本日は http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/smartanswers/
の中から Reducing Employee Turnover についての概略と感想です。
In US or Japan, labor shortage has been here to stay due to retirement of baby boomers, and this phenomenon will be continuing in the next decade or two. Accordingly, keeping employees, especially good employees, is the critical issue for a corporation.
High turnover will lead a company to considerable burden of expense, but estimating the true cost of turnover is kind of a hard task. Then, we will divide the cost into two groups: direct cost and indirect cost. Direct cost is recruiting fees such as advertising fee, agency fee and basic job training cost. On the other hand, indirect cost is more difficult to measure and is usually higher than direct cost. Customer service loss, loss business opportunities, and general business disruption are examples of indirect cost.
In order to retain good employees, many large companies have implemented attractive job packages. However, smaller companies may not be able to have those lucrative packages because of lack of resources. Thus, smaller companies should more focus on non-monetary means to keep their employees. For instance, flexible working hours, working at home, and family-like workplace culture will promote employee job satisfaction, which will lead to low turnover.
Regardless of organizational size, fundamental compensation and benefit plan such as health care and over time payment are required. But, smaller companies should exploit their strengths to differentiate themselves from larger companies. From this point of view, smaller companies should have elaborate strategic retention measures through creating clear communication flow. For example, companies should provide new employees with necessary skills and training to achieve organizational goal. Employee-training should be provided on-going basis, not sporadic basis. Building culture of innovation or creativity will motivate employees because they can try more exiting jobs early on. Employees shoud have a clear understanding of their company's strategy and goal. Involving employees in formulation of corporate strategies can be an effective measure to motivate good employees.
Last but not least, constructing good relationship with employees is essential. Employees will be motivated when they are valued. Good managers can create good relationship with employees. Mutual understanding between a company and employees is crucial to retain and motivate good employees, which will bring the company sustained prosperity.