How to Retain Employees through Team Recognition

“I’m putting in my two week’s notice,” are the words every employer should be scared to hear. High employee turnover is associated with poor working conditions, unsatisfactory salary, and, most likely, lack of appreciation. Today, when freelancing industries thrive and global society goes mobile, employees can be much pickier than ever before. To keep satisfaction high and turnover low, you need to find the way to recognize the efforts of your staff.

What is employee retention?

Retention of employees is the ability of a business organization to maintain the optimal working conditions and encourage staff to remain with the company. By retaining and rewarding the workforce, you support the integrity of an organization and keep the atmosphere healthy.

Why is employee retention important?

31% of employees quit their job within the first six months, according to BambooHR. Effective employee retention helps build long-term success without spending substantial costs on staff training and hiring. Here are the benefits of employee retention for a business organization:

• Unified team = better results. The longer people work with your organization, the better they understand the mission. With a unified workforce, achieving business goals is much easier than if you employ the “easy come, easy go” approach.
• Training time & cost investment. By spending time on new employee training, you take valuable hours from your work schedule. In this context, employee retention accounts for faster growth and better development of the workforce.
• Customer service quality. High turnover and work with new hires can be a reason for poor communication with clients. Enhance your retention strategy to deliver consistent and high-quality customer services to clients.

Employee retention strategies

To keep employees happy in your workplace, utilize the following retention strategies:

Hire people you want to retain

In 1998, Schmidt and Hunter developed a study, indicating the first employee assessment greatly demonstrates the future performance of thatperson. The best way to improve employee retention is to make the right choice during the job interview. By hiring people with clear ambitions and the desire to grow within your organization, you save yourself the trouble of rehiring.

Mentorships

A great way to retain employees is to strengthen relationships with new hires when they come onboard by building mentorships. Pair experienced specialists with newbies in your organization to help people integrate. It’s critical to separate work supervisors and mentors. Mentoring isn’t the introduction of work goals and tasks; it’s about acquaintance with corporate culture and creation of personal connections.

Build a family culture

SquareSpace is a great example of a company viewing relationships as their top priority. Self-proclaimed as “flat, open and creative,” SquareSpace doesn’t use any managerial relationships and maintains a family-like corporate culture. To motivate people to remain in your organization, dare to outsmart the traditional model of manager-executive-employee relationships and build a strong family instead.

Regular reward & recognition programs

By making employees feel valued, you incentivize innovation and the desire to stick with your organization. Design a long-term appreciation plan which rewards and retains your staff. Here are proven ideas for employee recognition:

• Annual bonuses.  Make it a rule to reward employees who achieve their goals or go the extra mile annually. To make it consistent, provide people with financial bonuses in addition to their base salary at the end of each fourth business quarter.
• Peer-to-peer recognition. The best way to help people feel valued is to let them create this value. Organize creative corporate awards events at which your employees are empowered to evaluate the achievements of their colleagues. To make it fun, leverage thematic competitions like AI corporate awards or engaging video contests.
• On-the-spot bonuses. What if someone shows extraordinary results along the way? To prove that no achievement is in vain, reward employees with on-the-spot bonuses like gift cards, cash, or small presents.

Relevant: How to retain and reward volunteers

Employee retention ideas and examples

Tapping into the wisdom of business a leader who knows how to increase employee retention, we’ve selected the top 3 retention strategies worth sharing:

“Change your POV” from Hyatt

To highlight the value of employees’ opinion, Hyatt leverages the “Change the Conversation” approach developed by the Stanford School of Design. The strategy prioritizes the principles of listening to employees rather than educating them. As the result of this approach implementation, the majority of employees stay with Hyatt more than 12 months.

“Go for A only” from Netflix

Netflix splits employees into three groups: “A” players (who drive company success), “B” players (who show average performance), and “C” players (who are poor performers). Focusing on the “A” level, Netflix builds long-term success and cares only about those people who show extraordinary results.

“Doing good” from Mars, Inc.

It’s not solely about adding value to company performance. Mars, Inc. managed to reduce turnover to 5% by rewarding community work. Mars employees are paid if they participate in a volunteer project or community works driving sustainability values.

Retention tips and recommendations

Making every member of your team feel like a super star isn’t an easy task. Check out some ideas to help you keep turnover as low as possible:

• Support ideas. If you say “no” to an idea that your employee has been nurturing for months, you run the risk of getting a two week’s notice. Instead, say, “Let’s think about it together.” To keep staff motivated, emphasize that every incentive is highly appreciated in your organization.
• Banish threats. To feel safe within your company, employees should never hear anything that will make them look for another job. If they fail, try to solve the problem and give them a hand up instead of threatening their income.
• Make recognition easy. All you need to enhance employee retention through employee recognition is to pick a good system for awards management. Choose a flexible software allowing you to run frequent, successful contests and industry awards.

Conclusion

To boost retention through employee recognition, shape a consistent vision of your ideal team and work to make it a reality. Launch online contests, keep an eye out for employees’ ideas, and build a corporate culture that makes people happy.