prone to providing general, public praise who has Profiled her subordinates will know which employees need that and which, because they are more pragmatic and reserved, need a more specific discussion of what, exactly, they did well and why and would prefer to take place in private. Conversely, Profiling will help the no-nonsense boss who, herself, wants “just the facts” provide the stroking and public praise her more outgoing employees need and want.

In this tight, “seller’s” labor market, the employee who feels understood and appreciated by his boss is much less likely to leave than one whose boss makes him feel like a number.