Written in Partnership with Amir Bakian
As uncertainty continues to swirl around the global economy and generate hesitation among business leaders, the importance of employee performance and retention in achieving business success cannot be overstated.
And while businesses maintain their own identities and remain in their own lanes, they share common challenges in hiring, nurturing and retaining talent.
“How do you nurture employees?” asked Erica Rose Ruggeri, founder and CEO of the Rose Consulting Group. “How do you retain them? How do you move them up? In order to get really good talent, you have to have a vision that’s bigger than the vision they have for themselves.”
This is just one of the strategies for fulfillment embraced by the Rose Consulting Group, a female-owned executive search and consulting agency that personalizes recruitment strategies as it guides companies to retaining top talent.
Another of Erica’s strategies is placing a priority on empowering employees. This can be achieved by setting quarterly goals and holding quarterly check-ins and reviews.
“A big problem,” she said, “is that people don’t know if they’re doing well. There’s got to be quantifiable things for people to accomplish and achieve, so there’s a reason for them to be promoted—or get laid off.”
Also, emphasizing the need for a streamlined org chart can ensure clarity and effective teamwork.
“I remember when I was at an agency, there was no clear direction,” she said. “They changed the titles multiple times. It needed to make sense and it didn’t. There needs to be a hierarchy in a way so that people can get promoted, and see that there’s a career path and a future. Everybody wants to get promoted.”
And then there is the money.
One of the best ways to motivate and retain employees is to implement fair and equal compensation.
“If somebody gets a 7% raise and somebody else gets a 3% raise, massive problems will ensue,” Erica said. “So raises need to have some sort of standard overall. Compensation is always a critical problem in retaining top talent.”
Linked to the compensation problem is the lack of goal setting and clear swim lanes.
“People are lost and they don’t understand their roles and responsibilities,” Erica said.
Additional guidance that the Rose Consulting Group team has for achieving success includes:
- Recognize and address low performers.
- Maintain transparent and open channels of communication.
“Companies really need to start from scratch and make sure everybody knows their roles and responsibilities, their quarterly goals,” Erica said. “Then, they must be given enough time to take action.”
As for low performers, Erica said, “Finding success means taking a lot of time to mentor them, putting in the time and effort to help them. And a lot of people don’t want to do that. They just want to fire and replace.
“But then they realize that the new hire is not being trained properly and the company loses them. Then, it’s just this cycle. You’ve got to take the time to train somebody properly. I specialize in developing strategies for weeding out low performers, and developing the team that you have and the potential that’s there. So when you do hire from the outside, it’s driven by growth and success.”
Visit www.roseconsultinggroupllc.com to learn more.
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