The need for stable workers in an organization cannot be overemphasized, as they would ensure smooth and steady flow of operations in the organization. However, certain factors can cause employees to quit their jobs, such as work overload, bad manager, no promotion, the feeling of being underappreciated, small paychecks and no incentives, uncomfortable working environment and condition, ineffective communication, inability to adapt to the organization’s system, and business’ setbacks, amongst others. Managers now needs to become proactive and do certain things to ensure they retain their employees in the workplace.
These are 14 things Managers can do to retain their employees: –
- Work on yourself- work on yourself to become more optimistic, encouraging, accommodating, friendly, and a better manager. This would ensure that your employees are happy with your attitude and feel good and comfortable working with you. This would also create a positive environment in the company where employees are free, comfortable, and happy to work together.
- Do not over-labour your employees- you should know the energy capacity of each of your workers and the labour needed to complete certain tasks. With this knowledge, you can avoid over labouring your employees by assigning tasks to them based on their capacity, and not putting the workload of two people on the shoulders of one person. This reasonable consideration would make your employees very happy to work with you and would boost their work performance.
- Appreciate your employees– they want to have this sense of pride knowing they are important and valuable to you and the organization, and they get this feeling when you appreciate their efforts. Your display of appreciation may not be so formal or big, but the little acts that says well done or thank you, would go a long way to make an employee feel appreciated.
- Throw in some incentives and consider upgrading salaries and wages- an incentive does not have to be so big; it can be a free meal, drinks on you, giving out a couple of change, and things like that, in your bid to encourage their hard work and motivate them to do more. Also, consider increasing their paychecks regularly, especially if they are really working diligently and delivering effective services.
- Increase the communication flow in the organization- you can do this by creating an avenue whereby employees can freely speak out their minds concerning issues, communicate their needs, and on your part, let employees know that they are heard and listened to. Also give them feedback and ensure that communication flows in the organization.
- Promote workers that are due- employees that are due for promotion should be promoted and not bypassed by newbies in the organization. This would give them a sense of accomplishment in the organization and personal fulfilment.
- Incorporate flexible activities into the day’s agenda- I mean flexible activities that would make work to feel as fun and not a burden to employees. This would help to alleviate stress and increase comfort in the workplace.
- Trust in employee’s abilities- I know that managers are always trying to get employees to do what they want. They have set their standards for the business and all they need are workers who would work and measure up to these standards. This is a normal procedure, however, the manager should not always be on the employees neck because of this, wanting them to do things exactly the way he or she wants it. Don’t complain about everything they do because they are not following your pattern. This would make your employee grow very uncomfortable. Learn to trust their abilities, because if they didn’t possess the abilities that make them equal to the task, you wouldn’t employ them in the first place. Therefore, let them freely work in their own ways and meet up to standard.
- Respect your employees- understand that your employees are people with families. They are fathers, mothers, and beloved children of their parents, with this in mind, treat them respectfully the way you ought to treat a person. Don’t treat your employees as trash just because they’re working for you and you’re at the top. No employee would want to tolerate that, so it is an important step to consider if you are thinking of retaining your employees.
- Be fair- be fair when treating your employees- Do not practice favouritism and give some employees unlawful edges over the others. This would make the others feel unvalued and unimportant, and this would make them feel unimportant in the workplace. So, in other to curb this, practice fairness.
- Create a clear standard and goals- this would give all employees the will to work harder, actualize set goals, and find meaning in the workplace.
- Be realistic in your demands from employees- do not set unrealistic goals and make unrealistic demands from your employees. Set clear goals that are reasonable and possible to attain. Also, demand employees to deliver their best services and not push or pressure them to do more than they can naturally achieve.
- Assist your employees to develop strong leadership skills- by doing this, you are upgrading them and providing opportunities for them to grow and add value to their lives. You can do this by organizing seminars that would lecture them on how to build leadership skills, also by organizing activities where they can practice what they have learnt, furthermore, you can assign them to handle projects where they can actively lead a team.
- Employ the right people- in your bid to retain employees, employers should hire the right people for the job in the first place. If this is done, it can prevent employees who were not right for the job to quit. So, by employing the right people, it would be easy to retain them.
We have seen all the possible things managers and employers can do to retain their employees. I hope this article was helpful. Thanks for reading!
