Fitting Employee Development Into Maslow’s Hierarchy Of Needs

Why meeting only basic employee needs is no longer enough

Like a bad breakup, workers are leaving their jobs in droves and letting employers know, “it’s not me, it’s you.” Ouch. It didn’t have to be this way. As we face the Great Resignation, HR leaders around the globe are forced to look internally at what their companies could do better to retain talent. One big disparity: investment, or lack thereof, is in career development.

Every HR leader or college grad has likely studied Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Russian-American Abraham Maslow penned his A Theory of Human Motivation in 1943 which describes the stages of growth in humans. The hierarchy of needs is typically shown as a pyramid. From the bottom of the hierarchy upwards, the needs are: physiological (food and clothing), safety (job security), love and belonging needs (friendship), esteem, and self-actualization. The idea is that needs lower down in the hierarchy must be satisfied before individuals can attend to needs higher up.

When applying the hierarchy of needs to a professional career, the base of the triangle would be the givens: a salary or wage and benefits. Once you go beyond that layer, it’s all about self-fulfillment and growth. Meeting just the bottom rung of needs is no longer enough. With nearly 10 million jobs available right now across the country, companies must stand out to help employees reach their self-fulfillment goals. If they don’t, people will leave for a company that will.

For this reason, investing in employee development isn’t a nice-to-have, it’s a necessity. According to Employee Benefit News, employers spend around 33 percent of a worker’s annual salary replacing an employee. To put that into perspective, they estimate that it will cost $12,000 to replace an entry-level employee making $36,000 a year, $20,000 to replace a manager making $60,000 a year, and about $50,000 to replace an executive making $150,000 a year. On the flip side, as of 2020, employers worldwide spent an average of $1,111 per worker on learning and development. That’s a slight drop from what was being spent the year previous. This means companies aren’t prioritizing this important piece of the employment puzzle.

Money talks, and it’s obvious that it makes good business sense to invest in current employees rather than replace them, especially at a time when jobs are plentiful, and workers are not. But beyond money, it’s the right thing to do. Nearly all companies are governed by a set of values, and most companies have some form of education or continuous learning as one of their core values. Few companies live up to it. If you want to keep your employees employed and satisfied, you need to walk the walk. Your commitment to learning must be more than lip service, providing both the opportunity and the support for employees to excel.

A commitment to development must start at the top with your leadership team. When leaders commit to career development, understand the value, and encourage teams to take advantage of opportunities, that’s where real growth begins. Ensure your leadership team is aware of the benefits of investing time and resources into valuable training, as well as the risks of turning a blind eye to development. Without this commitment, employees will never feel as though they have the support needed to take time away from deliverables to better themselves. Remind leadership that an investment in development benefits not just the person, but the team and company as well. It’s a win-win for all involved.

To ensure this accountability, add a personal goal to yearly performance reviews to which both leaders and employees must report progress. Tying this personal growth to a yearly review ensures it won’t be overlooked and will help the business in budgeting for needed personal development programs. Keep these goals top of mind for managers and encourage your teams to schedule times every month where they focus on their personal goals.

Bad breakups between employers and employees are bound to happen, but when you speak the love language of your team by showing a true commitment to their development, they’ll likely repay the business by bettering themselves and putting that growth back into the company. As with your personal relationships, remember that a little investment goes a long way in building a prosperous partnership that lasts.