Retention of employees is key to organizations that provide care and services to others. Vital to good care is consistency and predictability and many organizations today struggle with keeping staff for expended periods. By understanding the organization needs and having a working understanding of various cultures represented by the organization, human resource planning can better establish retention plans around needs, culture, and demographics. Retention takes effort, time and understanding (DeCenzo, & Robbins, 2010). Simple things like break time and break time activities can play a large role in employee satisfaction.
It is important for managers to have a cultural understanding of key importance to the employees in order to maintain comfortable working conditions. According to DeCenzo and Robbins (2010) there are some key pieces for employee retention. First, employees must have a safe and healthy working environment. Second, assistance with issues around a personal nature. It is important that human resource personnel learn early that personal issues become work issues and organizations that assist with things like employee assistance programs go a long way in retaining their staff. Finally, employee relation programs, which help employees, stay well-informed lesson uncertainty and help employees feel wanted.
Training and leadership are also key roles in retention. Care by managers and being involved in leadership decisions are more likely to assist in making employees want to stay employed with an organization. Training programs that assist employees in further developing their skills also go a long way in retaining employees. Finally, benefits and compensation are important to ensure employees are getting fair compensation for like work in the industry they are a part of will help with employee relations and ultimately retention. Key to these entire variables is knowledge of value dimensions and understanding that culture will play a role in what is important to employees. Organizations can benefit by periodically surveying staff to find out what current concerns are, as well as what current aspects of the working environment are important to retain.
Human resources planning must include and look at all trends around culture, workforce demographics, and labor force trends. When looking at these aspects, human resources personnel can best plan around the current and future needs of the organization. Plans to recruit and retain must match with the organizations overall planning and take into consideration the needs of the current economy. Though many things are involved in retention, key to success lies in the knowledge of current and future trends and an understanding the needs of current employees.
Tim Geels – Mandt Faculty
