Consider these 7 benefits of employee retention

Businesses with a high employee retention rate are more likely to earn a reputation as a great place to work. They also are better able to focus on growing the business and developing employees instead of finding and training replacements.   

While organizations can expect some employee turnover, employee retention is important for many reasons. Consider these seven benefits of employee retention.

1. Improved productivity: It usually takes a new employee a year or two to build relationships and productivity. Often, seasoned employees have to bring new employees up to speed, which takes them away from their usual productivity. And when employees have to cover for employees who quit or frequently train others, it can lead to burnout, frustration, lower quality work and lower morale.  

2. Reduced cost: Consider all of the costs of advertising for new employees, from interviewing and onboarding to training and development. Expenses add up. High turnover is associated with loss of productivity, customer service issues, impact on company culture and lower engagement. All of these can contribute to rising costs on top of finding and training new hires. Retaining employees reduces or eliminates these costs. With increased productivity and quality of work from long-term employees, your business can become more profitable.

3. Improve morale and team cohesion: Higher employee retention boosts employee morale and builds team cohesion. It takes time to build a team and coalesce team synergy into something beneficial. Retaining employees makes this more likely, enabling greater connectedness and generating positive synergy.

4. More skilled employees: Higher retention rates mean your employees can become more skilled. After all, this development and institutional knowledge take time to learn, develop, and perfect. Skilled employees are crucial to succession planning and solving complex problems. Trained team members can help mentor other employees to improve your organization’s overall quality of work.

5. Reduced training time and costs: With higher employee retention, you can invest time and resources to help your veteran employees learn new skills and improve their existing ones. Professional development has long-term benefits to growing your business.

6. Better customer experience: Newly hired employees aren’t as knowledgeable as seasoned employees, and customers are likely to notice. Experienced employees develop relationships with customers, and they can be part of why customers keep coming back. With more experience and deeper organizational knowledge, veteran employees are often more capable and confident when solving unique or complex customer issues.  

7. Improved employee engagement: It takes time for new hires to become fully engaged with the company. Long-term employees are more likely to be more loyal to the company and more engaged. Employee engagement is the outcome of employees who bring their best to work every day, feel committed, and want to refer your company to others. 

Bob Helbig is media partnerships director at Energage, a Philadelphia-based employee survey firm. Energage is The Washington Post’s partner for Top Workplaces.