3 Reasons Your Best Employees Stay, Even When They Receive Better Offers From Your Competitors. If you're loyal, your team will be loyal.
By Tahir Mohammad Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Why do your best employees stay?
Harvard Business Reviews' Vincent Flowers and Charles Hughes say "job satisfaction" and "company environment" are some of the core reasons that motivate an employee to stay in an organization.
Just imagine how deadly it would be for your company to lose your employees for simple, preventable causes. Keeping top talent in an unfocused organization is like leaving your flowerbed without water and sunlight. So here are three reasons why your best employees stay (even when they receive better offers from your competitor).
Related: 5 Companies Getting Employee Engagement Right
1. They're engaged.
Most employees leave because they're not engaged with the organization they work for. Only 32 percent of US workers are engaged, according to a Gallup study of 2015.
Henry S. Miller, a management expert, defined employee engagement as a "desired outcome that occurs when workers feel a heightened mental and emotional connection to their jobs, their manager, their co-workers, and/or their organization and its mission."
Employee engagement is one of the critical factors that motivate workers to not only stay in their organization but to also work toward achieving its bottom-line results.
(Image Source: The Henry Miller Group)
When employees are engaged, it means that they're emotionally attached to their organization and are willing to put in the extra time, energy, and resources to meet their organizational goals. According to another Gallup study, employees who are "engaged and thriving" are 59 percent less likely to look for a job with a different organization in the next twelve months.
So, the question is, how do you engage your employees?
- Connect their passion with your vision.
- Empower them to succeed.
- Invest in their well-being.
This is why it's important to get to know your employees before you hire them. Why? Because to connect their passion with your vision, for example, you need to understand their passion first and then fit it into your company vision.
Now, by letting your employees know they're respected, you'll keep them engaged.
Related: How to Make Employee Engagement a Top Priority
2. They're respected.
Managers must treat their workers like human beings by offering them mutual love and understanding. Personally, managers should show their employees concern, respect their efforts, and recognize their hard work. Because employees are not machines. They're humans.
They have strong feelings, emotions, and desires. When an organization treats its employee like an object, the employee feels disrespected. They leave. When, on the other hand, an organization treats its employee like a human, with mutual love and respect, the employee feels appreciated. They stay.
To respect its employees, an organization must recognize their hard work. According to the Human Resources expert Susan Heathfield, recognition motivates employees, encourages them to work harder, and makes them stay with the company for a lot longer.
It will be even better when the workers receive personal treatment. Let's talk about that next.
Related: Employee Engagement Is More Important Than the Customer
3. They receive personal treatment.
My uncle has four employees who have been working with him for more than 10 years. The secret behind his retention? "Treat your employees from a personal level," he once told me. "Mix work and family. It's a win-win for both the organization and the employees."
When you treat them personally, your workers will connect with your company emotionally, which will increase their engagement and boost their performance toward achieving your vision.
When the granddad of one of my uncle's employees was paralyzed, my uncle covered the medical bills. So last year, when my uncle's exporting company was on the brink of collapse, the employee worked for almost six months for free. "Just pay others," he told his boss. "I'm not your employee; I'm your brother."
This is what happens when you treat your employees from a personal level. They become your family, not your staff. And they'll stay with you for better or for worse.
