How to retain your employees

Staff walking away is a big problem for employers, especially now that there is a huge staff shortage. Find out how to keep staff attached to your business.

1. Offer attractive employment conditions  

The key to employee engagement and loyalty is good primary employment conditions. Pay your employees a salary package tailored to their needs, offer flexible rewards for outstanding results or let employees choose working hours and a leave balance that suits their family situation.

You can stand out from other employers by offering flexible secondary employment conditions. Examples include a good pension, a travel expense allowance, a year-end bonus. But you can also think about exchanging holidays. With good fringe benefits, you ensure higher employee engagement.

2. Offer a contract sooner  

Satisfied with a new staff member? Consider offering them a permanent contract sooner. Doing so is a token of appreciation and offers job security. The introduction of the Balance Employment Market Act (WAB, in Dutch) has made it more attractive for employers to offer permanent contracts. The aim of the act is to strike a better balance between permanent and flexible staff.  

3. Consider green and social employment conditions

The annual survey by pension provider BeFrank shows that almost half of employees consider sustainable employment conditions important. 3 in 10 employees want their pension money to be invested sustainably. Or, for example, offer extra holidays when your employees go on holiday by bike or train. Or offer a company e-bike. A number of financial schemes make company bikes advantageous. As an employer, you can also help your employee make their home more sustainable. This can be done with tax benefits through the work-related costs scheme.

4. Offer retraining or up-skilling opportunities  

Offer your employees relevant online training courses or webinars. This will increase engagement. Draw up a personal development plan together and record agreements in it. As an employer, you can offer untaxed compensation for study or development costs for employees. When filing your tax return, you deduct these costs from company profits. The payroll tax handbook (in Dutch) explains how this works.

5. Offer good homeworking facilities

Arrange a good home office for your employees and reduce the risk of physical strain or illness. The easiest way is to give employees a monitor, keyboard, mouse, and chair from the office, for example.

6. Arrange a coach

Provide (career) coaches that employees can talk to if they encounter problems or want to explore development opportunities. The job coach scheme helps with long-term sick or disabled employees or with a trial placement.

7. Focus on job satisfaction

Motivation comes not only from money, but also from job satisfaction. You can achieve this in several ways, such as a good working atmosphere and autonomy. Organise regular company outings and get-togethers. And remember private situations such as birth and marriage, but also deaths, divorce, and illness. Give your employees independence: more freedom and flexibility to organise their own work. Dare to step aside and give your employees responsibility and challenges. That way, employees feel involved in your organisation and feel seen by you as a manager.

8. Keep talking to your employees

Talk to your employees regularly about how things are going at work and their development wishes. That way, you will know what is going on and, if necessary, you can make changes to reduce the likelihood of them leaving. Express your appreciation to them and communicate successes. Compliments promote cooperation, motivate employees to perform better and increase job satisfaction. It makes employees proud of their work and the organisation.

9. Give applicants an honest picture

Set clear expectations and arrange a good onboarding period. "Of all employees, half have doubts within the first year and a large proportion of them reapply to another employer," says Heleen Mes, founder of HXWork and an expert on employee experience. "If, after starting at a new employer, you don't find what you came for, you will be gone very quickly." So give job applicants an honest picture of the position and your business.

10. Do employee satisfaction surveys

You only really know what employees think of their work when you ask them. Therefore, do (anonymous) research into how they experience the job or the working atmosphere. For example, via a survey. If you do this annually, you can see changes and make adjustments.