You’ve gone through the hassle of hiring a new employee. You’ve reviewed overwhelming stacks of resumes, conducted countless interviews (most of them a complete waste of time), and made a final decision. You’ve invested time and energy training this person, developing them to the point where they can finally begin to free you up…
…and then they quit.
Why does this happen? And no, it’s not any of the reasons your employee tries to convince you of: it’s not that the job is a poor fit; it’s not that they’re unqualified for the position; it’s not because their spouse or their kid or their dog needs more attention. Why does this really happen?
Let us share a brief anecdote that perfectly explains why you’re losing great employees. We hired Beth as the key assistant to our lead entrepreneur. She started while the entrepreneur was on vacation, as that gave us a week to train her on the client management system and prepare her to hit the ground running upon his return. We expected that, when he returned from vacation, Beth would be up and running and in a position from which she could actually support him.
Beth was fantastic. She was a fast learner with a positive attitude. But the day after the entrepreneur returned from vacation, she quit. “I just can’t work with him,” she explained. “He’s nice, but I have no idea what he is saying, what he wants…I just can’t keep up!” This is what so many great employees try to say, but don’t. Fortunately, Beth’s honesty allowed us to stop and restart her training experience, and gave us the opportunity to revisit two important secrets to employee development and retention.
Secret #1: Kolbe
If you’ve used Kolbe, you love Kolbe. It’s a fun exercise that helps people understand how they operate. However, a valuable use for Kolbe is oftentimes overlooked: it can help team members understand where their (and each other’s) point of overwhelm and shut down is, thus preventing unrealistic expectations and miscommunication amongst teams. We would safely estimate that 99% of office communication problems are because of a lack of awareness in Kolbe.
Secret #2: The Gap® (The Strategic Coach® Concept)
The Gap® is a concept by the Strategic Coach® that explains how we, as individuals, become stressed out or discouraged…stuck in the gap between where we are, and where we want to be. When you’re on-boarding a new employee, it’s important for them to understand that it’s completely normal to be discouraged and overwhelmed by the learning process that lies ahead of them. The Gap® also provides specific strategies to help new employees along their journey, such as training plans with explicit target dates, etc. This is an effective tool for keeping new employees on track while reducing the amount of overwhelm they feel along the way.
In our years of experience helping boutique law firms and small businesses find, recruit and hire top-notch talent, we’ve found these two concepts to be crucial. Our Smart Hire Solution™ process leverages the power of Kolbe, encouraging all team members and leaders to review each other’s Kolbe and determine what it means for each person, in each role.
The hiring process is time-consuming, energy-draining, and expensive…especially just to have your new hire quit on you! Implementing one of both of these employee retention secrets can help prevent this from happening, and ensure a more seamless on-boarding process.
If you’d like to talk to us about any problems your company or firm is experiencing through its hiring and training processes, we encourage you to schedule a complimentary 30-minute discovery session with one of our lead management consultants.
