If you have good staff, retaining and motivating that staff is essential. You might think that's only in the financial side, but that's not the most important thing. Far more important is that you do justice to people's natural desire to keep developing continuously. If you provide a development culture, they will be less likely to look around. Learn more about how to embed a culture of learning in your organization in this article.
Why learning is so important
It is peculiar to people to want to improve themselves. Because when you feel you can do something well, you enjoy doing it more. Employees stay motivated if they can keep their skills up to par. Then confidence grows: that what I do is good, contributes to the bigger picture and I get appreciation. But more importantly: I can continue to improve. For example, by taking courses or getting more responsibilities.
Then another offer may come along that may be more attractive financially, but if the learning culture there is not as good, that money doesn't matter as much. It's also important to keep talking about it so that the learning curve continues to rise. Standing still is going backwards, and going backwards means people are going to look further.
Here's how to create a development culture to retain and motivate your staff
So to retain and motivate staff, they must be able to develop themselves. And have that in the corporate culture. This can be done by paying attention to a number of things.
1. Provide development budget
This is a very concrete implementation, but no less important. With a development budget, your employees can take training and courses to develop themselves. Look for what makes your people happy and what they themselves want to develop. Give them the opportunity to draw up an action plan for themselves. And if an employee wants to take a course that is far outside their area of expertise, at least discuss it. It may not be directly relevant to your company, but if it makes him happy, it will be valuable to your company.
2. Internal mobility
You always have to keep an eye on whether someone can live up to their potential in their current position. Sometimes someone knows the tricks of the trade too well and it is time for a new place. That may be another employer, but if your internal mobility is in order, you can also offer them a new challenge within your own organization. This can start very simply, by offering internal internships, for example.
3. Learning from mistakes
You learn the most from your mistakes. Therefore, make sure your employees feel the confidence to dare to make mistakes. Don't judge and condemn them, but see together how they can learn from them. You cannot influence the result of a mistake afterwards, so it is better to accept and learn. Of course you should discuss mistakes, but always do so in a constructive way.
Retaining your staff
Good staff is worth gold and so you need to retain that staff. But gold is not the best way to keep them in. Give them the opportunity and freedom to develop within your company, and they will pay it back with loyalty. This is especially important if your company is about to grow substantially, for example, with the help of investors. Want to know what impact investors have on your business? Then download our white paper.
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