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Tech companies are under more pressure than ever. With employees resigning at record rates, companies of all sizes are scrambling to develop a stronger employee retention strategy.
What’s employee retention got to do with your virtual meeting platform? At Welcome, we’d argue a whole lot. Virtual meeting software can help you build a better employee experience—and ensure a major return on investment.
In September, a researcher at Vizier published the results of a major employee turnover study in Harvard Business Review.Over the course of Summer 2021, more than 4 million employees voluntarily left their positions. According to the study, the majority of these employees were between 30 and 45.
If you’re shocked by this revelation, you’re not alone. Typically, this demographic doesn’t hop between new jobs. That’s a trend more often observed in younger employees, who are still discovering which positions and companies are a good fit for their skills or career ambitions.
By contrast, older, more experienced employees have more established careers and out-of-work responsibilities, like aging parents and young children. They’re also more burnt out as another year of the pandemic goes on. Because of their level of experience, however, these employees now have more leverage than ever when deciding to go on the job hunt.
The Vizier survey also reveals that tech companies took an especially brutal hit during this time period. In this industry alone, employee resignations increased by 4.5%. Unfortunately, the industry benchmark for employee turnover is already notoriously high. According to a widely cited LinkedIn survey, turnover in tech averaged about 13.2% in 2018—that’s 2.3% higher than the worldwide average.
As the pandemic continues, factors like burnout, heavier workloads, and feelings of isolation are driving great employees away from the tech sector—and driving up the costs of employee turnover.
Now that experienced employees are more likely to seek out the most flexible, well-paying position, competition in the hiring market is fierce. And employers are left wondering how they’ll foot the bill.
According to Gallup, the real-world costs of the employee turnover rates we’re seeing during “The Great Resignation” will be staggering. Collectively, U.S. businesses might lose as much as $1 trillion to voluntary turnover.
Even on an individual level, the numbers are alarming. Replacing an experienced employee can cost as much as 125% to 200% of their annual salary, depending on their role. If you’re paying competitive rates, you risk shelling out millions of dollars every single year in turnover costs alone.
Office perks or flexible schedules aren’t enough to motivate unhappy employees to stick around, either. Most often, the only thing holding employees back from leaving their positions is access to employer health insurance benefits.
A new study from insurance platform Policygenius found that as many as 33% of employees would leave their current jobs if they didn’t have to worry about health insurance.
As these alarming trends indicate, designing a better employee experience should be top of mind for every company leader right now. And if your employees are only sticking around for health insurance, then you’ve got a big problem on your hands.
Now that we’re in the middle of an all-out talent war, you simply can’t afford not to create a better employee retention strategy. Your bottom line depends on it.
A strong employee retention strategy is rooted in your company culture. When employees are engaged, they feel more connected to one another, your company’s leadership, and your mission.
They’re also more likely to stick around longer and be more satisfied with their work. Here are 4 strategies you can use today to start improving your employee sentiment scores.
From sales calls to team syncs, your employees have already been on camera all day. Sitting through a company-wide meeting is a surefire way to lose their attention. (Hello, Zoom fatigue.)
Thankfully, engagement during a virtual meeting doesn’t always mean turning your cameras on. But it does require that you think of your employees as active participants and not as a passive audience.
The more you give your employees content to respond to, the more engaged they’ll be. Especially when you can demonstrate that their input has an impact on your company’s policies or business goals.
For example, you can ask for feedback on a core company goal by taking a virtual poll or encourage team members to react to presentations by dropping emojis in the chat box. With up-to-the-minute feedback, you’ll know whether employees are satisfied with their roles or the direction of the company—and be able to address their concerns moving forward.
Tech tip: Holding an internal event, like an all-hands meeting? Use virtual meeting software to measure and track engagement and employee sentiment scores. The more data you have at your disposal, the easier it is to track and measure progress as you build a better employee experience.
As a leader, you know that giving your employees more flexibility—especially during the pandemic—isn’t just a perk. It’s a requirement. But if the office is no longer the hub of employee connection, you need new ways to foster employee belonging.
Encourage your employees to DM one another, connect one-on-one over calls, and create group chats about specific projects or workflows. When your team is empowered to connect through technology, all the energy you generate during company-wide meetings flows into the rest of the work week.
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In this new era of hybrid and remote work, it’s especially important to ensure that new employees feel connected to colleagues they may not meet in person. According to Glassdoor, a great onboarding experience can improve employee retention by as much as 82% and increase productivity by more than 70%.
Create an onboarding strategy that encourages current team members to DM their new colleague or set up intro calls across the organization. When you build belonging into your company culture—and your tech stack—you’re creating a better employee experience from the ground up.
When it comes to the daily grind of virtual meetings and never-ending to-do lists, there’s not always a lot of room for individual agency in the workplace. Identify the moments when you can give your employees more choices for how and when they engage with company leaders and company-wide content.
For example, during a company-wide all hands meeting, encourage your employees to gather in small groups or in their DMs to watch and react together on your virtual meeting platform. By giving your team more agency around how they connect, they’ll actually want to—and you’ll be able to increase motivation across the board.
Tech tip: When hosting a meeting on Welcome, activate your lounge rooms to provide employees with their own special places to gather by team or tribe.
Leading remote or hybrid teams is challenging for everyone, including CEOs. Executives aren’t in the office every day, connecting with their employees or ensuring that the entire team is aligned with their vision.
Because of this new reality, it’s more important than ever for leadership to communicate clearly and effectively with their teams, no matter where employees are located. A recent survey conducted by IBM Watson Media discovered that employees not only crave this kind of connection with their leaders, but they also want to better understand the strategic direction of their company.
And technology can help. By using people-centered technology to clearly convey your company values, recognize and reward success, and align on new goals, you’ll help your employees feel more connected to the company itself—and to the leaders who shape decision making at the highest levels.
Improving your employee retention strategy in the middle of “The Great Resignation” is more important than ever. With the staggering cost of high turnover rates, you can’t afford not to invest in your people. Employee retention goes to the heart of your company culture, too. When you design your in-person or virtual workplace for a better employee experience, your employees feel engaged, connected, and motivated. And that’s a winning combination.
1. Who Is Driving the Great Resignation? (HBR)
2. 5 Reasons Why Employee Experience Should Be the Focus of Your Enterprise Right Now (Unily)
3. This Fixable Problem Costs U.S. Businesses $1 Trillion (Gallup)
4. How to Calculate Employee Retention Rate (Lattice)
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