How to Stop Your Rockstar Employees from Jumping

How to Stop Your ‘Rock Star’ Employees from Jumping Ship

A recent survey from global recruiters, Robert Half International, found that one third of Kiwi finance and accounting employees have been looking for new jobs outside of their current organisation.

At a Robert Half breakfast briefing held in Auckland this morning, trainer, career coach and former recruitment consultant, Kim Seeling Smith, discussed the key reasons why New Zealand finance and accounting staff are looking to leave, along with some effective strategies to not only keep them, but to increase productivity and job satisfaction, as well as reducing stress on the part of the manager.

Seeling Smith said, "turnover is expensive", citing the average cost to replace an employee as between 50 – 200% of their salary for one year. This means an employee earning $80k per annum would cost a minimum of $40k to replace – a significant figure when multiplied for an entire workforce.
"Not only is retention a cheaper option, a stable staff can add value to your company and help to make it more competitive.”

Bringing together a combination of scientific research and her own anecdotal evidence from the 15 years she has spent as a recruiter (six years based in Auckland), were she conducted interviews with more than 5,000 staff and companies, Seeling Smith presented some strategies for staff retention in her keynote speech: The Critical Path to Keeping Critical People.

“Retaining good employees is hard work, especially in today’s environment, and yet the concepts behind it are actually very simple,” said Seeling Smith, who boiled the three key reasons why people leave down to “issues with people, structure and process”.

Many managers mistakenly believe that employee retention boils down to salary and benefits. While people do need to be paid a fair wage, research shows that most employees will be far more engaged by simply being given the opportunity to do meaningful work at a company they love, with a team they enjoy. Especially if they are able to put their own unique mark on that work and be recognised for their achievements.

“The first step is to stop and have a think about who the critical people in your organisation are – the quiet over achievers, and the ‘rock stars’,” Seeling Smith told the briefing. “This is where you should be putting 80 per cent of your energy. Creating a structure and management processes where your critical people can really excel at their roles and become ‘strategically creative’ will create the type of environment that most employees want, drastically reducing the amount of turnover a company experiences.

“Placing more emphasis on the retention of these people is one of the smartest moves you can make. Keep them happy by creating an environment where they can be innovative, strategic, and solve problems for their organisations. Not only will they be happier and more engaged and productive, you, as a manager will have greater job satisfaction as well."

Seeling Smith noted that most organisations hired for a particular skill set because they want employees to be able to add value from day one. She likened this strategy to rolling the dice.

“At best it’s a crap shoot because you are dealing with human beings and they will constantly surprise you. Hire, instead, based on a candidate’s cultural fit within an organisation. You can train a skill set but you can’t train cultural fit,” she said.

Based in Sydney, Kim Seeling Smith speaks trains and consults on staff retention and career management issues. She has co-authored a book 101 Great Ways to Enhance Your Career, which will be available in November.

ENDS

© Scoop Media