How to attract and retain the best people

How to attract and retain the best people is an issue that’s not going away anytime soon for businesses. Out of the box thinking is required to find solutions that meet the needs of your people, your business or organisation, and your clients.  

It can be a big shift for leaders and teams to move from the ‘9-5’ or ‘you must be in the office’ thinking, even though flexibility and working from home worked well for many during the pandemic.

Challenge your thinking.

Why do your people need to be in the office full time? If you are working to outputs, why do you need to measure time spent in the office when the work is getting done and the results are being achieved? Do you need to shift your thinking on how performance is measured?

As a leader, you don’t need to be captain of the world and walk this road alone.

Involve your people. Research tells us people want to be involved in decision making around their role. Being involved, and feeling heard helps reduce the chance of burnout which can lead to a loss of talent and the cycle continues. Have the conversations, find out what is important to people – they may well have an idea you’ve never thought of.

Having a lack of control over decisions, an absence of fairness, and feeling unheard are all factors in burnout. These can often be addressed by simply having the right conversations and involving your people. Encourage your people to manage their day, so they meet both their work and personal needs, leading to greater balance.

One size doesn’t fit all.

The research also shows most people don’t want to work from home full time. People want a mix and there are generational differences.

Younger workers tend to enjoy the social aspect of coming into work while older workers want a reason to come into the office. These could include collaboration, mentoring, cohesion, or learning.

Office time is great for learning, collaboration, and action – better together type work. While working from home can be great for our deep work, thinking, emails and ‘getting stuff done’ without interruptions.

Work is not as important to people as it once was. 

The pandemic has changed that, culture has shifted. People have choices and are questioning and reassessing what is important to them. Understanding what is important to your people, being transparent and involving them in decision making around their roles will help you retain and attract great people.

If you’d like to know more about how to create a great culture and place to work, so you can retain your people and attract the best, get in touch and let’s see if we can help.