Cultivating Employee Satisfaction And Retention

The beginning of the year is the quintessential time for a fresh start in our personal and professional lives. No matter the industry, the clean slate of the new year presents an excellent opportunity to refresh and revamp the culture and operations of the workplace. In particular, tending to the relationship between management and employees and prioritizing employee satisfaction and retention to minimize turnover will maximize the health of the company culture. With this goal in mind, a company’s people team should focus on three main areas: maintaining a quality total rewards package, ensuring a seamless candidate experience and developing a robust and capable group of managers.

Curating An Attractive Total Rewards Package

In the current employment environment, employees expect (and deserve) a wide range of benefits to support them and their families, from quality medical insurance to additional lifestyle perks. As an employer, it is essential to curate a top-tier, expansive benefits package to attract candidates and retain current employees. This package might include traditional health benefits, medical and family leave options, life insurance, retirement savings and planning, paid time off and more. Beyond these typical benefits, many companies offer additional support, such as fitness stipends and tuition reimbursement. 

From the beginning of employment, employers must ensure that employees experience a positive open enrollment experience. Part of this centers around the people team—they must be prepared to answer any questions to facilitate a seamless process. From there, the team should continue to educate each employee about their benefits so they can take advantage of their offerings, reminding them how to access them periodically. 

Additionally, employers can go the extra mile to make employees feel heard and ensure no benefits are wasted. For example, Wurk shares a total rewards report with individual employees summarizing all compensation, from salary to the amount spent on them for each benefit. This allows employees to understand their comprehensive package beyond just their paycheck. Additionally, issuing a total rewards survey allows employees to select benefit preferences, a simple way to cut down on waste and cater to rewards that best serve the team. 

Facilitating A Positive Candidate Experience

The complete employee lifecycle is paramount to a company’s health, with employees requiring engagement at every step. Starting with the candidate experience, employers should cultivate a process so positive that candidates want to join the team, reapply, or refer friends to the company. Right off the bat, job descriptions must provide a very accurate depiction of the responsibilities and expectations of the role. If a new employee does not understand what is expected of them at the start and becomes frustrated, they are more likely to leave the position. In the job posting, advertise the company’s excellent benefits and rewards. Whether an applicant is interviewed or not, be sure that the people team communicates promptly and thoroughly at each stage.

Next, onboarding sets the tone for an employee’s time at a company, significantly impacting their tenure. The first 30, 60 and 90 days at a job are crucial and should be spent training in the knowledge employees need to succeed in a new role. Within the cannabis industry specifically, as many as 25% of newly hired budtenders turn over in their first 30 days of employment (NCIA). These early weeks are critical to integrating new members and providing them with a solid foundation to grow. Beyond this complete understanding of their duties, new employees must have access to everything they need upon starting, eliminating confusion and delay when beginning their tasks.

Ultimately, a new team member should be set up for success at every turn. Knowing who to reach out to, having an attentive manager and being introduced to more company members are just a few ways that a new employee can feel comfortable and confident. Managers and human resources can utilize tools like onboarding surveys to fine-tune their process while providing data and feedback as time goes on to celebrate good work and support improvement.

How Quality Managers Encourage Retention And Satisfaction

Managers are the key to employee happiness at any stage of employment: through engagement, development and performance, managers make employees feel important. If employees do not feel engaged, they will be more willing to seek out other opportunities, leading to turnover and a diminished work culture. To combat this, managers should be fully transparent, willing to listen and receive feedback and take responsibility for their actions. Managers should be empathetic and lead with kindness and by example—they must not ask more of their employees than they are willing to do. At the same time, no one can give their best when they are not at their best, so managers should also invest in their self-care and well-being.

Fortunately, quality managers can be taught: putting managers, both experienced and new, through an accelerator training program gives them the best possible start to their mentorship career. Such training can cover many managerial topics, including bias training, communication workshops and leadership seminars. Maintaining a central communication channel for managers, such as on Teams or Slack, is a great way to facilitate the sharing of ideas and advice among leaders. Managers should also receive periodic performance check-ins beyond annual reviews, allowing for more regular, transparent feedback on their strengths and weaknesses.

Supported Employees Will Help The Company Grow

Supported, thoroughly engaged, and invested employees will stand the test of time and remain loyal to the organization. Retaining high-caliber employees is the surest way to build a company and reach growth goals. Backed by comprehensive benefits, commitment to the employee lifecycle, and encouraging managers, employees across industries will be interested in your company and enthusiastically contribute.