How to Recruit & Retain Staff who will help you Achieve your Purpose

Your people are your most precious commodity, whether they are leaders, administrators, technicians, sales or production staff.

Staff turnover in many sectors is at it’s highest rate ever with employees feeling little or no sense of loyalty to employers and moving on in search of something more satisfying or lucrative. Yet there are organisations who are bucking that trend, reducing the rate of staff turnover and increasing employee recommendation of the company as a good place to work.  In the UK the Virgin brand lead by Richard Branson places staff satisfaction and retention high on their list of priorities.

When Virgin acquired Northern Rock and created Virgin Money, only 28% of Northern Rock employees recommended it as a place to work. After 12 months under the Virgin brand that figure rose to 73% with largely the same group of individuals and staff turnover fell from 11% to 7%. In 2013 HR Virgin Money were awarded HR Team of the year in the Personnel Today awards based on a change program that empowered and inspired the workforce to get behind the new company.

The Virgin way
Virgin have taken the time to discover the characteristics that capture the essence of their brand and embed the resulting set of values across all it’s companies. A look at their recruitment page finds terms such as ‘Insatiable curiosity‘, ‘smart disruption‘, ‘heartfelt service‘ and ‘delightfully surprising‘ are used to attract only those employees who are a good fit for the brand.

In addition to embedding such values, Virgin also work hard to include staff and give them some ownership of major decisions.  As part of the change process from Northern Rock to Virgin Money they made sure that communications were 2-way using Town Hall meetings, negotiations with employee forum and a helpline.

The ‘new generation leadership’ approach taken by Virgin and other forward-thinking companies is substantially more appropriate to younger employees, known as Generation Y individuals, or Millennials – our future leaders.  Gen Y employees have a reputation as being fickle individuals who are looking for more than just a job. They were brought up being encouraged to question everything, many placing purpose very high on their priority list.  They want to find a career that is in line with their own values and that will help them move towards discovering and living their own purpose.

A rigid control and command environment where everyone does what they are told because the boss says so is not the place to nurture or retain emplolyees from this generation.

Start with Who and Why

New generation leaders who want to create sustainable companies with a loyal staff-base should think about following Virgin’s example and looking at their brand from inside to out.  Your Brand Essence is a unique combination of the ‘who’ – the personality that drives the style of business, and the ‘why’ the big-picture purpose of the company.  Your Brand essence is at the centre of everything you do and underpins the core messages behind marketing, recruitment and customer engagement.

What is the essence of your brand?

What are the core values of your brand that will attract like-mined employees?

What are the inherent characteristics of your brand that differentiate you from competitiors

When you start with your  ‘who’ and ‘why’, or Brand Essence, you can recruit staff and leaders who are in alignment with your brand values and are far more likely to stay with the company for longer, doing whatever is necessary to help the brand achieve it’s purpose and goals.