49. How to Retain Top Talent

The BizLibrary Podcast

This week, we're delighted to welcome Roberta Matuson from Matuson Consulting, an accomplished author and effective business consulting.

We had some questions for Roberta about employee retention; she gave us a formula that is simple but effective: employees want good leadership, purpose, and development.

Too often, employers rely on gimmicky benefits that are aimed to retain employees: they may offer air hockey tables or free food, but not focus on the important things that employees truly want to get out of a job.

Good leadership, Roberta explains, means that employees have space to be autonomous. We have too many micromanagers, Roberta says, and that means that talented employees become quickly frustrated by poor management.

Developing managers and ensuring that new managers are prepared for their roles is an important step that companies need to take if they want to improve their employee retention.

Employees also want a sense of purpose: no one wants to dedicate their career doing something they find meaningless. A sense of purpose that comes from a job is a powerful way to win loyalty and encourage higher employee retention.

While this might be easier said than done, an important first step is to define a mission that justifies why your company exists.

BARK, the company behind the popular BarkBoxes, says their mission is to “make dogs feel as happy as they make us.”

This type of emotionally-impacting mission statement delivers purpose to dog lovers,

Finally, the third ingredient in the retention mix is talent development. Roberta offers a few key strategies that employers can take to quickly show employees that you care about their development: one of these is to form a company book club, where employees can read and discuss relevant business books.

Of course, we’d never miss a chance to promote our award-winning content library that is available on any device and effectively teaches new, important skills to employees at all levels!
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