Who Else Wants to Retain and Motivate their Best Employees?

It looks very simple, doesn't it? "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." The Golden Rule appears so all-inclusive that it might be a solution for all human relations. Simply handle everyone the way you would appreciate being taken care of and everything will run wonderfully, yes?

Just a second... It seems that something is off...

Does your company's twenty-two year old hotshot account rep aim for the exact same benefits from their job that your forty-something accounting clerk wants? Is your technical staff aiming for similar goals and reimbursement as your secretary?

Obviously, their needs and wants are very unique, though many business owners use a universal approach when rewarding their most important employees. After a large job is finished, everybody gets an identical thing, whether you buy them a meal or a gas card. Delivering the same thing to everyone is what's fair, right? But do you think it's truly fair for your most valuable staff?

Hold On to Your Most Valuable Staff

Startlingly few managers realize that the Pareto Principle lesson about their team indicates that 2 out of 10 of their team are producing 80% of your entire team's success. In addition, just about every management book talks about studies which compare the productivity of the most valuable workers to the not so skilled (yet still effective) workers. The difference between the extremes have been found to be as much as 100 to 1. The nearest these ratios ever seem to approach is about 4:1. But how much more does this extraordinary variance in value wind up costing?

Let's say that your yearly salary for the company's least skilled staff member is $30,000, how much does it cost for your most valuable staff? Since a lot of the costs for an employee stay the same, those costs don't go up in relation to base salary. For the intent of this examination, let's use some worst-case figures, $60k. Assuming that your $30k employee generates $30k of value (otherwise they'd be gone, right?). If your most valuable employee is a mere four times more productive than the worst, they deliver far more value for how much more they cost.

If you pays for more classes for your low-end people, costs immediately go up, but without any assurance that productivity will similarly go up. Consider, also, what part of your time is factored into the "cost" of this moderately competent employee? Probably none. Management costs are usually invisible, factored away as overhead. It certainly feels like you're being productive - trying your hardest to bring along the strugglers, hoping that they eventually rise above their shortcomings. Consider how much of your time is spent with either of these employees:

The self-managing dynamo who, with speed of a bullet train, handles customer complaints, delivers defect-free results, and even cleans up after himself in the break room

The new guy who has a few interpersonal problems, occasional quality issues, difficulty listening to reason, and shows up late on Mondays because of the occasional hangover

Apparently your most valuable performers are worth the effort. As such, it's incredibly important for every entrepreneur to keep their best, as this group of your greatest makes up the bulk of your team's value. Their experience with your unique systems combined with their talents and ability to get the job done in a pinch makes them nearly invaluable.

Now, what's the best way to show appreciation for your most valuable people? How do you indicate to those high performers that they're wanted, and boost the likelihood that they'll be there for you when you need them again?

What's the best plan to keep your superstars?

Pay them cold, hard cash. If your $30k employee cranks out 100-hour weeks during the home stretch of a key project, most pure cash rewards would come in at a rate way under minimum wage. Simply rethink this alternative. This can be quite insulting, seen, instead, as a paltry offering to pay them off and ease a boss' guilty conscience. Regardless, after the IRS gets his chunk, the ultimate impact of this cash may end up being far less than it costs to give it out.

Pay for a training trip. Some folks might be happy to be rewarded with an opportunity to attending a training event in a new city expenses to the company. They may even try to spend the weekend before or after, at their expense, just to really benefit from this chance to get away for a bit. Watch out though, this could appear to your superstar that you found their performance less than desirable. They might assume that they need further classes to be deserving of the more desirable reward that they'll eventually get. If your worker is thin-skinned, they could get concerned that all of that extra work they exerted was a red flag to you that they were having a hard time. Offering an instructive incentive in this circumstance could be mistaken that this difficulty was apparent to you, and you are now taking corrective action.

Promote them. Though the draw of an impressive designation or tangible gains associated with a promotion may inspire some, more and more workers have come to recognize the hazards of the Peter Principle. They're afraid that their world will change drastically when they become team lead. Your powerful personnel probably enjoy their current job. That's why they're so gosh darn capable at it. Before considering a promotional reward, ensure that the new job honest takes advantage of the talents and skills of these talented folks, or you may end up having to replace them. If you think it's best to risk it, make sure your top performer understands that they can switch back if things don't work out with the newly promoted position.

Give more vacation time. Everybody wants time away from the office, right? However, if you offer this bonus to a very dedicated staffer who is so wholly immersed in their job that they have little else in their lives of work, they may not know what to do during all of this free time.

Do unto others as they would have done unto them.

You can see that there are quite a few mechanisms to reward your top. It's dangerously simplistic to offer all of your team members the same thing. It's especially easy to offer them something you'd like yourself.

These examinations reinforce an all-important process: communication. To summarize, ask your key people what they really would like. What award will allow them to truly feel respected? The experiences that causes a person to be an excellent account rep is very distinct than the life of a great administrative assistant. You may be surprised by the replies you are told. In fact, your employees may be surprised, as well, to discover that you are giving them a voice to determine the award for their hard work.

Do they want more money?

Do they want more challenging responsibilities?

Do they want some time away from work to appreciate their children?

Would they rather have more mentoring?

Do they merely want to be acknowledged at a company meeting?

What have they received previously that really made them feel good?

The results can vary notably for each person, depending upon their long-term goals, how their needs are currently being fulfilled within Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, and the current stressors in their life. Don't make the mistake of taking for granted that the answer you hear today will hold true throughout your key performer's career.

Ultimately, instead of hoping to reward your people the way you would like to be rewarded, break The Golden Rule, and invest your time actually appreciating their needs and wants. By involving them in choices that affect their lives so directly, you might unexpectedly take advantage of the Hawthorn Effect, and inspire your people by proving you care. You will probably find that you've developed a workplace that makes your high achievers more contented than they've ever been. As a result, they will uncover methods to push themselves to new levels of productivity, understanding that their efforts will turn into rewards that are truly meaningful to them. You may even earn their respect and commitment for a lifetime.

Article Source: ArticlesBusiness.net

Daiv Russell is a management consultant with Envision Engineering.

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