S6 Ep4 of Engaging your People for Success- Winning the War for Talent - Lisa Askwith

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Introduction

People are the powerhouse behind everything, they are an intrinsic part of your business, and your everyday life. If you can't engage and work with them in a mutually beneficial style then everything suffers.

I passionately believe in not only ensuring your people are engaged, but in putting people at the centre of the work equation. Whilst the business, or product, or service, is still vitally important, it is the people that will ultimately make or break your company's success.

Many Business owners forget this, and get too heavily involved in metrics, ignoring the empathetic leadership that is needed to build a successful company culture. Culture is king especially now that the new generation of workers want to feel connected, valued and able to make a difference in their organisations…...or they move quickly.

In today’s show I will take you through the steps for giving you many different ways in which you can structure your business to make sure it not only retains the Best Talent, but also makes your business one that people want to join.

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Show Objectives - The Why

Today’s show is building on our previous shows this week as we explore your employee’s perceptions and needs to get a pulse on what could be going on in their lives as they navigate new working conditions and the challenges, struggles and opportunities of their roles; and how as a business you can not only manage that, but capitalise on it. Retaining Good Talent is crucial to any businesses ability to innovate, grow and succeed.Your great people are regularly recognised by others, as we live in a connected world that is digitally at our fingertips. Hence, now more so than at any time in the past, we risk losing people if we dont structure our business to keep them. So it's time to look closely at what you really offer your people, adn not to expect them to stay just because you pay them.

Key Issues - Owner Perspective:

1. Losing good talent is expensive to any business

 

1. There are several external factors that need to be considered as well as internal ones, the key external ones when you are developing your business direction, these are;

 

1. The Gig economy.
2. Gen Y and beyond being more focused on finding something that fits  culturally with their beliefs and having a high willingness to change roles if they don’t.
3. The emergence of Millenials
4. The death of the long term job, replaced by 2-7 year workers
5. Out of the box things like a global pandemic
6. Work from home and workforce flexibility
7. Flexible work
8. Internal agility
9. Remote workforces
10. AI

What You Need to Know -

It is always a loss to see good talent leave an organisation unnecessarily, so what are the key issues that cause good staff, or in reality a lot of staff to leave, and quite often the bad, or underperforming ones to stay? They mostly revolve around culture. Getting your culture right is one of the single most important things a business needs to do to set them up for long term success, and retaining good staff. Staff need to feel valued and your culture should embrace and promote that..

Key warning signs that your culture has degraded or become toxic and you will lose the Best Talent

1. Disengaged staff
2. Group clicks
3. Silo thinking and mentality
4. Increased sick leave
5. Increased turnover
6. Lack of accountability
7. Blame culture
8. Bullying
9. Nepotism
10. Disengaged staff
11. High staff turn over
12. Lack of teamwork

​What You Need to Do​​ - The How- Segment 3

Winning the War for Talent- Key steps

• Assess and improve your attractiveness as an employer
• Understand your brand and appeal to people who have similar qualities
• Attract, motivate and retain the right employees…through leadership and culture
• Develop a step by step recruitment, on boarding, probation, and training package that reflects your respect for people and the business, while being up to date and relevant
• Your people are your greatest ambassadors, don’t forget this when it comes to recruitment- Develop your internal recruitment strategy
• Develop effective employee compensation and benefits schemes
• Quantify the contribution your employees make- allow then to see their value
• Develop your Training programs for everyone- not just the superstars- Your lateral achievers will help you win the war for talent
• Manage major change programmes and ensure that the changes stick
• Develop CSR- Corporate Social Responsibility
• Benchmark your HR function, culture and leadership against those of your competitors
• Develop the internal resources to manage HR issues proactively, while developing strategic HR to take your business forward.

 
 
Culture and Leadership are critical for success.

Sibhan’s book gives a great Culture change diagram that is relevant for every business and helps keep you on track. The steps work and guide you to success.

Linked closely to Culture is Leadership, the two are symbiotic. You need exceptional leaders in order to have a continuously great culture.

The strongest piece of advice I can give, that I have seen work time and time again, is to get the right Leadership team in place who embraces developing a sustainable culture that focuses on people and the business. This works well, but it does take commitment.

Great leaders matter more than you might think. McKinsey research shows that positive relationships with management are the top factor in employees’ job satisfaction—and, by extension, correlate with stronger corporate performance. Unfortunately though great leaders are also hard to find. Sadly in a recent survey 75 percent of Americans see their boss as the most stressful aspect of their job…..it simply should not be this way, not does it have to be this way. Further during the COVID-19 pandemic, both bosses and employees have been under more pressure than ever…..people under pressure revert to type,a dn that often means command and control management and not authentic leadership. This further causes problems for any business.

Focus on ensuring your leadership or your leadership teams abilities are up to date and able to show value and empathy to your people if you really want them to stay.

The key needs that staff are now looking for to stay in a role, are fairly consistent across industries. What surprises most people is the consistent No1 need is not money, instead it is having a good manager and feeling valued. So we are back to leadership and culture.
So focus on finding out what a good manager looks like to your staff, and train your leaders that way.

The research shows that having a good leader, means they are leading based on empathic leadership, so staff are looking for a boss who can;

Understand that they are more than just a worker.

 This means someone who can be approached when things go wrong either personally or professionally, without prejudice.

1. Someone who treats all staff equally
2. Someone who recognizes staff
3. Someone who promotes continued learning and alternative projects
4. Someone who is not command and control, but rather gets the job done through involving staff and making them feel valued….Value is one of the key points that constantly comes up.

Key points for you to focus on in your business are

• Psychological safety
• Ability to be recognised
• A feeling of belonging
• Supportive relationships
• The opportunity to make a difference, and Corporate Social responsibility        
• New projects and opportunities to learn and grow
• Inclusive on boarding that allows staff to understand the company and feel part of something bigger, as well as feeling truly welcomed
• Team environment
• Emphatic and emotionally available leadership
• Agile to flexible work environments
• Non-monetary benefits- charity, time off, part time, WFH, study leave etc
• A clear career path, that is achievable and supported
• Accessible training
• Clear and constant grading and job requirements
• Cross training

All work together to promote and maintain a positive organisational Culture, one that attracts and retains great people!


On top of this employees need a clear career path, and succession plan, they need to see it is achievable and understand how they can go about getting to where they want to be in the business.

So what do employees want out of having a career path available and accessible that is supported by their manager?
 

• Value;
• Promotions- more money
• Sense of self-worth and achievement
• A plan for the future
• Having their voice heard
• Self improvement
• Recognition
• Fulfillment

                               
What about those that are 100% happy where they are? You lateral achievers- who are also often your quiet superstar achievers. These are the core of your people, and should be thought of that way!

They still want to feel valued- but they don’t want to change roles, and that is good as it gives you a stable staff.

They still want to feel like they are achieving something
They still want their voices heard.
They still want to be recognised

Don’t forget some will be planning of retirement (flexible work packages, and mentoring)

Make sure your career paths, training and development also cater to these ‘lateral’ employees, as this is a key to your success.


So whilst that takes time to achieve, there are so many steps you can implement on the way that will start to help from Day 1. Retaining your people is a key part of your culture and vision as a business, as we move through this season of Engaging your People for success, you will see how many of these key components overlap and support many crucial business areas, as well as support each other. This is what will allow you to develop the strongest people engagement tool kit that will guide your business to the highest levels of success.


Shows
Previous: Episode 3 Enable your Strategy to Support Your Culture, not work against it!
Next: Episode 5 Nurture your People and remove bias in Promotions 

Written by Lisa Askwith

Director of ApexBRS | ApexBRS, Regional Director of See Global Media, Chair of  EGN Singapore, and Associate Professor Cambridge Corporate University | At the Age of Change, providing the HR component of the Global Executive MBA and BBA. Lisa has worked for some of the largest companies in the world and successfully led restructures and change management programs in order to improve the bottom line through engaging the people for success, while developing exceptional leaders who can make a positive impact on Culture and long term business sustainability.

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