Businesses everywhere struggle with employee retention. The dust has finally settled after the Great Resignation and Great Reshuffle. Now, according to a report by Lattice, two-thirds of HR teams changed focus from talent acquisition to retention. Furthermore, 83% of organizations are putting more emphasis on keeping employees around than they had before. But what does that actually entail? 

Clearly, employee retention is top of mind right now. After all the attention businesses have put toward recruiting top talent, they don’t want to repeat that cycle all over again. Talent acquisition isn’t cheap. Instead of regularly dipping into the talent pool, focus on giving your current employees more reasons to stay. 

Perhaps you may think your team is perfectly content today, but WorldatWork found that 65% of Americans considered finding roles elsewhere in 2022. Of course, you’ll never eliminate voluntary turnover, but building a more engaged workforce is always in your control. In this blog, we’ll share strategies to improve your employee retention in 2023. 

Improve Onboarding

Employee retention starts with recruiting. However, once your new hires are locked down, you need to set them up for success. No matter how experienced your recruit may be, they need guidance on how they’re supposed to work for your company. So first, start with structured trainings that lead to a few quick wins. 

Then schedule meetings where the new hire can meet members of your team, and keep it casual! While discussing key information such as how their roles interact should be part of it, you also want that new employee to get a sense of your company culture. 

Of course, onboarding in-person versus remote requires slightly different approaches. Remote onboarding benefits from a bit more structure when getting everyone up to speed. But if you create a seamless onboarding experience, that employee you spent so much time trying to hire will realize they’ve made a great choice too. 

Invest in Learning and Development

Learning and development plays a significant role in employee retention and engagement, but that’s not all. When done well, L&D programs contribute to 260% increases in financial results. Essentially, providing your employees with opportunities to grow and develop critical skills helps everybody. 

Learning and development initiatives are powerful retention tools. Invest in educational resources such as online courses, mentorship programs, conferences, and more. Your employees see it as a sign of good faith and appreciation when you invest in their careers and growth. 

Develop clearer career paths 

You could have the most upbeat culture, vibrant company outings, and highly competitive compensation. But none of that will matter if top performers can’t see a future for themselves there. Career development shouldn’t be an afterthought. Yet, according to the previously mentioned Lattice report, only 33% of HR leaders believe their people clearly understand how to grow in their organization. 

Work with your team to identify career paths that align with your goals and your employees’ ambitions. Employee retention means investing in the future of your current employees. Though not everyone who works for you today has the desire to rise through the ranks, you’ll probably want to retain many of those who do.

Analyze (and potentially increase) compensation

Pay transparency is in vogue, not just for recruits but internally as well. Though that presents new challenges for many companies, especially smaller ones, it’s also an exciting employee retention opportunity. By analyzing your current compensation strategy, you might find areas needing improvement. 

For example, unconscious bias might rear its ugly head when you go digging through your payroll. Inequitable pay leads to turnover, whether intentional or not. Moreover, a report by beqom found that 37% of employees felt their employer was less trustworthy for keeping gender pay gap data under wraps. 

This is the perfect time to smooth out your compensation strategy, ensuring everyone gets what they deserve. Yes, that might mean a few raises are in order. However, increasing pay for deserving employees saves you the trouble (and cost) of backfilling that role in the near future. 

Provide wellness resources

Employees value companies that care about their well-being. In order to retain employees longer, you should consider investing in wellness resources targeting physical, mental, and financial health. For example, invest in mental health and wellness benefits or resources such as meditation apps as an entry point. Also, look to provide physical health perks such as reimbursements for gym memberships and exercise gear. 

Then, see how you can better support parents at your company with childcare benefits. Additionally, do you have a 401(k) plan? If not, set that up as soon as possible. If you have retirement benefits in place, see what kind of extra financial education resources you can provide your employees. All of these wellness perks work together to give you a leg up on employee retention. 

Seek out better benefits

Benefits can be expensive and complicated, especially for smaller businesses, but they are one of the fastest ways into your employees’ hearts. That’s why 54% of HR departments outsource benefits work to ASOs, PEOs, or HROs. But the costs seem well worth considering how high-quality benefits affect retention. 

For example, a 2021 report by Achievers found that one-fifth of employees would consider staying at their company if they offered better benefits. So by improving this one aspect of your business, you could see a notable impact on employee retention. 

Build a transparent and communicative culture

Company culture isn’t everything when it comes to employee retention, but it sure is a lot. The best cultures prioritize communication and transparency, and in doing so, they create safer, more engaging environments for everyone. However, it can be challenging to improve your culture if you haven’t yet identified problem areas, so kick off the new you with an employee engagement survey. 

This lets your team know you care about their feedback, but the work doesn’t end there. Once you gather that data, work across departments to effectively apply your findings. At the end of that process, you’ll have the makings of a stronger, more strategic culture that people love being a part of. 

Offer greater flexibility

The corporate world has changed for good; employees value flexibility more than ever. The beqom Culture and Compensation report found that 68% of employees would consider leaving a role for more flexibility regarding where and when they work. Hybrid models are a massive success in bridging the gap between work-from-home flexibility and in-office culture and camaraderie. Essentially, employees know they can be productive from anywhere, and it’s up to you to show you trust them. Otherwise, someone else will. 

ADDA makes retention easier!

Smaller businesses don’t usually have the same time or resources to spend on their employee experience as larger companies. However, ADDA can bridge that gap for you. Employee retention becomes much more manageable with our employee engagement and HR expertise. If you want to learn more, schedule a call today.