Strings Attached

Although there’s been a lot of talk about engagement as a retention tool, the link between engagement and retention is only somewhat reliable.  Highly engaged employees may decide to pursue exciting opportunities elsewhere while disengaged employees elect to stay in a job that fails to engage them.

At the end of the day, it’s a complex mix of factors that keep people in a job or lead them to move on so I think we need a better word than engagement.  My suggestion is connection because people who feel personally and professionally connected to a company, to a manager, to a group of colleagues, or to a particular job, are more likely to give more of themselves and less likely to go elsewhere.  

Of course, financial connection also matters, i.e., most rational people care about money and will try to get more of it.  However, the problem with fighting the war for talent with money (besides the price tag) is that it’s the easiest thing to match.  In other words, another company trying to lure away your top talent can’t whip up a new company culture to attract a great person but they can usually offer more money.

Let’s talk a little bit more about social and professional connection.  There are a few connection points that are especially important:

• The Community – A common desire people share is the desire to make a difference, as Patty Azzarello’s recent post about meaning highlights.  Companies that offer people a chance to feel connected to a larger community - for example, with green technologies, community outreach,  products that improve people's lives or general saving of the world - are strategically placed to win the war for talent. 

• The Company – Cultural fit is what gives people a feeling of connection, which is why honest employer branding is so important for successful recruiting.  The caveat is that there’s a fine line between cultural fit and diversity and it’s easy to miss one in pursuit of the other, i.e., too much diversity can sabotage corporate culture and too much corporate culture can kill diversity.  The golden rule is that people feel more connected to a company if they also feel like they fit right in.

• The Colleagues – How people relate to their colleagues has tremendous impact on how connected they feel at work.  What can we do?  We can provide opportunities for people to have fun together, which strengthens feelings of connection.  We can facilitate professional connections between colleagues with networking opportunities and mentoring programs.  And finally, we can provide collaborative tools and processes to connect remote employees.

• The Manager - Obviously an employee's relationship to their manager impacts connection because the manager influences work assignment, how rewards are allocated and whether people feel valued.  A standardized approach to management may work well for companies that want standardization but if the goal is connection I recommend a more personal approach.  The best managers help people achieve their own goals and the best companies reward managers for doing so. 

• The Job – When it comes to feeling connected to a job, personality fit is at least as important as skills fit.   People can learn new skills but they can’t change who they are, at least not without psychological pain.  We can and should put people in stretch roles but there should be a core match between the type of person and the type of role if we want people to look forward to coming to work.  Recognition also creates a feeling of professional connection and Derek Irvine offers some good advice about strategic recognition. 

You can’t make everything perfect for everyone but the more social and professional strings you can create between the organization and the individual, the harder it will be for the individual to cut those strings. 

In other words, don't try to make people stay - try to make them not want to leave.

Picture courtesy of IMDb.

Laura Schroeder is a Compensation Strategist at Workday, headquartered in Pleasanton, CA.  She has more than twelve years of experience designing, developing, implementing and evangelizing global Human Capital Management (HCM) solutions and is currently pursuing a certificate in Strategic Human Resources Practices at Cornell University.  Her articles and interviews on HCM topics have been published in the US, Europe and Asia.  She lives in Munich, Germany and enjoys cooking, reading, writing and spending time with friends and family.

Comments

[Paul Hebert]

I would take this one step further. Not only do you want to give them reasons to stay vs. not give them reasons to leave - why not approach it as "what is the best thing for this person period."

I've had conversations with employees where I've said - go get another job - you'll never hit your potential here. As managers, we should be looking out for our employees as if they were our kids.

The idea that a company should "hold onto" employees smacks of control and frankly indentured servitude. Approach is as a caring, interested person. That way those that want to stay and can fulfill their inner needs - and perform will stay. Those that can't will go - and maybe recommend your company to a client or some other employee looking for a place to land.

I'm a big believer in approaching all of this employee stuff from a parental standpoint. Not in the way that employees are children but in the way that most parents only want their kids to be happy and reach their potential where ever they find it.

[Laura Schroeder]

Thank you, Paul, for this great addition to the discussion. I completely agree that employees will and should do what's best for them. And employers that help them do this will probably retain good people longer. The goal is not to keep people forever, the goal is to maximize their potential while you have them and not lose them before their time. I like the parental analogy as well, although it opens up another discussion about whether the goal of an organization is really the 'happiness' of its employees.

Anyway, thank you for weighing in with all these great points!!

[Derek Irvine, Globoforce]

Connected -- I liked that, Ann. It speaks more to what I like to think of as "employee engagement" -- creating an environment/culture in which employees want to engage -- want to be connected and can see themselves being connected.

[Derek Irvine, Globoforce]

Whoops, apologies, Laura. I've been commenting back and forth between the Cafe and Comp Force. Great post!

[Laura Schroeder]

No problem Derek - I don't mind being mistaken for Ann. :-)

My theory is if companies only focus on engagement they may miss connection points, but if they do connection right, engagement will follow. Does that make sense?