You need to take action to ensure that your new hires don’t become next year’s culture escapees.
So, you just found wonderful new hires from other companies in your industry. Congratulations…and beware, these new hires are part of the “Great Resignation.” They left their last company looking for change, and if you don’t provide it, they’ll leave your company too.
The “Great Resignation” has been getting lots of press. It is acute among mid-career professionals, particularly in Health Sciences and Technology. People are leaving their jobs in search of more money, more flexibility, and more happiness. Many are rethinking what work means to them, how they are valued, and how they spend their time.
Take four actions to help ensure that today’s new hires don’t become next year’s culture escapees.
Immerse New Hires In Your Culture: Employee retention efforts begin the day a candidate accepts your employment offer. Stay in contact with people before their first day to keep them excited about joining your company. Refresh and keep your onboarding program current, welcoming, and ensure it reduces the time to productivity for new hires. Maintain formal and informal networks for the purpose of understanding how work “gets done” at your company.
Provide Strong Compensation For Critical Roles: Validate/reverify the 10% of roles that are most important to your business. Identify jobs you “can’t leave open.” Buy compensation data for these roles and then pay them well, perhaps even over market. Make upward adjustments in pay outside of the annual compensation cycle. Encourage leaders to acknowledge and celebrate the importance of people they manage in critical roles during ongoing one-on-one discussions.
Empower Individual Managers To Make Work Flexible And More Fun: Eliminate HR/Headcount rules that prevent managers from creative solutions to getting work done such as job sharing, contract, and part-time work. Require managers to spend time on team building and bonding activities. Provide time and money for them to make these activities impressive and engaging.
Stay Serious About Hybrid Work: Remove technical barriers that prevent effective hybrid work. Ensure that your physical workspaces include cameras, microphones and/or specific video conference rooms. Link your hybrid efforts to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion projects/programs to ensure that people who work away from your physical locations have equal access to knowledge, networks, and opportunity.
Chaotic times provide great opportunity. Stagnant companies are trying to return to 2019. They will wonder where their great employees and senior leaders of tomorrow went. Vibrant companies are using this time of resignation and turnover to improve their talent, build stronger teams, and better results. Which type of company do you intend to be?
