-Retention starts with hiring people with strong skills match, company fit and job match.
-Diligence in the hiring process is critical.
-Many businesses view the hiring process as a "necessary evil" and fail to pay anywhere near enough attention to it....it should be viewed as an opportunity.
-In order to be truly diligent in hiring good people, several things should occur:
1. Should be willing to take the time to carefully seek out and screen potential employees.
2. Should be willing to be patient and not hire the first "body" that comes along.
3. Should be willing to be objective and not let biases influence you to any great extent.
Remember that you want to hire top performers....someone who will consistently meet or exceed reasonable, yet demanding expectations.
Here are some things that will help you maximize your chances of hiring the best people:

1. Be patient....remember that you are almost always better off with a vacant position than you are with a marginal to poor performer filling it.


2. Develop a complete and accurate job description for all of your positions that detail all duties and tasks.


3. Develop a profile for each position....this profile should focus on skills, personality traits, interests and background.


4. Utilize assessment tools to measure things like work ethic and integrity as well as learning ability, interests and personality traits and to predict the degree to which a candidate will match the job being hired into.

5. Spend a little extra time and money to attract as many good candidates as possible.

6. When you don't have open positions, you should be prospecting for good people by keeping your eyes open in town who appear to possess the kinds of skills you are looking for.


7. Develop interview questions prior to interviewing geared toward core competencies required to do the job.


8. Have others interview the candidates whenever possible to get various perspectives.


9. Conduct second interviews to get another look at candidates you are interested in....did they just have a good day the first time?

-What are the critical skills that are required to perform each of the jobs in your business?
-It is important to understand what skills you are looking for in your candidates: Are interpersonal skills critical for example? How about sound math skills? Or working under pressure?
-Inventory, so to speak, the skills critical to performing each job within your business.
-These critical skills are sometimes called core competencies....put another way, what core competencies should you look for when hiring for each of your positions?
-Once you have identified these core competencies for each position, you are then prepared to "customize" your interviews toward uncovering whether the individual has these core competencies.

Note: your employee training should be keyed to strengthening core competencies required to perform at high levels.

-Develop interview questions around the critical skills/core competencies by looking for behaviors that that reflect the core competencies.
-For example, if the ability to calm an angry customer is a skill you are seeking, a question such as "Without naming names, tell me about a situation where you have had to calm an angry person and describe how you went about it."
-What you will be looking for are specific behaviors that will give you some indication that the individual is capable of dealing with issues and tasks that are important to the job.
-Develop and use the same interview questions for each candidate applying for a given position.
-Consistency in the hiring process will help you compare "apples to apples". A structured interview helps provide consistency and, if structured properly, will yield sound information about the applicant's skills
-Bear in mind that you are looking for someone with excellent skills and personal qualities...not necessarily someone who has experience in your industry.
-A person with sound skills and personal qualities can almost always be trained to do the job.
-A person who has experience, but lacks the necessary skills and personal qualities will probably understand the industry and have good product knowledge, but might lack people skills, for example, or some other critical skill.
-Pre-employment assessments and skills tests can dramatically improve the quality of individual hired.
-Job fit/match can best be determined by using assessments....a good assessment tool will indicate the degree to which a candidate is able to do the job.
-We can't stress enough the importance of your businesses' reputation as a key element in attracting the kind of people you need working for you.
-Do you know how your business is perceived in the community?
-How many people want to work for an organization that appears to be poorly managed, has poorly maintained facilities, is unfriendly and offers wages at or near the bottom of the local wage structure?...not many and they will be reluctant to apply and employees will be very difficult to retain
-In terms of wages, try to be a leader in your market....think about the cost of paying a little more versus the cost of turnover
-Don't be afraid to be creative or aggressive in offering incentives:
Shift premiums
Profit sharing
Longevity bonuses
Holiday bonuses
Signing bonuses
Etc.
-What is your "style" ?
-A manager's/supervisor's style plays a major role in an employee's level of morale and productivity and ultimately the retention of the employee
-Managers/supervisors who are able to hire good people, set clear expectations, train effectively, show concern for their employees, treat employees fairly and who have strong people skills will generally be much more effective in getting high levels of productivity and will retain good employees longer.