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by Rajen Kumar

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Running a magazine concentrating on issues of small and medium enterprises and managing with limited resources is a like living life on the edge. In this rush of meeting deadlines,...

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Apr 2012

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Knowledge Kit

Talent Retention Tips for SMEs

SME Joinup
Sep 2011

A recent study taken by PwC that was published in the PwC Private Business Barometer stated that, ”Human, not financial capital, is the key to business growth.” Ironically, in today's market scenario that is extremely volatile and unstable, potential employees look for security in a job and they look at an SME as a less stable job option. They tend to believe that the chances of smaller companies getting affected are more because they do not have the deep pockets to dig into to retain talented individuals when compared to the established players in the market.

This factor is a bane for the SME's because they do not get the talent they are looking for. Retaining talent is as hard as finding a talent!

While there are no tried and tested rules to retain talent in any organisation, there are some pointers that you can adopt to ensure talent retention.

Money Talks

In today's scenario, bigger organisations are hiring the best and leaving only the crumbs for the SME's. Yes, we know you are a start-up and are aware that big salaries in start-ups are hard to sustain. But if you could provide a decent salary as compared to the industry standards, you could have people working for you.

Job Opportunities

Define the skill sets you are looking for. So when you hire, ensure that you have the right people in your team whose career graph has been chalked out for the role you are hiring. Let them know that there is room for them to grow, learn and contribute.

It is important that you create opportunities for employees that can help them demonstrate their abilities. Stimulate employees intellectually to enable them to achieve their challenging goals.

Appreciate talent

People between the age group 21- 35 are the ones who are raring to go! Young professionals have an inherent desire to move on as they want to try different things when they progress through the course of their careers.

Most of them clock in an average of two years in an organisation. So the talent acquired in most cases is spent in another organisation.

If you can prioritize employee recognition, you have crossed the major hurdle. You can then ensure a highly productive, positive and an innovative organisational environment. Appreciate talent and take time out to say a thank you to them. Encourage their actions. Studies indicate people who feel appreciated are a lot more positive in their approach and their ability to contribute to the organisation. People who possess a positive self-esteem make some of the best employees.

Train to retain

It is important for an SME to impart trainings to ensure that their employees have the right skills required for the organisation to grow. Training allows the employees to get better at their skills and in some cases allows them to learn something new. Allow employees to participate in cross functional trainings or invest in professional trainings and seminars that can enhance their skills.

It is a known fact that an SME can offer more challenging opportunities for an individual because they can provide an exposure to the entire business and not just one area like the bigger companies. Use this to your advantage.

Be Flexible

Since most Small and Medium Businesses tend to be flexible, provide options like flexi – timing or working from home. In most instances, if provided with the right tools, your employee can work from anywhere.

Make them responsible

When employees are made accountable, there is a certain confidence instilled in them, because they feel that you think they are capable of handling that job! Nothing can be better morale booster than that!

You could start with something as simple as asking the employees to represent their department at an external meeting or provide an opportunity for the employee to participate in the decision making process. Small gestures like these will make them happy.

At the end of the day, every person has different motivations for working. The common factor that makes most of the people want to work is the reason that they want to obtain something from their work. The 'something' can be as simple as impacting their morale, a desire to learn a new skill or improving the quality of their lives. While people may move on in search of better motivating factors that can make them happier at work, you as an employer must understand what makes your employee happy in order to retain talent.

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