Over 25 years of consulting, the second most common problem I see being faced by SME’s, after managing their cash, is to attract and retain talented people.
Many managers do not put enough time, thought and energy into their personnel roster, as they do not have the time to do so.
So they think.
The hidden costs of just keeping a seat warm by substandard recruiting outcomes are huge. Not only does recruiting consume time and money, you then have to train and manage a series of new employees as the poor decisions come home to roost. As with a customer, spend the effort to ensure they are the one you want, invest in them to ensure they stay with you, and over time the investment will deliver a great return.
Some of the things I have seen work over my 45 years of commercial life are as follows:
Pay over the odds.
This is not to encourage a culture of greed or entitlement, it is simply to make sure that really good people do not have remuneration as a reason to go elsewhere. You will always lose employees from time to time, but ensuring good pay removes one reason for them to leave. It is also a great way to ensure former employees have nothing bad to say about you, which in turn, makes recruiting easier.
Recognition.
People love to be recognised for doing a good job, for delivering over and above. Recognition of a good employee makes them want to come to work. Some just want the one on one recognition, others need the public affirmation of their good job by the boss. Be sensitive to which an individual might prefer, and deliver as appropriate. I have never yet seen a situation where someone was uncomfortable because they were recognised too much!
Have a clear strategic framework.
Employees like to know why they are there, other than to pay the rent and feed the kids, and what roles they play in achieving an outcome for the enterprise. Having in place a robust and transparent strategic framework not only provides the foundation of decision making at all levels, it enables people to articulate the role they play in success.
Do not micro-manage.
Micro-managing someone implies that you do not have the confidence in them to let them do the job they were hired to do. The usual outcome is that they do not do it, and they go elsewhere, or are at best, are disinterested and therefore sub-optimal employees.
Manage good people by the outcomes they achieve, not by the detail of the means by which they are achieved.
Play to the strengths of good people
Nobody is perfect, and no one person is perfect for any specific job. When you have someone good, rather than try and change them to address the gaps they leave, find ways to fill in around them so that their strengths can be developed and leveraged.
Have a significant ‘onboarding’ process
First impressions count, and you can only make them once. Making a new employee feel welcome, valued, important to the whole group is easy if you think about it. Rather than just having them turn up, almost unannounced, to a desk covered with the detritus of the previous incumbent, make a show of welcoming them, ensure they are introduced to everyone, specifically including the big bosses. A drowning person can often drag others under in their efforts to swim. It is no different with a new employee, far better to spend a bit of time and effort teaching them to swim than to deal with the consequences of discovering they cannot, or that they do breaststroke when freestyle is required.
Role clarity
Every person needs to understand their own role, and that of those around them, particularly those that are impacted by their performance.
Treat people as people, not resources.
Total transparency will go a long way towards this outcome. Good people react very positively to honesty, and non-judgmental feedback on their performance.
As a reminder, the biggest problem most businesses have, and particularly SME’s is cash. Generating, collecting and managing it.
When you need an old experienced hand, give me a call.
