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The success of your company is largely determined by the quality of your talent. Hiring and retaining the right people for your business should be a top priority if you want to succeed in your field. Even with great vision and killer strategies, you won’t get very far without the right people in the right places doing the right things.
The best companies and organizations worldwide make sure they have the right people for the job, even before they come up with strategies. In their priority list, the who comes before the what. The future is completely unpredictable, recently proven by the global pandemic that brought everything to a halt.
Related: 10 Tips for Retaining Top Talent
When faced with chaos and uncertainty, the best strategy is to have a team of brilliant people who can easily adapt to any situation and thrive no matter what comes next. Yet most companies struggle to attract and retain top talent because they are not well equipped to do so.
The best way to attract and retain top talent is to create a culture and environment that appeal to them. Your employer brand can be flawless because people perceive your company and its values ​​positively. But ultimately, the culture and environment you create within the organization will keep your employees.
Related: 5 Companies Tell Us How They’re Retaining Their Best Talent
How to manage your team
With a well-functioning team of A and B players in your organization, the leaders’ lives are easier. Managing top talent is quite easy, as the employees are top performers in line with the company’s core values. You need to appreciate your team’s differences and know what to do for each category.
The A players are your star performers. They are ambitious, driven risk takers, who in most cases put their professional life above everything else and are always looking to move up the organization. Employers generally like this type of employee. However, they are likely looking for opportunities elsewhere, so make sure there is always room for growth within your organization.
Your B players are your solid, stable performers. They are aligned with your company’s core values ​​and most can be coached to A-level performance. Most companies don’t recognize their B players, even though they do most of the work. While they may not be as enthusiastic as the A players, they get the job done. These employees tend to stay put and typically carry company history. Be sure to challenge your B players through incentives such as promotions and pay increases to help them develop into A players.
C-players are underperforming employees who don’t align with the company’s core values. Ideally, they should be excluded during the interview process and should not enter the organization. If you have C players in your company, they need to be resolutely coached. It is in your best interest as well as theirs to set them free to pursue other opportunities that may suit them better.
Related: 10 Strategies for Hiring and Retaining New Employees
How to retain top talent?
The best way to retain top talent is to invest in coaching and training. Grow your team to reach its potential. If some of your team members aren’t performing well, go in and find out what’s going on. Are there bottlenecks among your employees?
Sometimes poor performance can be due to a skills gap or miscommunication. You could write off an employee as an underachiever, when in fact he doesn’t know how best to fulfill his role. Coaching and skills development can be helpful in this case to help the employee realize their potential. You can also switch them into a role for which they are better suited and in which they would perform better.
The roles played by each team member should be defined by responsibility, accountability and results. This will improve your team’s life as they have clear metrics to measure performance. In this way, they can keep each other in check and help improve their performance and productivity.
Look at all the roles that need to be played within your organization and then look at your team members, highlighting their strengths and weaknesses. This way, you can match the right people for the right roles and do activities that make your customers’ lives easier. This goes a long way in improving your brand image and customer loyalty.
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