What is the Great Resignation really about?
It's about the Great Self-Evaluation, according to some workplace experts.
During normal times, when people quit their jobs in large numbers, it signals a healthy economy with jobs in plenty. However, the current times are anything but normal. The pandemic led to the greatest recession that the world economy has ever witnessed in its history. And yet, employers are complaining of severe labour shortages.
With the pandemic life in the world begins drawing back, and more and more people are leaving their jobs in favour of better pay, more happiness, and more flexibility.
This massive surge in resignations and job hunting has been unofficially dubbed the “Great Resignation”. Obviously, managers are anxious to hold on to people. Many that were reluctant to grant their teams more flexibility are now loosening their restrictions. But the measures are not nearly enough. Many managers believe that beating the Great Resignation is all about changing their stance on work from home rules, but what many misunderstand is that employees have much deeper concerns than coming into the office.
The Great Resignation isn’t just a fight about remote work. Sure, burnout is rising and is likely to keep spiking, and is a major reason why employees are handing in their notices. But it’s far from the only reason. The rising work overload is only one cause of the burnout. Additionally to that is the lack of emotional support that employees need to thrive through these difficult times.
Employees aren’t just looking for higher pay, more vacation time or time-offs, or more days at home. Those perks would surely help in the short term. But as the study by Gallup stated, the Great Resignation is not an industry, role, or pay issue. It’s a workplace issue. Employees are actually questioning the meaning of the daily grind.
The highest quit rates were among the not engaged and actively disengaged employees. And disengagement is very costly. According to the Gallup study, the lost productivity of not engaged and actively disengaged employees is equal to 18% of their annual salary.
A majority of the currently employed are not engaged. This means that new hires will most likely land on a less-than-engaging team, and may probably not stay long.
In addition to losing employees to departures, companies are having trouble attracting replacements.
To turn the Great Resignation into the Great Retention in the new year, business leaders first need to understand why employees are leaving their roles.
According to the survey held by iHire’s 2022 Talent Retention, the top five reasons people left jobs in the past year are:
- Unhappy with their manager/ supervisor
- Unsatisfactory pay/salary
- Poor work/life balance
- Lack of recognition/ appreciation
- Few growth/advancement opportunities
If you’re an HR professional yearning to make a dent, here are the strategies for Great Resignation that can help improve retention rates.
1. Check the Data
Data is always vital to understand the cause of the great resignation. Organizations might face a skillset gap when employees leave. So, it is crucial to calculate the retention rate of your business and ascertain what impacts the great resignation has on key business metrics.
Once you’ve identified the root cause of turnover, you are well-equipped to create highly customized retention programs which will be aimed at correcting the specific issues that the workplace struggles with the most. You may even discover through the process that a lack of effective infrastructure may have been hampering your organization’s ability to make important data-driven decisions.
2. Find out what employee wants
Employers often neglect their employee’s wants and opinions before they call them back into the office. And this way, you do not build trust in the workplace. And with the lack of awareness of employee wants, HR cannot create retention strategies considering their needs. Therefore, you need to understand that not considering employee needs will set up a tough and disappointing lesson for the organization.
3. Hybrid working flexibility
Your employees will be happier with more flexibility. Therefore, organizations need to ensure that they supply benefits that are of concern to the prolonged well-being of the employees. Moreover, if remote working is off the plate for your organization, you should provide your employees with benefits and incentives to retain them.
4. Look after long-term retention policies
The pandemic has made employees want flexibility in the workplace. Therefore, HR professionals should not consider it as a temporary tactic. The HR practices should be modified to become people-centric – make the employees feel connected, positive, and energized at the workplace. Lighten the workload, create flexibility, and reduce stress for the best.
5. Listen to employees
One key for managers looking to retain top talent is to listen better. "Get direct input from employees in terms of what is working and what is not," said Gia Ganesh, vice president of people and culture at Florence Health Care, an Atlanta-based healthcare software company. "Address concerns with a plan of action based on the input, share the plan, and start acting on it."
6. Show appreciation
"Recognition plays a huge part in building a delightful culture,".
"Yet recognition does not always have to be monetary or tangible. Verbal appreciation can be equally effective." recognition can come from peers, managers, or an entire team. "Simple public Slack channels where managers can share public appreciation are easy strategies to implement,".
7. Provide Inspiration
Karen Cho, HR leader at Columbus, Ohio-based Designer Brands, the parent company for DSW Stores.
"It's critical that executives inspire and communicate with top talent around three things: the future of the company, their value in the organization, and opportunities and development for growth," Cho said. "What executives often fail to do is simply ask their top talent probing questions like, 'What would make you consider an opportunity outside our company?'
"The answer might surprise you, and then you know what you need to do to retain each individual."
Conclusion
It’s crystal clear that we have been bestowed with an incredible opportunity to reshape the world of work and it’s crucial for leaders to remember what their employees want and keep them at the heart of everything to truly build a workplace culture that works for them.
Together, we can make 2023 the year of the Great Retention.