Employers are coming to the realization that good talent takes more than just a good salary and the benefits package the role comes with; that employees are willing to even take a lesser pay and benefits package in exchange for a conducive work environment.
Talented candidates are becoming picky, they are looking for a workplace that will not only enable them to deliver but also provide that feeling of family unity up and above the pay and benefits package. Good candidates will freely table their notice to terminate their contracts within the first few days at work if they realize the culture is not what they are looking for, if they do not get the right organizational culture.
Gone are the days when employers had the edge on retaining great talents, gone are the days when salaries and benefits packages retained employees. The dynamics have changed, employees who know their worth are willing to walk out at any time.
If there is anything the Covid-19 pandemic taught us, that must be the fact that employees no longer fear losing their jobs and starting afresh. They actually do not fear, especially the extremely talented ones who know their worth will not entertain a bad workplace culture. They will quit and after a few days/weeks you will be surprised to see their LinkedIn profiles updated with the notorious magic line '... I am happy to announce that I have joined company A and will be taking up the role of a . . . '
But what is great workplace culture?
First, let us understand that workplace culture is what your workplace truly is; from how you conduct recruitment and onboarding, how you communicate, the policies and procedures available, the type of leaders available, and the reward system to the core values and how they are lived within the organization.
Good workplace culture starts with creating a respectful work environment, that is conducive to operation, that has the leadership living through the core values, that promotes all efforts, builds her workforce, and has an effective reward system. A place where one will happily wake up every single morning.
Picture this, we spend 80% of our active time in the workplace. Now imagine the workplace is toxic, disrespectful, has leaders full of egos, promotes classism, and has stiff policies with zero thoughts on culture. Is this a place you would love to wake up to every single morning? Such a workplace is a breeding ground for mental health issues - avoid it if you can.
Sadly though, avoiding such a place if it is the only source of income for an employee and his family is difficult. The employee is kinda trapped in a toxic place with no escape route. How would one perform best in such a toxic place? How would they grow their careers? Why wouldn't such a place give you mental health issues and some chronic diseases such as high blood pressure and ulcers?
This then explains why good talents will avoid such a workplace despite the goodies the roles come with, no one is ready to waste their career in a toxic work environment and develop mental issues in exchange for a supposed good salary and benefits, absolutely not when they have a choice.
This explains the reason why candidates will spend their first few days at work to learn about your culture and determine whether it's worth their talent.
I remember this time I had just finished a recruitment process for a new hire to join the leadership team. The candidate spent only three days at work, on the fourth day, called in sick, on the fifth day sent a notice to terminate their contract. Later on I came to learn their had gone back to their previous employer, when I sort for feedback, the answer was simple "you offer a good package, but the three days I spent at your place were enough to warn me on what I was getting myself into"
What do you do to attract good talent when you know your workplace culture is not the best?
I believe you need to hire a workplace culture champion. This role will be charged with the responsibility of creating a conducive work environment through constant reviewing of policies to ensure they are reflective of the current workplace dynamics, coming up with initiatives to promote that culture you want to create and be known for, come up with reward system for culture champs amongst others. This will be the go to person incase a new hire would like to understand what your culture is and how it supports the role you are recruiting.
As the management you may also want to ask yourself whether within the workforce there are some bad apples that need to be transitioned out to enable the role of the workplace culture champion to be more effective.
Also let the new hire know there is an opportunity to help you build a model workplace culture. They could join a culture committee or something like that. If you let candidates know that you have a gap, that you strongly believe they could help fix, believe you me, that weakness maybe the magic to attract, hire and retain great talent as opposed to losing on them.
My point is, workplace culture is the backbone of any successful organization. Don't forget, you can have all the strategies in the world, you can have all the best talents in the world, you can have all the resource you need but if you don't have the right culture you are as good as a game of football without match officials - chaos.
And as Richard Branson would say; there is no magic formula for a great company culture. The key is to treat the staff how you would like to be treated.
Thank you so much for reading through - may hope is the article gives you some insights into the role of workplace culture in attracting, hiring and retaining good talent for the good of the organization.
Do you have any thought on this? Please share them on the comment section below.
Spot on, Peter.
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