Employee Retention | Viatech Global

As businesses continue to rebuild from the recession, it is important to understand how to engage and retain employees. Treating employees fairly is at the core of meeting this goal. It sounds simple but it’s often not well executed. Businesses see the bottom line and forget the path to the bottom line is the people within the organization.

Costco CEO Craig Jelinek understands how to treat employees fairly. He pays them a wage that sustains and retains them as employees. The industry average is $12.67 per hour compared to Costco’s $20.89 per hour wage. 80% of Costco employees have health insurance compared to 50% of the employees at their biggest competitor, WalMart. As a result of having a living wage and affordable healthcare, they are less stressed, and happier. Jelinek believes that treating employees fairly is the key to creating a healthy economy. He might be on to something with the Costco stock rising as much as 30% since he became CEO. (Source)

There’s no secret formula for treating employees fairly. It’s all about who you hire and promote to leadership positions and how they execute the following:

Effective communication of the company mission, vision and values. Leaders need to have a grasp of what the company values in order to hire and manage employees who fit the company culture.
Set clear roles and expectations. Employees want to know what they need to do and how what they do fits into the larger company goals.
Establish a path to recognition and rewards at all levels of the organization. An effective recognition program will help engage and retain employees.
Mentor and coach employees to their individual styles. Not everyone learns the same way. Pairing complementary learning styles during the on boarding stage for example dramatically enhances the process as well as increasing the engagement of the individual. At all levels of training understanding how a person learns is crucial to training effectiveness and productivity.
Understand the personality types of employees at all levels of the organization to ensure they fit within the organization.

It’s on this last point where the team at Viatech Global can be most effective for your organization. We believe in helping businesses hire the best, empathetic leaders who treat employees fairly and with respect. We accomplish this by measuring their inherent talent to be leaders. To learn how we can help your organization engage and retain employees, please contact us.

Science and scientific discoveries have resulted in many paradigms shifts throughout the centuries. From realizing the earth is not flat to the fact that not everything revolves around the earth and that the earth is but a spec in the larger galaxy that we are a part of. Scientific discoveries have led to much advancement, but at the same time each new discovery is met with objection and resistance. Take for example; in medicine it was discovered that doctors who wash their hands, had fewer patients that died. It wasn’t until later that we could see the microscopic diseases that they were carrying into surgery with them and many doctors resisted the necessity of washing their hands until it was strictly enforced and accepted. Today, it is amazing to see the many applications of new technology in medicine from the use of internal cameras that give a much clearer picture of what is happening inside the human to MRI’s that can help target specific medical procedures.

Science is on the verge of making a new paradigm shift when it comes to understanding the human brain and performance as well. There are more neuroscience studies coming out daily now that is truly possible to keep up on. However, the results of many of these studies should be turning people’s heads and practices when it comes to how organizations are run and when it comes to the selection and retention of employees. In a recent webinar by Dr. David Rock and Dr. Matt Lieberman, they presented information on over 30+ Biases that every human has that we cannot overcome by just simple training. Their implications for all of this, was that if we really want to break down the bias that exists in present organizations, we need to find better ways to factor out human bias. Very similar findings were presented in the book, Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People by Mahzarin R. Banaji and Anthony G. Greenwarld, where they point out mind bugs that keep us from seeing the truth, to the hidden cost of stereotypes that many of don’t know we even have. These findings should have a real impact on changing the present practices in organizations when it comes to the selection process, the promotion process, and the review process. In short, we need to come up with more objective measures than just human on human evaluation as it is impossible for even the best train individual to completely remove their bias. This really means that a whole new paradigm shift in how we attempt to manage and deal with employees needs to take place.

I had the privilege of attending a very intimate HR conference last summer and was able to sit down with 12 HR managers from larger companies, not just in the US but international as well and just ask them what their greatest headache was. The amazing part was that most of them said the very thing that Dr. Rock was attempting to point out. They felt that there was not a unified approach across the larger company on how people were selected and trained. Different sectors in different companies may have used one assessment or another, but there was not a unified front across the organization. In fact, one HR director would have given anything to finally find a system that could cross over from selection to help them with ongoing training and retention and succession planning.

We at Viatech Global would like to help you and your company become an early adopter in the future paradigm shift in the HR industry. We work with a series of assessments that will provide more objectivity to your selection, training, and retention of top talent. It will take the guess and bias out of what you do. It will provide your team with a language of understanding that will help you develop not only your individual employees, but also your existing work teams, so that they can become more productive and attempt to overcome some of the biases, blind spots, and blocks to performance that exist.

The workplace is a changed environment and we understand the challenges faced by organizations as a result of these changes. We’re no longer in a “climb the corporate ladder” environment; employees are ready for positions to open – and not at your organization. They understand the value of change and so should you. At Viatech Global we’re helping employers identify, engage and retain the right employees. We’re also helping resolve workplace issues among employees through our value science tools. Many employers are seeking cost-effective ways to re-build employee engagement.

We offer the following five reasons it will benefit the bottom line to work with us:

1. Build and retain strong teams: Through our series of value science tools we are able to identify the key players of the organization. They may be different than who you perceive your leaders to be and that’s okay. We will help you create and re-create engaged teams who stay with your organization when others may leave.

2. Cost effective employee training: One of our greatest assets is that we want to train your trainers on how to effectively utilize value science tools to create teams that are engaged and productive. We provide a variety of resources and certification through our certification program, ongoing classes, workshop materials and more. Viatech University

3. Value Science Tools: Our suite of assessments provides an in-depth view of employees’ strengths, behaviors and values. Not only will they learn about themselves through the process, your management team will learn how to effectively utilize employees.

4. Cost savings and increased productivity: Review our case studies to see for yourself how our consulting services and programs help increase productivity and decrease costs at an array of organizations. Our client Memorial Hermann demonstrated approximately $42 million in annualized savings in their system of 27,000 employees. https://www.viatechglobal.com/praise/success-stories/

5. FREE Assessment: You can’t beat FREE! Please visit our website, fill out the information on Viatech Global Free Assessment to receive a complimentary assessment and evaluation.

We value your time and desire to have you make an informed decision about working with us.

Please contact us for additional information and resources via phone at 505-765-9903 or 800-494-5218, via email at info@viatechglobal.com.

A Critical Activity After You’ve Hired the Perfect Employee –You Hope

I recently read an article[1] about things to do in an onboarding process and believe it has great value to our customers and partners. There were four tips to make your onboarding process more effective:

Explain the big picture and set expectations.
Get them involved straightaway.
Provide them with all the information they need.
Closely follow their progress and recognize their work.

The article points out that not many business owners realize that the first six months of hiring a new employee are pretty critical. According to the Aberdeen Group, 86% of new hires make their decision to leave or stay within that first six months. Out of those who choose to leave, 79% do so because of a lack of appreciation from their manager.

According to a survey by BambooHR, 91% of HR managers think their onboarding processes need to be improved. And guess what? 45% of these managers believe that their companies waste up to $10,000 per year on ineffective onboarding processes. This is from small companies. I imagine it is a lot more with larger firms without an effective onboarding process.

Those four tips are great, but I’d like to offer some modifications and suggest a few more, especially since the big reason for new hires leaving is lack of appreciation.

Pairing the newly employed with a mentor to help navigate the new environment is key. The trick is to pair them with a mentor that has a teaching style best aligned with the new hire’s learning style. Pairing the two using similar behavioral styles is not the answer. How people learn is not necessarily synonymous with behavioral style. There are tools that can do a good job understanding a person’s learning style and what style is best to receive training. Uncovering learning style and compatible teaching style is not obvious and is helped along with available tools.
The author’s second tip is to get them involved in a project right away. Great idea, but in our experience, it has been proven to first integrate them into the team. If assessments are used in the hiring process, then debrief the new hire with their report(s). This does not take much time and shows the new team member a caring approach. That’s valuable all by itself.
Collaborate with the new team member’s manager. We use a collaboration tool that places behavioral style information side by side showing each individual’s strengths and communication proclivities with suggested adaptations to enhance understanding thus promoting effectiveness. This reinforces transparency, trust and appreciation. It also enhances happiness by mitigating the stress of entering a new position and culture. Promoting happiness is a huge enhancer of productivity.

Onboarding is critical, as the article states.

“According to a survey by BambooHR, 91 percent of HR managers think their onboarding processes need to be improved. And guess what? 45 percent of these managers believe that their companies waste up to $10,000 per year on ineffective onboarding processes.”

If that $10,000 was totally invested in tools, assessments and training, the payback is worth it. Depending on the organization a 1 -2% productivity increase would be significant, and it should be sustainable. There are very good tips in the article that will enhance your onboarding process. However, keep in mind the entire selection, hiring, onboarding process as well as team integration and development path can be greatly enhanced using sophisticated assessments and tools. A well-designed system will increase high-potential hires, enhance productivity, and employee happiness if properly deployed and supported by management.

[1] By Tommy Mello Sep 10, 2018

Lets share some ideas!