Staff can become a large stress for small business, especially retaining great staff. It can be costly replacing staff, not to mention all the time it takes to effectively train the new team members. But there are a few simple ways in which to encourage your staff to stay with your business longer. Here are my tips for retaining staff.

5 Tips For Retaining Staff

Exit Interviews

These are one of the most powerful staff retention tools. While it might seem a little backward, if you are coming from a place in business, in which you’ve had a high staff turnaround, then understanding why your staff are leaving is a great asset. When you have an understanding of why staff have left, you can formulate a plan for correcting the issue, or ensuring it is not an issue for the new employees.

Even if the employee has left for an outside reason, such as moving state, exit interviews will give you some great feedback on what your staff are feeling inside your business. A must do for each staff member leaving.

Clear Expectations

We all want to feel like we have reached expectations, but if expectations are not clearly defined it is difficult for your staff to feel as though they have met your expectations. Your job as a business owner is to give firm direction to your staff.

Start by having a clearly written position description, that you also verbally communicate with your team members. Work towards setting KPI’s (Key Performance Indicator) to help keep your staff on track and performing well. Help them set goals to work towards, and encourage their growth within their role.

Pay Fairly

Most of us have confidentially clauses built into our employment contracts, but most of your staff will be talking about their wages. There can be a great deal of animosity created when it is perceived that someone is not being paid fairly. If you are paying according to the award or across the board above the award, it is hard for your team to become upset due to wages.

It’s a simple tip that can really have an impact on how your staff feel about their job.

Invest In Your Team

If I had a dollar for every business owner who showed hesitation around investing in training for their staff I would be a very wealthy person. Hey I get it, as a small business those dollars that are invested, are very hard earned. But in order to keep your staff happy in their jobs, we need to keep them growing within their positions. Self and skill development is an important part of staff retention, and helps keep your team excited about their jobs.

That is not the only benefit to your business, the skills they learned will be transferred to the business and other staff members. We all need to keep learning, to keep us stimulated and invested in the company we are part of.

Appreciate Your Staff

Your staff are the backbone of your business, and they need to know you appreciate what they do. There are many ways in which you can do this. Here are a few tried and tested ways to show your appreciation, tell them!, performance bonus, early days for performance, single them out at a toolbox talk or staff meeting and let the rest of the team know about something great a team member did, shout the team lunch, breakfast or a few drinks, drop by site with a cold drink on a hot day, bring a staff member in to a client meeting and praise the staff member in front of the client.

These are just a few of the ways you can show your staff you appreciate what they are doing. It is just as important to let them know if something has gone wrong, and the way in which you have that conversation should be equally as positive. Believe it or not, this also has the power to show your staff they are appreciated.

These tips for retaining staff and tried and tested by many successful trade businesses. I recommend you implement them into your business today. If you would like more tips on staff or your small business, come find me over at Tradies in Business.

Have you had issues with staff retention?

Nicole xx