Companies are always in a race of attracting top talent. It is generally a battle of survival of the fittest. If you’re an HR professional or a manager, you must know how difficult it is to attract and retain good employees. The strategies that earlier worked before might be ineffective for the modern workforce that highly comprises Gen Z and millennials.
These are technologically adept people, open to exploring and willing to go the extra mile when it comes to work flexibility. In fact, the latest findings indicate that over 82% of the global workforce prefers a hybrid work culture. So, where does this leave you as a company manager or CEO?
You must become strategic when it comes to attracting and retaining top talent. Good pay still makes sense, but flexibility on top of that allures any employee to the core. Moreover, a positive work environment shouldn’t be thrown out of the window simply because you prioritize productivity.
Mental well-being speaks volumes to modern job seekers. So, you must re-align your talent search strategies to ensure that you win and retain the best. But how? Here are the best ways you can attract and retain top talent;
- Build your Online Presence
How do you feel when someone offers you a gift that isn’t branded? Surely, you will analyze it, think for a few minutes, and then answer “Well, thanks”. That’s surely how working for an organization without an online presence feels like. Modern employees like customers are interested in brand stories.
How did the organization come into existence, what experiences should I expect when I join it, and what are my chances of thriving as a new hire? An online presence proves a company to be authentic, reliable, and trustable. Moreso, it makes it stand out by pushing its brand identity.
This makes it easy for it to attract top talent since online is the go-to for job seekers. With that, consider building your company’s online presence. You can invest in a website and social media.
Create a website that details the company’s services, i.e sections for “about us”, “who we are”, and contact information among others. Also, create social media profiles on leading social platforms like LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook. Then promote your company with interesting short-form videos, photos, and company events. Use hashtags in your social posts depending on the post and goal. This will make it easy for you to attract more talent.
- Create Compelling Job Descriptions
To help your job description stand out and attract the attention of job seekers, ensure that it is compelling. Quite often job descriptions follow the same format, but you can leverage copywriting tips to spice up your post.
Within a few words, help your target audience understand what you expect from them. Highlight the benefits of working with your company. Details about pay, working conditions, and hours must be clearly highlighted to trigger interest in job seekers.
Also, mind about the tone of your job post. Your word choice influences the reader’s perception dimensionally. Try to avoid jargon and unnecessary details that may disengage the target audience.
- Offer Competitive Compensation
Yes, good pay contributes to employee satisfaction deeply. For employees to feel good at their jobs, and comfortable with their living standards, they must receive good pay to offer them peace of mind. Otherwise, they will be lured off by other companies that offer attractive pay.
With that, as much as you may be an industry leader or a powerful company, try to provide attractive salaries to your employees. Analyze the average industry salaries and pay your hires accordingly to prevent them from opting out. Besides that, consider other employee benefits such as paid time off, medical insurance, retirement plan, and life insurance among others.
Additionally, provide grounds for promotions, salary increments, and performance appraisals to recognize and appreciate your talent. This will motivate other employees to work hard and remain with the company for a long period of time.
- Offer Breathtaking Onboarding Experiences
First impressions are crucial to new hires because they last forever with employees. An effective onboarding strategy not only helps employees but also impacts the company’s bottom line. A good onboarding strategy plan helps to thoroughly integrate new hires into the company culture. It generally makes them feel that it’s the perfect place to be.
Good onboarding experiences can help new hires fit in and feel supported. On the other hand, it can help a company reduce employee attrition and dissatisfaction. Precisely, onboarding experiences impact new hires deeply. If you want to create a reliable onboarding strategy, then consider the following;
Assign a buddy to a new hire. Certainly, a new hire will require help to understand the company environment. You can assign a supervisor or a team leader to show the new hire around and provide the necessary assistance.
Apart from that, you can offer a welcome package. It doesn’t need to be expensive, but it will surely display a unique company culture. It can be a mug, a hamper, or a card. Also, you can use the company’s social media site to post a welcome message for your new hire.
- Offer Career Development Opportunities
As much as modern employees care about salary packages and a positive work environment, they surely value career development opportunities. Attracting new hires with competitive salaries and employee benefits isn’t enough to make them stay. They value career growth and skill enhancement to help them stay relevant in this ever-changing corporate world.
With that, to retain your top talent, you may have to introduce career development programs to improve their skill set and relevance in the employment field. Providing career development opportunities also makes employees feel that you care about them.
So things like workshops, mentorship programs, promotions, and training must be part of the company. Besides helping employees grow, it will improve their efficiency and working experiences hence reducing employee turnover.
- Prioritize Employee Engagement
What happens after you win over a good and experienced employee? You invest in their work experiences to make them stay! We live in a time when employees are constantly wiggled between their work and personal lives. This makes many of them miss out on work-life balance, depending on what they have on their platters.
With that, employees are ever on the lookout for job opportunities where they can achieve the flexibility they desire or the work-life balance they dream of. This makes employees switch from one job to another. But did you know that you can do something differently to retain your top talent?
Employee engagement involves activities and strategies that help employees bond more with their jobs and company. Effective employee engagement strategies also improve employees’ mental wellness, helping them enjoy their work experiences. Engagement generally increases employee morale and dedication, leading to better productivity levels.
- Treasure Feedback
Hiring processes are a great way to attain valuable information from prospects and new hires. It is a reliable way to learn employee expectations. This helps companies assess their HR practices and company cultures to make necessary changes. This improves a company’s likelihood of attracting and retaining top talent in the market. On the other hand, collecting employee feedback helps create an all-inclusive and positive work environment. It also makes employees feel valued.
Bottom Line
Recruitment and hiring processes can be daunting for HRs and managers. That’s because of the competitiveness of the labor market. However, effective employee recruitment and retention strategies help companies win top talent easily. Modern times are ever-evolving and no matter how good your company is, you will lose top talent if you don’t invest in retention strategies. This blog details several ways you can attract and retain top talent, whether you’re an IT company or an enterprise-level organization.