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Employers of Choice - Why They Attract Employee Loyalty

Written by: Peter Nicholls

Article Overview: Far from business determining the future of the workforce, the workforce now determines the future of business. While earning money at work is still vital, commitment to one employer is not. People want more than money - they want employment that enables them to achieve their personal goals.

Employers of Choice - Why They Attract Employee Loyalty

One of the biggest decisions taken by western society businesses in the last twenty years or so has come back to bite them. I refer to the decision around 1990 that the cost of permanent staff was too high to sustain and, as much as possible, work should be out-sourced to contract or casual labour. The consequent widespread sacking of staff - especially in the middle management ranges - had a devastating impact on the workforce culture, including workers' dependants.
Loyalty - both ways - died almost overnight. The concept of long-term commitment to the one employer, rewarded with a retirement pension and the proverbial gold watch when they reached their 60's, became a thing of the past. Term contracts for specified objectives became the norm.
It didn't take long for the workers, including people new to the workforce, to find a positive response to this situation. If business doesn't want to be responsible for workers' careers, the workers were going to have to be responsible for their own. Workers became their own managers. They began to:
- develop and refine their transferable skills to maintain high employment prospects in a dynamic marketplace.
- choose jobs and employers that best suited their personal goals and enabled them to periodically adapt to changing needs,
- work for as many employers as they wished - consecutively or concurrently, for as long as suited their needs and offering the conditions they wanted.
The rest, as they say, is history. This new flexibility has suited the rapidly changing, stressful, pressurized 21st century lifestyle, offering many benefits to the employer, the employee, industry and society in general.
But business hadn't bargained on other cultural shifts that were going to greatly complicate the issue:
- an ageing workforce,
- a changing interest in life priorities by many 50+ baby boomer managers, and
- people who make up the emerging younger workforce no longer see work as the driver of life but more a passenger.
All of this has given rise to the emergence of the concept of the Employer of Choice offering a range of benefits over and above the money. Flexible working conditions, work/life balance - lovely in theory but difficult in practice - childcare / eldercare provisions and expanded maternity leave involving both the mother and the father are just some of the provisions that have surfaced since the 1990's.
The boot is therefore now on the other foot. Far from business determining the future of the workforce, the workforce now determines the future of business. The dollars that come from work continue to be of major importance but not so the commitment to any one employer. Workers want more than money - they want employment that enables them to achieve their personal dreams and goals.
Employers now find themselves in a struggle to attract, retain, nurture and sustain the best people. The struggle is heightened by the fact that such workers are not sitting at an employment agency, waiting for offers. They are already committed to working for their current employer of choice. Powerful incentives are needed to encourage them to move to another organization, one that is often in direct competition with their present employer. Dollars alone are not enough.
In seeking the best incentives, employers are slowly (I repeat, slowly) beginning to recognize that, to find out what will attract the right individual, they have to look outside their workplace environment. They need to look beyond the person's potential working capabilities and embrace the fact that staff are whole human beings, driven by their reasons for living, not just for working.
To add an interesting twist, the people who are trying to attract staff are themselves not impervious to these cultural changes. They too are increasingly reviewing their life goals and employment aims.
Business, globally, is discovering the need to harmonize its drive for economic success with the desire of its workers to achieve personal goals. It's a bit like satisfying customer demands - you don't need to know every individual person's unique needs but you do have to design your product knowing each buyer will have a personal reason in mind for buying it.
Employers of Choice understand that every employee, or potential employee :
- is on their own personal journey through life, only some of which is spent in the workplace
- has a unique set of life aims and objectives
- chooses workplace cultures that best help them achieve those goals, and
- sees work not as an end in itself but as a means to other ends.
Purchasers buy on emotions - selecting products or services that make them feel good about themselves. We are more likely to commit to employers who appeal to our emotions as much as, if not more than, our pockets. Organizations that cultivate this type of workplace culture are more likely to gain strong staff commitment, sustained high levels of work productivity, reduced long-term stress, improved workforce stability and the vital edge over their competitors.

Related Articles
  Negligent Hiring
  If you don’t take care of your employees… they won’t take care of your customers
  Engaged Employees Increase Bottom Line Performance
  Loyalty and Leadership - 8 Ways to Earn The Loyalty of Your Employees
  Flexible Work Arrangements: Why Should You Offer Them?

Article Tags: ageing, balance, goals, harmony, human resources, personal, potential



Related Forum Posts
Re: From Sales to Marketing - Loyalty, Glad to know a little about you. Yes, this forum holds quite a bit of useful information. We hope you will join into the conversations and get to know us. Welcome!
Post subject: It's Not Personal, just business - I so agree! Actually, the business world as we know it IS in trouble. I heard some stats last week that they expect by the time 2050 that 70% of workers will be freelancers. Employee/Executive Bullying won't be able to stand it when it could be easier for someone to simply contract with the nicer guy (or gal). I, for one, will be choosing the nicer ones!
2 Forums Updates - Many of you have been writing in suggesting that on my website and in my newsletter we include the link to the actual forum post and not just the name of the post and a link to the Forums home page. Well, after looking into it I'm pleased to announce that this feature is now available. Thank you everyone for the suggestions! We've also added names for members based on how much they post. Level one is Newbie, Level 2 is Intern, Level 3 is Employee and so on... There are 10 levels in total. I'm looking forward to seeing how everyone does! Keep the suggestions coming - they are great!
Re: Finding AND Keeping Good People - Employee retention or as you mention “Keeping the Good People” is one of the biggest challenges for any growing business. It takes a huge effort from the entrepreneur’s end. I can come up with the following when it comes to KEEPing the good people- 1. Motivation of the employees 2. Recognition of the needs of the employees 3. Activities to make the employees feel valuable towards the organization 4. Make benefits more accessible 5. Offer profit sharing incentives 6. Create clear career paths at the company 7. Consider telecommuting, job sharing and other flexible working arrangements 8. Incentives are essential and they don't have to be huge 9. Have other managers praise an employee's work 10. Be sensitive to the balance between work and private life
Re: Template of Service Agreement/Contractor Agreement - Shimmy- I, too, would be happy to share my template contract for a service provider. But beware, a template agreement may not be sufficient to properly address your needs. Some key differences between Employees and Service Providers: 1. Tax Status. Employers are responsible for withholding tax on employee's earnings. Independent Contractors are responsible for reporting their income/taxes. There is a significant reporting burden and liability associated with this. 2. Confidentiality/Intellectual Property. Often times, employee handbooks will specify an employees confidentiality obligations and many states impute a duty of loyalty. Contractors are under no such obligations absent a written agreement. Same thing for IP/Creative works. The copyright Act draws a sharp and significant distinction between employees and contractors when it comes to ownership of creative works. 3. Liability for tortious acts. Generally an employer is liable for the tortious acts of its employees under the theory of respondeat superior. An entity hiring a contractor may/may not be liable, but without a written agreement for the contractor to indemnify/defend the hiring entity, their may be little recourse against the contractor. There are many other subtle differences too numerous to mention. I hope you find this helpful.


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