Attraction and retention
"To attract and retain the people they need, employers must find ways to 'customise' employment offers."
2006/07 Hewitt Best Employers in Australia and New Zealand Study
Fortune magazine’s annual ranking of the Best 100 Companies to Work For in the US shows that healthcare benefits, work-life balance and perks are important to companies that want to keep employees happy and attract new talent. At the same time, wellness programmes can mitigate the risks of an ageing workforce.1
Ensure your business maximises the value of money spent on recruitment, training, and development by keeping a firm lid on staff turnover. A carefully-designed health and wellness programme provides a solid reason for existing employees to stay where they are. And when you do need to recruit, it can help to make your workplace attractive to the best candidates.
Tactics for a skills-scarce employment market
The most successful organisations are those focused on creating a value proposition that attracts, retains and develops productive people.
A Southern Cross health and wellness solution can help differentiate your company in the job market.
The "laws of attraction"
In the search for skilled applicants, you’re not just competing with other New Zealand businesses, you’re competing with the overseas job market.
There is a shortage of skilled workers in New Zealand. Of New Zealanders departing long-term to other countries, 50% were highly skilled, 23% skilled and 26% semi-skilled or elementary.2
Employee benefits are one of the main reasons why employees stay with an organisation.3
Over the next 12 months, many organisations will make the decision to look towards alternative incentives to both attract and retain talent.3
Excessive work hours, lack of work/life balance and fears about job loss are the foremost sources of stress that are having an impact on organisations today.4
Professional recruiters agree that employers who are better at meeting the needs of employees will always do better in the battle for talent. Consequently, organisations need to communicate what makes them different as an employer, and to deliver on that promise.
Top employers...
- Show they care about their people
- Encourage two-way communication between staff and management
- Support a culture of work/life balance
- Have good staff retention5
The rules of retention
- The cost of hiring and training a new employee can vary from 30% to 200% percent of annual compensation.6
- When selecting employee benefits, employers have to consider the needs of every generation – Gen Y, Gen X and ageing baby boomers.
- From day one, employees will compare their expectations with reality and those who quickly gain a high opinion of their employer will want to stay.
- The cost of providing a fully subsidised health plan for your company can be as little as 1% of your annual payroll.7
Hanging onto Generation Y
Research reveals that Generation Y (people born after the mid 1970s) employees are primarily motivated by career development and would sacrifice loyalty to a current employer to achieve it. Improved annual leave and subsidised health benefits should therefore be considered if employers are looking to retain Generation Y employees.8
Sources:
1. Working towards wellness, World Economic Forum, 2007
2. NZ Herald Saturday Sep 13, 2008
3. Randstad 2009 Employment Trends Report
4. The Health and Productivity Advantage, NBGH/Watson Wyatt North American 2009/2010 Staying@Work report, Nov 2009
5. Candidate Buying Behaviour: An Exploration into the Key Motivators of Today’s Job Seeker, Hudson 20:20 Series, 2008.
6. American Management Association http://www.careerseminar.com/ror/index.html, accessed May 1 2010
7. Based on actual premium costs of the Southern Cross Wellbeing One plan for a 41 year old as at 1 March 2009, calculated as a percentage of the average NZ salary of $45,000.
8. 2008 Survey of Employee Satisfaction and Motivation in New Zealand, Seek Limited, 2008