It’s relatively cheap and easy to solve most retention problems. Most employees don’t leave for additional financial reward but many line-managers like to hear this is the case, because it shifts the issue of losing employees away from themselves and onto other parts of the organisation.
Employees too often say they left for financial reasons in exit interviews to preserve their positive references and because, well, they are leaving, but why upset the apple cart, right?
The majority of turnover causes can often be overcome, through engagement, good leadership and personal development opportunities. All healthcare leaders have control over the majority of the reasons why their workforce opt to seek new employers.
We recently ran a LinkedIn poll asking this exact question. With nearly 2,000 followers, we asked our audience if they were to seek change during 2021, then why? Here were the results:
- Improved Work / Life Balance – 36%
- Opportunity to Upskill – 27%
- Improved Working Culture – 18%
- Increased Salary / Package – 18%
This further illustrates the point. An outsider may have concluded that improved financial reward would be the leading answer to this question, but not so. In fact an improved work/life balance topped the answers, followed by the opportunity to upskill and then an improved working culture.
Within healthcare especially, it’s vitally important to ensure continued communication with your workforce. Simply asking the question of how you could improve an employees working experience will not only make them feel good about being asked, but also allow you to rectify any issues before it’s too late.
After all, employee retention is a cheaper option than recruitment — and if you’re looking for an engaged, coherent and settled workforce, it’s the more valuable one too.