Retaining & Attracting Staff tells you how you can make sure that your staff are happy and will stay with you whilst attracting fresh talent and keeping them too! For information on training, apprenticeships and traineeships call: 0121 707 0550 or e-mail: info@pathwaygroup.co.uk For more business advice visit: http://pathway2grow.co.uk/blog

1. Retaining & Attracting
the Best Talent

2. "Success breeds success"
"We all want to be part
of a winning team."

3. These are a couple of well know phrases, but when it
comes to retaining your best people & attracting similar
team members to your business, they are vital parts of the
thought process.
The message is a simple one, by retaining your best team
members who create success in your business, you will
attract more like minded & high quality individuals.

4. Leigh Brannan’s piece on ‘the 7 reasons employees leave’
cites four pillars of employee motivation as
Trust, Hope, Worth and Competence. To put this into
practical terms, this means we need to communicate
well, provide a clear vision for career progression.
How do you go about retaining
your best talent?

5. Reward & recognise our staff for their achievements &
their contribution to business success & to train them
to a level where they feel confident to deliver their role well.
Importantly, this training is for all staff, and in particular
managers, because training managers impacts both the
manager (usually a high performing team member)
& also up & coming team members.
How do you go about retaining
your best talent?

6. Research suggests that 50% of staff
will leave if they don’t have a good
relationship with their line manager.
How do you go about retaining
your best talent?

7. So let’s break that
down those key areas!

8. In basic terms communicating regularly &
clearly with employees will keep those
employees engaged.
There is significant evidence that points
to increased motivation, productivity &
longevity of engaged employees.
Communication

9. Being open & transparent so that
team members are aware of how the
business is performing is a powerful
way of creating a strong team
environment.
Not only do people enjoy knowing
how the business is doing, but in
addition they want to work with you
to improve that.
Keep team members informed of the
company’s success & progress

10. From the youngest to the most experienced member
of your team, a new idea or a fresh perspective
could have significant impact.
Give all staff the opportunity to contribute to the
business & then follow up on this.
Creating environments such as brainstorm session or similar
creates the opportunity for two way communication on key
issues and makes sure people feel heard.
Make it a meaningful
two way process

11. As communication evolves are there
other ways in which people can be kept
up to date with what is happening in
the business, of course face to face
communication through presentations
& team meetings is key, but social
media also may have a role to play.
The key is to be regular in
communication and in a format which
your team will engage with.
Don’t just use email

12. Whether your business is large or small,
creating opportunities for staff, managers
& leaders to meet and talk, creates a culture
of openness & of a team.
Team Networking Opportunities
Career Progression
Staff members need to see that by staying with
your business rather than moving elsewhere that
not only are they contributing to the success of
the business, but also that their career is moving
forward & that they are developing.

13. A key part of management & retaining your best people, will be
about understanding where the person wants to get to in a
business. Then working with them you can create a career
development plan which they will be working towards.
This plan will clearly be about contributing to the businesses
success, but by having an individual plan, the person can visualise
what their hard work & success will give them as a result.
Make it clear it’s available
By showing early on that career progression is
something that happens in your business, & that they can
achieve it, you demonstrate that if performance warrants
it & if the person ‘wants it’, they can progress.
Listen & make a plan

14. Exposing good people to as many people from within
(and sometimes outside) & organisation is an excellent way of showing
the benefits of a career with your business, but also is an excellent way
to give people access to new knowledge & skills which they may not
experience in their current role.
Don’t always promote
Very often, high performing individuals are high performing
because they enjoy their job and are highly competent at it.
They may not want to progress at this time.
That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be challenged, but rather that as
managers we listen to people & understand what they want at any time.
Set up mentoring

15. Giving staff training in areas which actually make a difference to the
success of the business is vital because not only does it mean your
staff will be skilled in important areas for your business, but will also
see the value of both the training & their on-going contribution.
Staff Training
The cost of bot training staff is best considered when you consider what
might happen if untrained staff stay in your business. What could be the
impact? On the other side, for high performing talent, they want to be
surrounded by competent and other high quality people.
Staff training delivers this as well as helping to contribute to career
progression as detailed above.
Identify the skills which are core to the
success of the business

16. If staff know that they can utilise & access training at times when they
need to develop, this helps with their career development as well as
showing them that as an organisation you are committed to training.
Get staff involved in projects
that fit their development needs
Allocating staff to projects and in areas of projects where they will be
either using newly trained skills or learning new skills from others within
the team as they work is a very effective method of improving staff skill
levels. Be explicit about the learning and development you are looking
for the person to get from this.
Create a clear training programme

17. The ability of your managers to coach team members rather than dictating
jobs & moving on will be the difference between a motivated & engaged
member of staff & a disillusioned one. Being able to guide & help staff find
their best skills & talents gives the company & the individual the best
opportunity to succeed.
Train the managers
Whether you have an inspirational leader in the business or not, the key
person in most staff members working life at any time is their line manager.
Very often it is their ability to get the best out of and work with their team
which influences the retention or otherwise of high quality staff.
Managers should be coaches

18. Managers need to be trained to give both positive & negative
feedback to staff in a timely & relevant way. Leaving recognition or
performance issues until an arbitrary time for a review will mean that
the good & bad performance will likely be forgotten. Employees value
immediate feedback & this helps keep progression plans on track.
Empower managers to reward exceptional performance
Rewarding employees who perform well so that they and others become
aware that individual achievements are recognised is a great way to
increase morale. This will motivate top performing employees and also
act as an initiative for low performers to work more effectively.
Encourage feedback at the time not once a year!

19. And how does
this contribute to
attracting talent?

20. If your business has highly motivated, high performing individuals,
this invariably attracts more of the same kind of individual.
High quality staff are looking for career development, personal
development & training & a culture of reward & recognition.
If you can create these things, then the right people
will want to join your organisation.
That is why it is retain and attract not attract & retain.
In order for the best to want to join your business, they need
to see that the best who are with you want to stay with you
So we come back to "success breeds success".

21. Why not contact one of our business advisors at
Pathway Group who can point you in the right direction.
Call: 0121 707 0550
E-mail: info@pathwaygroup.co.uk
For more business advice visit:
http://pathway2grow.co.uk/blog
Want to get started?
Pathway can help!
Pathway group have a number of courses to help managers & staff in
your business. From an online course to more tailored support & advice.