5 steps towards better Employee Experience

IWD 2025:  WOMEN LEADERS AND SPEAKERS AT GROWTH FACULTY 

What Leaders Love About Patrick Lencioni's Team-Building Sessions

Employers are struggling to attract and retain talent. Some report 40-50% turnover in the last 12 months.

According to a recent McKinsey study 41% of workers are considering leaving their jobs in the next 3 to 6 months.

Managing Director and Founder of TalentCode HR Trudy McDonald told todays masterclass the key to retaining staff is **personalising** their experience of work.

_The least fair thing you can do is treat everyone the same._

Heres a summary of what participants learned at this valuable live virtual event, starting with her 3 recommended actions.

1. **Have different conversations with your people.** What do they value? What are their aspirations? Have your leaders and managers get to know them personally.

2. **Ask questions about their job** : What do you enjoy most about your role? What could we do differently to make this your dream job?

3. **Make sure your leaders and managers** are holding their people accountable. Setting goals and having check-ins helps with engagement and helps to create a high performance environment.

[ ****](https://thegrowthfaculty.ac-page.com/monograph-leadership2022)[ **Free Download** : 10 Leadership Qualities That Will Help Solve Challenges in 2022](https://thegrowthfaculty.ac-page.com/monograph-leadership2022)

3 actions to retain staff

Across the globe, people need to be re-engaged with their work. To future-proof your organisation, Trudy says to first consider the many factors at play.

- ******Job ads** have hit a record high, organisations are struggling to fill vacancies and retain talent.

- Covid and flexible work arrangements changed **mindsets** about what people want from work.

- This led to the great resignation, the great renegotiation, and **quiet quitting.**

- People are moving to **non-traditional roles** or taking sabbaticals.

- More people are taking up a tree change and **relocating** to rural areas.

- Well-above **market salaries** are being offered to attract talent.

Quiet quitting is where the 80% of people not engaged at work show up  but dont give their all. Trudy says shes heard how people feel they are on a treadmill and lacking purpose.

_Im feeling pretty exhausted Ive lost my motivation Im not sure how much longer I can do this._

Why are companies losing staff?

Trudy said she asked an early career doctor what factors would entice her to move jobs \(e.g. to a regional hospital\).

She said:

_I dont want to work where Im made to feel guilty if Im asking to be paid for my overtime. I dont want to go to the executives and have to beg. I also want to feel like I can be a person, like I can leave the office and go down to the bank if I need to._

McKinsey research shows that **remuneration** is the number one reason that people stay or leave their job. **Flexibility, meaningfulness of work** \(purpose\) and **development and advancement** are also key drivers.

Factors driving employee attrition and retention

If people perceive that theyre paid **fairly** we can take money off the table, says Trudy.

How people create their perception of fairness:

- **How much am I paid today vs what I could earn elsewhere.** Its important for leaders to do salary benchmarking. Most of us are bombarded with job offers and sky-high salaries we can earn  these big figures are not necessarily the norm.

- **They will look at internal equity**. People will compare salaries, especially if they perceive they are working harder than others in the same organisation. Trudy: We need to behave as if everyones salaries have been left on the printer.

- **For how hard Im working, do I feel Im being paid enough?** This may be total hours worked but could also be a bad manager \(i.e. _Im not being paid enough to put up with this_ \).

**Takeaways** :

When talking about remuneration, emphasise the fairness, not just the amount. If you can afford to pay above market average  sing it from the rooftops. When things get tough those whove thrown money around will find it difficult so ideally set pay at market average or just over market average.

Money

Individuals want to work for an organisation **going somewhere** and what that means for them, Trudy told Growth Facultys masterclass.

Have you dusted off that **strategic plan**? Have you refreshed it and engaged with your team members on **where the organisation is going** and what it means for them?

- Why are we getting on the bus? \(purpose\)

- Where are we going \(BHAG/Vision\) What does this mean for me?

- What is the first stop? \(1HAG\)

- What is the next stop? \(3HAG\)

See our blogs on BHAG and _3HAG Way_ : [**7-STEP STRATEGY FRAMEWORK FOR GROWTH IN 2022**](https://www.thegrowthfaculty.com/blog/stepsforsuccessfulgrowth) **** and [**WHY YOU NEED A 3HAG TO REACH YOUR JIM COLLINS BHAG**](https://www.thegrowthfaculty.com/blog/Whyyouneeda3HAGtoreachyourJimCollinsBHAG) **.**

Purpose

Trudy says flexibility is no longer a point of difference and its now the norm for organisations.

Companies are now experimenting with new ways of working.

For example, from next week Unilever will test a **four-day working week** for its 500 workers in Australia. The trial will run for 12 months, and workers will retain 100% of their pay but reduce their hours to 80% provided they maintain **100% productivity**.

According to Trudy. Unilever's meeting time will reduce by 3.5 hours per week, and teams will leverage technology in a more efficient way for communications.

She told the masterclass that research by UTS in NZ has found the four-day working week results in 34% fewer sick days, **stress reduced by 33%** , work/life conflicts reduced by 67%, and feelings of strength and vigour increased by 15%.

Meanwhile, she says a different evaluation of a six-month pilot programme on a four-day working week for UK organisations found that:

- 88% said the shorter working week was **working well**

- 46% said productivity had **stayed the same**

- 34% said productivity had **improved** slightly

- 15% said productivity had **improved significantly**

Trudy says the shorter working week is one you could try, but its not necessarily right for every organisation. Thats why you need to establish guardrails.

Flexibility

Guardrails arre guiding principles that leaders and teams can use to make decisions about ways of working:

- **Does it work for the organisation?** Can you be available for our external and internal customers?

- **Does it work for the team?** How are we going to communicate, innovate, build each others knowledge?

- **Does it work for the individual?** Whats the impact here of this on my team?

Trudy says you then have an opportunity to test it. Lets test it out and review every 3 months

How do you know its working? Define success as a combination of outcomes and behaviours \(not are you visible and how many hours are you working\). Then you have the criteria to say, youre not delivering on the outcomes, or these behaviours are not right.

What works for everyone

High performers prefer to work in a [high-accountability](https://www.thegrowthfaculty.com/blog/leadershipemployeeengagement) organisation.

A lot of companies are changing from a manager-employee accountability model, to one of **transparency**. A transparent workplace is one that promotes trust.

With trust comes vulnerability and with vulnerability comes accountability. Everyone knows what the required outcomes of the team are and **where everyone is tracking** on their tasks.

Trudy says transparency and team accountability is scalable.

Trust and accountability

Microsofts Work Trends Index 2022 found **62% of Australian employees were experiencing burnout** , compared with the global average of 48%.

No wonder leaders are met with exhaustion when they say Okay lets go again\! We need to remobilise\!

Trudy says we need to **stop, pause,** and **do a reset.**

Acknowledge theyre working hard and that in the new year you will do a reset, she suggests. It will give them hope. Otherwise, they will look for greener pastures elsewhere.

Offering hope to retain exhausted staff

Go into next year and wipe all calendar clean and start with a clean slate. Could we achieve the outcomes in a different way?

To do a reset:

- Do we have role clarity and clear measures of success?

- Where is there waste/where are there inefficiencies?

Role Clarity

- How do we hold each other accountable?

- How do we give and receive feedback?

Accountability

- Do our meetings have a clear purpose, agenda, and outcome?

- Who attends our meetings? How long do they last?

Meetings

- How can we promote dialogue and debate?

- How do we make decisions?

Decision making

A high performing environment is a balance of **challenge and support**. Its supportive but not too comfortable, challenging but not too critical and stressful, and, above all, it should not be meaningless.

Trudy says that employees highly value the support. However, since Covid-19 organisations have carried over the huge amounts of support they offer, but **get complaints** if they try to lift the challenge aspect of the job.

She says It comes back to the reset.

Redefine from January what it needs to be a high performance environment \(with the teams involved\).

Part of the plan is creating a [psychologically safe workplace](https://www.thegrowthfaculty.com/blog/psychologicalsafetyedmondsonfearlessworkplace).

Mental health and wellbeing

And last, but not least, a proven non-financial reward is recognising people through **appreciation**. This is not about simply giving people praise, its **constructive positive feedback** , and **constructive developmental feedback**.

Trudy says companies should upskill leaders and managers on how to offer constructive feedback.

Constructive developmental feedback

- **Situation**  what happened, anchored in time and place. Be specific.

- **Behaviour**  what did you actually do  the observable action.

- **Impact**  on you, others, task or the organisation.

See also our blog: [5 BIGGEST RECRUITMENT CHALLENGES IN 2023 AND HOW TO OVERCOME THEM](https://www.thegrowthfaculty.com/blog/recruitmentchallenges)

S.B.I. method:

With our [_Growth Faculty Pass_](https://join.thegrowthfaculty.com/growthfacultypass/) , youll learn from the best leadership minds in the world to help you overcome some of the biggest challenges arising in a changing workforce. Get exclusive access to weekly live, interactive and virtual masterclasses to discover how the best leaders are achieving results.

Our authors and speakers include Jim Collins, Liz Wiseman, Stephen Covey, Whitney Johnson and more.

Retention masterclass: Study shows 41% consider leaving their jobs

Founder of TalentCode HR Trudy McDonald on proven factors in retention

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Stay Inspired

Retention masterclass: Study shows 41% consider leaving their jobs

Founder of TalentCode HR Trudy McDonald on proven factors in retention

Keep informedStay Inspired

Keep informed
Stay Inspired