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by Eric Wise.
Original Post: How To :: Keep Your Best Talent
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I've spoken previously about interviewing developers from an employer
perspective, interviewing from a potential employee perspective, and
signs that developers are worth their salt. Now I figure it's
time to talk about the developers in your organization that you
actually want to keep. I've seen some companies do some pretty
boneheaded things that offend and otherwise drive their best talent
away and then they're mystified at why this has happened.
Sometimes Nothing is Better Than Something
The only thing more offensive than getting no bonus or salary increase
is getting one that is so insignificant compared to your
accomplishments that it feels more like a "slap in the face" rather
than the reward it was intended to be.
For example, a worker I know who works in the utilities industry came
up with a new way of performing routine maintanence on some equipment
that when down for maintenance costed tens of thousands of dollars a
day. The maintenance being performed is highly complex and
usually lasts 45+ days. This new procedure ended up cutting 15
days off the average maintenance, a savings of $150,000 every time this
maintenance had to be performed. Surely, the boss was pleased and
wanted to reward this innovation from an employee. Upon coming
into work the next week the employee was presented with a $20 gift
certificate... to subway...
Now being that this worker has family of 5, that probably won't even
cover a family meal at Subway. The point is though, when a worker
knows they've saved or made a company big bucks, a reward like the one
in this story is pretty much a slap in the face.
Keep Your Eye on the Market
This is more applicable to your junior and midlevel developers.
(A good midlevel developer seems to be worth their weight in gold these
days, but that's another story for another day)
There is a magic % inside most employees. The % represents the
amount of salary increase it would take to make them change jobs even
if they were otherwise satisfied with their position. Case in
point, an employer I know got started in the IT business soon after the
dot com crash when salaries were the lowest they've been in a long
time. They have a fairly talented IT staff and they've been
pretty good to them as far as most companies go except in one regard:
they embraced the standard 3-5% annual salary increase.
The market in the area has recovered and started to boom. With
something of a worker shortage in the area, salaries and benefits being
offered by competitors are increasing much faster than the standard
3-5% salary increase. Instead of reacting to the market quickly,
the company has stuck with their salary structure and now the end
result is most of the mid and senior level people are underpaid by
20%+.
The first symptom is that new hiring has become difficult for the
company. Frequently, they've made offers to workers who have
rejected them having received better offers elsewhere. Consider
this to be warning sign #1. The second warning sign was when a
few employees resigned citing better offers from other companies.
At this point, a wise executive who wants to keep their workers needs
to take a serious look at the market rate and the compensation being
paid to developers. Instead of moving quickly in this direction,
the company continued to sit on their hands and now suddenly there
seems to be a mass exodus from their staff. They've lost over two
thirds of their mid level talent now, which has a huge productivity and
opportunity cost for the time and effort it will take to replace
them. In the worst case, they'll panic and just "import bodies"
and bring in unqualified workers which will cause even more damage in
the long term.
It's Not All About Money You Know
Yes, those of you on a tight budget are thinking "How can I afford to
keep up with these large companies like Google buying everyone
up!?". Fact of the matter is, you can't. Nearly everyone
has a price. But what your goal should be is to keep your workers
satisfied. A happy worker is going to require a much higher
benefit in leaving than one who is disatisfied. This is just
common sense.
There are many intangible benefits you can implement to increase employee satisfaction without costing you a dime.
Praise your workers- It's amazing how many management types
forget to say "good job". Compliments are cheap, take no time at
all, and make a world of difference to a lot of people. Being
grateful and appreciative to your staff (but sincere) is a fast way to
build loyalty.
Institute worker friendly policies- FlexTime is a great
one. Casual dress when it's appropriate. CompTime if your
employees go above and beyond the call of duty and work excessive hours
for a period of time.
Small ways to say thank you- There are lots of inexpensive ways
to say thank you. Take your staff out to a nice lunch! For
a team of 10 this will cost less than $200, and the benefits to morale
and loyalty far outweigh the cost.
Pimp out the workspace- Equipment is a business expense.
Business expenses are tax deductable. Push for that extra money
in the budget to furnish dual monitors. Give employees a
semi-private work area free of noise and distractions. This is
especially effective with geeks, give them geek toys to play
with. I know a company that furnished iPods to all its IT workers
so they could listen to music while they worked. An iPod costs
less than $200 and wow what a morale boost!
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