Values, beliefs, and leadership behaviours are so important within a business and need to be shared, always treat employees how you would like to be treated. I’ve listed some tips below that I always recommend to put in place, and have personally used these tips to drive down absence and turnover within businesses during my corporate HR career.
- Always make sure you have a company induction for all employees, and start with contact prior to them joining the business. Don’t just leave them out in the cold working their notice elsewhere, and with no contact until their first day of work. A call prior to their first day gets you both off on the right foot, and shows your professionalism and the care for the new employee.
- Ensure employees have a buddy in place for their first few weeks to reduce any potential anxiety they may be feeling. Always support a new employee to feel welcome and part of the team, starting a new job is high up there when it comes to stress and anxiety.
- Hold regular reviews with the new employee during their first twelve months, this goes a long way, and ultimately shows the employee that they are supported.
- Always conduct an employee engagement survey each year in order to obtain true feedback and show areas needed for improvement. Don’t just file the survey response, go through it, make any feasible and necessary changes, and feed these back each year. If you have an intranet, publicise the changes made based on the feedback, and thank employees for completing the survey. Without people, there is no business.
- Always have a reward and recognition scheme in place, and acknowledge both internal and external achievements. Internal promotion, external passing of driving test, getting married, or completing their studies for example. Employee of the month, employee with zero absence, team leader of the month, the opportunities are endless.
- Be clear on promotion opportunities, and offer training programmes and encouragement for them to excel within the business. Hold regular feedback sessions, assign them a buddy who may already be in their desired role, and allow them to shadow this person. If they aren’t quite ready to move on up, be honest with them, and put a plan in place to support them with extra training. Give them that goal to work towards, to keep them motivated and on track.
- Allow and encourage employees to make suggestions, and actually listen to them. Invite them to attend meetings, set up a focus group, and show them that their opinions are valued.
- Hold an annual team event for example at Christmas, and make sure that all employees receive a Christmas card. People want to feel valued and supported, and when they don’t, they start looking elsewhere.
- Most of all, treat all employees with respect, and be kind. You were in their position once, remember how you felt. It is tough out there at the moment, don’t make it any tougher, some people are just hanging by a thread, and you never know what may be going on at home.
An engaged employee will be motivated to work, perform their best, aim for promotion, turn up for work, refer friends and contacts, and will be inclined to stay with the business. Happy employees work better, provide better customer service, and remain loyal to the business which looks after them and genuinely cares. Look after your people, and they will look after your business.