Attracting And Retaining Talent

Two critical areas of leadership include:

• Attracting the right employees, and,
• Retaining your employees

This is no easy task. A hiring mistake can set you back months and thousands and thousands or dollars much like an employee walking out the door can.

Here’s an excerpt of a letter to the editor a friend and colleague Roberta Matuson of Matuson Consulting wrote recently:

In the Boston Business Journal’s recent cover story, Tech-Talent Space Race, you highlight tales of businesses spending millions of dollars building out company playgrounds for their employees and yet employees are more dissatisfied with their employers than ever. New Gallup research suggests that over 70% of employees are disengaged – meaning, they don’t really care what happens to the organization or your customers, and this can be disastrous!

All the free beer in the world cannot make your employees delusional enough to remain with a boss or a company that has bad leadership.

That’s why I advise my clients to focus on what really matters to their people—and I can assure you for most, it’s not a nice quiet room where they can take a nap nor is it free snacks that are making people fat.

The types of employees that you really want to hire are those who are interested in learning and growing with the organization. They value employee development opportunities and the chance to work for someone who is a magnetic leader. They want to be associated with organizations that have a purpose that they personally connect with. Greater autonomy and flexibility in their schedules is also high on their list. As you can see, none of this requires the bells and whistles mentioned in this story.

I absolutely concur with Roberta. You would be well-advised to pay attention to her wisdom and take appropriate action.

Thought for the week:
“Change almost never fails because it’s too early. It almost always fails because it’s too late.” – Seth Godin