With employee engagement and staff retention continuing to challenge many employers, the stay interview is becoming a permanent part of the HR toolbox
There’s no end in sight, really, for the new challenges employers have been facing when it comes to staff retention. For some employers, this has prompted introspection ― what are they doing right, and what are they doing wrong? And to answer those questions, some are turning to “stay interviews” with employees to figure it out.
A stay interview isn’t an exit interview conducted with an employee who’s already on their way out. Rather, it’s an interview that takes place while the employee is working, with the explicit goal of figuring out how an employee is doing and, crucially, what kinds of things would make them stay at the organization, explains Canadian Business.
“By understanding what matters to people ― both personally and professionally ― employers can take efforts to retain workers,” added Candy Ho in The Globe and Mail. “Amid concerns of a recession, and with the cost of replacing an individual employee ranging from half to two times their annual salary, overlooking retention would be a costly mistake.”
Stay interviews can seem a little formal and formulaic, but many organizations that have adopted the practice have found positive results. The Ottawa Humane Society were asked about it and said they were “stunned” by what they learned; before they even completed a full round of interviews they had formalized the practice as part of their long-term planning.
According to companies finding success with stay interviews, the most important element of the process is preparing to be open to the kind of honest feedback the interview is designed to elicit: “If you ask people their opinion and nothing ever changes,” said Heather Wright of the BC Maritime Employers Association, “it’s a waste of everybody’s time.”
Content written by Kieran Delamont for Worklife, a partnership between Ahria Consulting and London Inc. To view this content in newsletter form, click here.