Discussion on:

Prevent high staff turnover with these tactics

How do over-tight budgets impact retention? If the company is making a sizable profit, but they continue to squeeze IT to "quit spending so much money," doesn't that also hurt morale? For some reason this "company" treats the employees by the book, but then wants to cut corners on the products they produce. Seems to me to be a sure-fire way to get people to leave.

Here we have unrealistic methods that will never be implemented at certain levels of staff in the corporate world (stock options for labor, that's laughable, not unless you know the CEO, bonus compensation is begrudgingly remunerated). Then you haveto weigh the management goals of getting something for nothing out of labor. People leave because of one thing, "compensation". The job management has, involves headaches and ulcers with no glory. You have to be twice as good as your manager to make1/2 to 1/3 the money. They don't have any solutions for the problems, yet take the credit when labor is creative and resourceful to come up with them. Then there's "empowerment", if that isn't a "you're on your own" situation, I don't know what is. Then there's management dumping you because you approach full vesting or turning 40 years old (magical age where federal age discrimination laws protect a worker). Each situation is different, if you build a better mousetrap and walk, take it with you. Chances are the compensation you received for it was inadequate. The manager who took credit for it, got the promotion, raise and/or bonus. Leave the concept w/ your former employer, but the knowledge, you suffered for, it's yours, regardless of what they made you sign when you walked on the job the first day. I used to be the most loyal employee you could have. Not any more, I'm/we're tired of being played.

I agree that an employee may not be able to get as much remuniration as his manager. But I think this is expected anyway. Otherwise the table should be turned round. I think all IT employees should be motivated to work towards two things:

1. Developing the manager in them: so that one day they too can manage labour. Management as Labour are two differnet balll games. By developing this management skill the IT employee increases his value until he is worth more than his manger. IT resources aren't scarce anymore so an isolated IT skill is not enough to gurantee a dream income. This will ease the compensation problem.

2. The employer should make a Honest Deal with the IT employee: I think all other problems are trust. Some people don't just fit into some environments while others do. Some employees accept some environments only because they have no choice at the moment. If the employee accepts the conditions and the goods and bads of the environment before starting off then he has a greater moral oblogation to work to make it better.

"Employees are promised new job assignments". One word of caution: don't make too many promises you can't keep. If you aren't honest about this and make a game out if it, the strategy can seriously backfire.

Luc

It's very simple...

Treat your people like you would want to be treated...

Would YOU want to be on-call every night for a month without extra pay??

Would YOU want to work extra-hard on a project, bring it in without a hitch, and not hear a simple "Attaboy" from your boss??

etc. etc. etc.

EVERY company I have ever worked for has thrown employee knowledge (worth how much?) out the window in order to save a few thousand bucks...

That's the problem.... that question mark after the"worth how much"... Managers only see the $3,000 in front of them... and have no idea how to quantify the years of knowledge in the employee's head.

There are two parts to the success of every business... Customers... AND employees... Treat the employees like crap, and you WILL lose the customers as your product and/or service degrades.

It's so simple... Treat people like YOU would want to be treated and you WILL be a successful manager.

Gull

Couldn't agree with you more; the last company I worked for fits your description to the tee. It was a living nightmare as managers, as you say, only thought of themselves.

One case in particular I'll share involved setting up a new server rack for one of our clients. I was approached @ 4:45 pm, (15 miniutes before quitting time), not by my supervisor, but by the supervisor of the call center,to simply to take some extra cable ties. Mind you, this is a 90 minute drive, and I needed to be there @ 8 am. To make this short and sweet, when I turned to leave after giving the tech the ties, he asked me with a puzzled look, if I was sent to help with the setup.

I didn't leave this tech alone, but helped him setup the rack, configure, etc. When all was said and done, I was eventually, nonchalantly, thanked (a week or so later), and when I asked for a simple comp day I was told nothing could be done. (Bull!!)

In 15 years of working in the computer/IT field, I've seen the Golden Rule trampled on more than I care to remember. This happened to be the 'coup de gras' (I think that's the phrase).

You are soooooo correct. Employee Retention is simple. Dont hire one person to do 2 or 3 jobs. Fund the IT department like it is a mission critical department. Dont just expect the IT guy/girl to work more than 9 to 5 without some serious compensation. Does the guy in accounting work 10 hour workdays 4-5 times a week and come in on sunday because the VP of sales cant get her e-mail? CONSIDERATION!

When I'm on call you will pay me half salary for that time even if I don't come in. Because I'm on call and cant go anywhere or do anything, so my time is realy shot to hell when I'm on call.

If common consideration isnt in the budget dont expect to retain staff and expertise.

In my early years, I worked for a monster and his wife. They had a little monster kid who was the receptionist. They were rude, ignorant, and unfairly demanding. I was told on my first day that "...Programmers come and go. If we don't like you, we can get another that looks just like you." I should have known it wasn't going to work out.

When I travelled, the boss said he "didn't pay for driving time", so I would drive for 6 hours a day, work on-site for another 2, and end up OWING the company 6 hours! (As he reminded me, he didn't pay for "driving time.") I suffered lots of snide remarks from both the owners and their little monster daughter. They removed my cube walls so that the daughter would have more privacy (people now went to the bathroom by walking around my desk.) My father died, and after my 2nd day off work the boss called, telling me, "Your father is dead, but you still need to make a living!"

After 11 months, I was in charge of a 3 million dollar account--the one that kept the company affloat. I was told that my coding improvements on that account had kept the company from taking a 33% loss in contract negotiations. I got a "thank you" for it, and that was the only kind word I can ever remember getting at that company.

Finally, I gave my two weeks notice. I had just been offered $10,000 more a year. My immediate supervisor (Rodney) knew the value I added to the organization, and tried to get my company to match the offer. The monster boss told Rodney, "No way I will pay that little son of a b**** another $10,000!"

So I quit. From what I've heard, the company quit progressing with the application. They hired two people to replace me. The company went under within 2 years.

If they had just been civil during my tenure there, I probably wouldn't have looked for another job. Will these tyrant bosses ever learn?

-Brian

What we want to call "intellectual property" is hardly property when it resides between the ears of those who have it. To "capture" such property would be tantamount to slavery, because it is individual, not collective, not collectable, and certainly not corporate. Perhaps one can capture and store the facts, the words, the formulae that make up the discourse about intellectual property, but it's not what's in the books or stored in files that constitutes the real value; the real value is what happens when talented and experienced human beings work with that stored information. Depending how you manage your business, that can work for you . . . or against you. But you can never own the creative energy, intelligence, and experience thatgives so-called intellectual property its value.

So . . . if a "valued" employee's walking comes as a surprise, perhaps the surprised manager needs to be let go and replaced with someone who really knows how to lead, even when it means letting oreven helping talented individuals go for awhile, knowingn that you can probably get them back when ever you need because you have that kind of relationship. Here in Florida we have retention ponds to capture precious rainwater; corporate retention programs do much the same thing: capture pond scum while the real essence of creativity evaporates.

Here's where I agree:
I never really thought about it, but your comments make me realize that 'never burn your bridges' is a proverb for employers, too!

Yes, there are some companies that keep their pond scum with employee retention programs. Yes, sometimes the pond scum floats up to management and chokes out the vibrant life beneath it. Yes, sometimes, the good employees flee to a better environment.

Here's where I disagree:
Better the devil you know. . . I've also seen brand new managers come in and reorg and slice and dice and leave the organization worse off than it was with the old management. Reliability and retention of experience was the missing link. The 'new' solutions had been tried, but the old employees weren't consulted. In a production environment, you need solid, stable, producers- not high flying mavericks. Bottom line, the old system worked; the pond scum actually kept bad fish from coming in and ruining the entire ecosystem. (Would you rather have an old, stable Apache webserver or a new Pentium 3 IIS box? What would you have said 2 years ago?)

Employee retention practices help me to see that the company cares about their staff, that we are valuable. One company gave the flexibility to come in early and take off early to take a UNIX class. Another encouraged me to read technical journals during slow times. Still another offered stock options. One manager groomed me to take over one of our satellite offices.

I've worked many different jobs in various industries, and, if I wanted to, I could go back to any of those jobs. My employers wished me luck in my new position, in some cases grudgingly, but they always understood that there were greener pastures. (Correction: one of my former employers would not want me back, nor would I ever want to go back, but that's a flame for another post.)

They company cuts back on staff. They want the techie availabley 24/7 but only pay an increasingly lower wage for the responsibility and they wonder why the techie walks. Maybe they should put themselves in the tech worker's shoes. If you have to put up with abuse, its always easier to do it with a better wage.

As to the lack of documentation that walks out the door, you have to have "time" to document things. When you are "making" up for the workload that used to belong to two other people,you only have time to keep things running and not do documentaion.

I agree with the list of options in this article however I don't think it goes far enough. If the employee doesn't think the company and manager care, no amount of compensation will prevent high turnover. When you become a number instead of a personthen it's just a job like any other job. They need to know that you understand that they have a life and although it is the nature of any good technician to get the job done, if they don't balance their work and home life we will simply have to livewith turnover. Contrary to popular belief most employees do assign a value to how the employer treats them in good times as well as the rough spots. It is the managers responsibility, as the steward for the company intellectual resources, to mentor and stand behind their staffs. It is also the responsibility of the company to support the manager as well.

T. Price
Director information Operations

It is possible that the intentions of article and those of some CIO's or management in general is good. But...

When you refer to aspects of employees opinions, efforts, strengths and even emotional facets as "capturing data" you move toward a disassociation of the employee from the work and the environment. These are real people were talking about, not a cost of doing business, not a statistic.

Statistics are all well and good for math or scientfic research but not for measuring value of human labour.

How about treating employees like people and not like assests and maybe they'll be more inclined to stick around.

Management has gotten what they have wanted for a long time - High Turnover which keeps their costs down (hire new staff at lower salaries - less benefits)...

As I posted previously - no matter what you try it will fail.. until.. Staff Retention is a Measurable goal in each and every managers/supervisors/directors/VPs/Executive goal.. Management will on care about it if it effects their bottomline paycheck... until then.. you are blowing smoke up peoples butts...

Management has gotten what they have waned for years - a way to reduce salaries and benefits.. and blame it on the employee for lack of loyality .. when the employee is underpaid - overworked - has the responsibilities of 2 or 3 staff - cares a pager / cell phone / supports24/7... lets see a manager get called at 2 AM - work until 5 AM - then be in the office at 7 AM to work ... Not a snowballs chance in Hell...

My 2 pennies - No Change until Management changes..

Maybe turn-over wouldn't be such a problem if IT folks were treated like human beings instead of replaceable cogs.

We are micromanaged, disrespected, and generally treated like idiot children who are good for only working 70 hours a week. This is so true in many organizations. I have been screamed at, told I was stupid, and been completely disregarded when I told the "manager" how long it really takes to get the product out the door. Then, when it really takes that long, do I get an apology? No.

That's why people leave.

Squeezing IT because the owner needs a new yacht, management needs a retreat in Grand Cayman, and production needs 5% more featherbedders or they will go out on strike can not be hidden.

All of us 40+ IT workers who were passed over in the dot-com boom need our day in the sun: We need to throw our sensible shoes up on the HR guys desk, hear some serious bonus and pay numbers, maybe even be given the keys to our own red Porsche ... or else we'll keep moving on when the management lies surfaceagain.