CASE STUDY
Taking a holistic approach to your business is the best staff retention strategy, according to small business owner Danny Cohen.
“It’s more than just keeping the staff happy. You have to keep the customers happy too. It’s the whole circle,” he insists.
“If you’re in a sales environment and you’re continually out of stock of a good-selling product, staff will leave because you can’t provide a good customer service basis for them.”
Consulting with staff and communicating with them in a way that they understand is also vital, he says. Cohen has watched his holistic theory play out in several business environments – in the Sydney stationery supply firm he runs, SOS Supplies, which has six employees, and in his previous role as Managing Director of an international medical company responsible for 80 staff across Australia and New Zealand.
One of his tried-and-tested strategies is calling a quick staff meeting every Monday morning to jointly discuss goals for the week. “[In these meetings] I’m giving people short snippets of information rather than big chunks,” he says. “Sure the boss is looking at the big picture, looking at six months or two years, but staff are really only focused on the day-to-day and the week-to-week.”
Setting their own personal quarterly goals is also important to motivate staff.
“Recognising that their goal has been achieved from my perspective is fundamental. I think recognition from the boss is fundamental for every single employee,” he says.
Finally, sometimes the best way to keep most of the staff happy is to actually sack a person who is causing disaffection, says Cohen.
“Sometimes you have to do this for the sake of the organisation because, at the end of the day, retaining 49 people is a lot more important than losing one.”
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Hire the right staff in the first place. Replacing staff in a hurry is unwise. Take the time to interview many candidates and leave the position open for as long as possible, perhaps using the services of a recruitment firm that can offer personality testing and expertise to choose the best staff. |
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Make staff retention the personal responsibility of the owner/manager to offer a coordinated and focused approach. Don’t delegate this one. |
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Personal recognition from the boss in all sorts of ways keeps staff happy. Don’t forget birthdays. |
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Allow staff to set their own personal quarterly or monthly goals and undertake staff reviews to monitor progress. Give rewards such as bonuses, thank yous, lunches or small gifts if they achieve their goals. |
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Run the business efficiently. Staff who have to deal with unhappy clients don’t stay. |
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Offer a career path and make sure that all promises made when hiring are fulfilled. Staff who feel they have hit a ceiling or roadblock get restless and resentful. |
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Two-way communication with staff is paramount. Regular Monday morning staff meetings are a good idea, as are staff performance reviews, newsletters and even a suggestion box. |
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