With no disrespect to former President Clinton’s once-famous
mantra, the most pressing issue facing American CEOs today
isn’t the economy, it’s people.
Nearly every CEO or business owner I know pines about the challenges they face finding good, qualified employees to add to their
staff. And once they find them, they’re even more concerned about
how to keep them.
It’s no secret that retaining high performers is an ongoing process with no magic formula. A study of more than 16,000 employees
nationwide by the Washington, D.C.-based research center
Leadership IQ found that a startling 47 percent of high performers
are actively looking for other jobs. That means they are posting and
submitting resumes, and even going on interviews, often on your
company’s time.
Compounding this are two other troubling bits of data. First, the
problem appears to be generational. Sixty-one percent of recent college graduates say they expect to stay with their first employer for
no more than three years. And from a slightly broader perspective,
only 30 percent of workers between the ages of 21 and 30 say they
would strongly recommend their current organization as a “good
place to work.”
What’s truly disturbing is the second piece of data. While top talent
packs their bags in anticipation of leaving, their counterparts at the
other end of the performance pole are putting away their suitcases
and settling in for the long haul. A meager 18 percent of low-performing employees say they are actively seeking other jobs, while only 25
percent of middle performers are actively hunting so-called greener
pastures.
So what can you do to ensure you’re attracting and retaining the
best and brightest people and aren’t either a leap pad for top performers or a repository for mediocrity?
Plenty, and it all starts with investing in your people and building
an organization with a culture that screams, “I care about my
employees.”
To better understand how Northeast Ohio CEOs are doing this,
Smart Business has teamed up ERC to conduct our eighth annual
Workplace Practices Survey. Take the survey online at www.sbnon-line.com/workplace and tell us how you approach work force
issues. The results, along with an analysis of the state of human
resources in Northeast Ohio, will be published in our August
2008 edition.
Contact Editor Dustin Klein at [email protected]
