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5 Toxic Mistakes that Scare Away the Best Employees

If you’re a business that keeps having some of your better employees leave, then you need to figure out which policies or what it is about the atmosphere of your company that is persuading them that they’d be better off elsewhere. Here are some of the missteps you could be taking that might be the cause.

1- Not Paying Enough

If the salary that you’re paying your employees is not competitive, then that’s not going to encourage them to be loyal and stick around. They might look at the salary at companies like Uber, Ola, TCS etc and hop over to one of those the first chance they get.

The bottom line is that you need to pay your employees in a fashion commensurate to what they are worth. The market will dictate what they can reasonably expect to some extent, but paying them slightly more than that might be what it takes to keep them around.

Remember, you can always motivate employees without a pay raise, but you need to pay them the market value at first.

1- Not Promoting From Within

If you are always filling your managerial spots by hiring from outside the company, it could make some of your longtime employees frustrated. If they feel like they’ll never be able to advance beyond their current position because someone else will be brought in, then they may grow frustrated and quit. The solution is to try and groom your current employees for management. Make sure that they’re familiarized with various aspects of the company the longer they are there. It will make them better candidates.

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Related Reading: How to Develop a Team of Leaders

3- Not Offering Healthcare

Not offering healthcare is a sure way to get employees to leave, if you can manage to hire them at all. Even companies that employ unskilled labor should try their best to have a basic healthcare plan. It doesn’t have to be top-of-the-line. The most rudimentary plan will be more attractive than no plan at all.

4- No 401K

Like a healthcare plan, employees will want to work for a company that offers a 401K program. Even if you don’t feel that you can provide any matching funds, just having the plan in place is a way to communicate to your employees that you want to help them save for their retirement. They will respond well to that.

5- Micromanaging

You want to oversee the work that your employees are doing, to make sure that they’re staying on task. At the same time, if you’re always looking over your workers’ shoulders, they’re going to grow tired of it. You must endeavor to find a balance. Correct your employees if they seem to be straying, but don’t micromanage every detail. This shows that you trust them to succeed on their own. 

The Bottom Line:

There is an art to managing any business, and you will get better at it over time. The most important thing to demonstrate to your employees is that you care about them and that you’re appreciative of the jobs that they do. There are verbal and non-verbal ways to let them know of this.

If you can cultivate a reputation as a company that cares, then you should have no trouble keeping all your positions filled. A nice holiday bonus never hurts, either.

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