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Why Training Plays a Critical Role in Hiring and Retention

Keeping employees from quitting their jobs after only a year or two is becoming a big challenge for many businesses across the country. Is it a problem for you?

“The New Reality of Employee Loyalty,” an article that Peter K. Murdock wrote for Forbes, suggests that to keep new employees, companies should discuss their career futures with them and have three-year development plans in place. “If you can’t see where your employee will be in three years within your organization, assume they will be working for someone else,” Murdock writes. And he is probably right.

And here is a secret for building employee loyalty . . .

Offer top-notch, comprehensive training for new employees

Why is training a secret for both hiring and keeping new hires? Here are some of the reasons we have seen.

  • Great training convinces new hires that you care about keeping them with you in the years ahead. If you demonstrate your willingness to invest in training employees, they realize that you believe in them and want them to be with you for the long term.
  • Great training sets your company apart from others. When job-hunters are given the choice of working for a company with a comprehensive training program and one that does not, they consistently decide to work for the company that does. It only makes sense.
  • A comprehensive onboarding program that brings in a wide variety of your new hires demonstrates that you are not a company that discriminates on the basis of background, religion, ethnicity, lifestyle or other factors. Your training program can be a vibrant and engaging experience that tells everyone, “This is a company where you belong.”
  • Training that teaches your company history and values increases the perceived worth of working for you. It shows that you are not only training people to perform specific tasks, but to join a company that stands for something. Note that videos that tell the history of your organization and that profile your leaders and customers are a low-cost way to create a compelling, value-added training experience that lays the foundation for employee satisfaction and long-term employment.

Another Way to Use Training to Encourage Retention . . .

As Peter K. Murdoch notes in his Forbes article, it is important to take the extra step of using training as a time to create long-term development plans for every new hire you bring on board. If you offer management training programs for employees, for example, talk about them. If you can identify certain hires for specific promotional tracks, talk about those opportunities during onboarding training. New retail salespeople can enter training programs to become future store managers, for example, and IT technicians can take additional training to join your team of digital marketers.

If you want your new employees to envision a bright future working for you, remember that training is the place to start.

About Evan Hackel

As author, speaker and entrepreneur, Evan Hackel has been instrumental in launching more than 20 businesses and has managed a portfolio of brands with systemwide sales of more than $5 billion. He is the creator of Ingaged Leadership, is author of the book Ingaging Leadership Meets the Younger Generation and is a thought leader in the fields of leadership and success.

Evan is the CEO of Ingage Consulting, Delta Payment Systems, and an advisor to Tortal Training. Reach Evan at ehackel@ingage.net, 781-820 7609 or visit www.evanhackelspeaks.com

 

 

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