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A plant that outgrows its container will eventually wilt. 

The same is true for employees: If they feel like they don’t have room to grow in their current job, they’ll face the choice of either staying where they are, with their skills withering from lack of growth, or they’ll break out and leave to go somewhere else where they can learn more. 

The good news is, in most cases, their manager can help them find ways to utilize their skills, or develop new ones, without having to change jobs and work elsewhere. 

As a manager, would you rather help your current employees thrive, or would you prefer to have turnover, lose institutional knowledge and have to start at square one with new employees even more often? 

 

Here are five ways you can combat turnover, improve retention rates and boost your employee morale. 

 

  • Talk to them about their goals. This might be a conversation for an annual review, or it might be something that happens informally from time to time, but ask your employees what they want to do with their jobs. Do they want to learn something new? Do they want to expand on a passion project and focus more on something? Do they feel overwhelmed? Do they feel like their skills are going to waste? Get a sense of what makes them excited about work, or what their interests are, and work together to find ways to dedicate more of their time to those pursuits. 
  • Help develop a path to achieve those goals. It’s one thing to listen to your employee talk about what they want to do and where they want to be in a few years. It’s another altogether to dive in and work with your employee to find ways to make those goals possible. How can you foster their interests and help them be successful in the ways that matter to them, not just to your company? Once you’ve worked together to establish these benchmarks, make it a priority to check in occasionally and see how things are going. 
  • Institute a mentorship program. If your employees express an interest in expanding their skill set to learn more about other jobs within your company, set up a mentoring program. This allows more senior employees to show newer employees the ropes, passing on their skills and wisdom. This shows the younger employees you’re invested in their future while also letting the senior employees know their expertise is valued and their leadership is important. 
  • Promote training opportunities. Does your company have access to any kind of job training programs? Is there a nearby college or vocational school that teaches courses that could be beneficial to your team? Let them know! If possible, pay for the courses, in full or in part, as a way to invest not just in your team but in the future of your company. Or promote internally, both online and in common areas throughout the workspace, online training programs that might be of interest to your team. 
  • Promote from within. This doesn’t have to mean an official title change, but it can! Show your employees that you want them to succeed by offering them the opportunity to advance: it could be from a team member to team lead; it could be from a junior to a senior position. If there’s an opening on a team for a leadership position, select someone already in the company. This is an aspirational move that not only shows faith in your current team but inspires others to believe they, too, can advance their career without having to leave. 

 

People want to work for companies that value them, not just as a body that can do a job, but as a fully recognized individual with their own aspirations and goals. Feeling supported in their career will keep employees invested and under your roof and might even help you attract top talent in the future! 

For more advice on how to help your employees succeed in ways that matter to them, contact Davis Staffing. Our experts are ready to help you find solutions that work for you and your company and, if you need to bring on more employees, we can help find candidates that match your requirements. Call Davis Staffing today and let’s get started!