When you ask most recruiters what is a priority for them most will tell you finding quality hires. This is a main concern for many recruiters, but another area that should be at the top of their list is employee retention. Depending upon the structure of an organization employee retention might not be a direct responsibility of those in charge of staffing, but many times recruiters are looked at to address the problems associated with the recruitment and retention of employees.

As human resource departments plan to initiate or revise productive hiring practices, the retaining of current and future employees should be included in the strategy. There are several reasons why employees leave companies. Many times you will hear it’s due to their direct manager/supervisor or company culture. Whatever the reason is, employee turnover is not a good sign for a company if it happens frequently.  

So, who is responsible for keeping employees engaged and wanting to stay? The answer will differ depending upon who you ask. The top qualifiers include: the overall organization, leadership and human resources.  The company’s culture will have a direct impact on all their employees’ outlook about the organization. Leaders have continuous contact with their employees and typically can help to foster a positive or negative attitude within a department or team. Lastly, HR is seen to have all the answers on how to keep employees happy and wanting to stay. The answer to the question is EVERYONE is responsible.

In education, the word community is used frequently to describe all those responsible for student achievement. The efforts to help a school, classroom or individual student to succeed is based on the collaboration and consensus between the administration, parents and school employees- the entire school COMMUNITY. This concept should hold true for employee retention as well. Everyone is responsible for helping to retain quality employees. Companies must foster an environment that highlights the value of its employees. This can be achieved by developing a retention model that uses data and company culture to support their hiring practices.

As a company prioritizes how they want to build a strong workforce, employee retention MUST be a part of the plan. The plan should include:

1. Identifying who is the main catalyst to promote employee retention.
2. What type of retention model best fits the organization.
3. How will the retention model be implemented. 
4.  How will the inevitable turnover be addressed.

This is the starting point for providing a strong retention strategy. How you implement and utilize your strategy is what will determine whether you can decrease your company’s turnover.

Who is responsible for keeping employees engaged and wanting to stay at your organization?  This is part 1 of 4 articles that will address employee retention. Part two will discuss ways to limit employees from wanting to leave.