4 Proven Steps to Hire and Retain the Best Talent Out There

Giselle Jenkins, Best Christian Workplaces Institute

Attracting. Retaining. Rewarding. Promoting.

Imagine using these four powerful, proven steps to find, develop and keep the kind of outstanding talent needed to fulfill your organization’s mission and improve the health of your workplace culture.

Here’s how Giselle Jenkins, Director for Consulting Services at the Best Christian Workplaces Institute, lays out this logical, four-part sequence:

“Outstanding Talent is the third of the eight culture drivers that make up BCWI’s FLOURISH Model that has transformed the workplace culture of hundreds of organizations across the U.S. and the world. Outstanding Talent is all about highly qualified people with the necessary calling, character, competence, chemistry and contribution that lead to the high performance needed to help an organization meet their goals and make a significant mission impact.

“Outstanding Talent includes:

1) Attracting

“Step one:

• Create great descriptions of your what the job entails.
• Focus on key competencies that are needed and crystal clear.
• Start with open-ended behavioral questions that screen for job experience, competencies, and culture fit.
• Offer a competitive pay scale!

“Next, to build a strong, onboarding plan, stick with the words of respected analyst and author Price Pritchett, who famously said, “Find good people and glue them to your organization.”

• “Gluing” enables your new people to quickly assimilate to the team so they can uniquely contribute to fulfilling your mission and vision.
• Don’t throw new hires into the deep end on day one and expect them to figure it out. Rather, do plan, train, and equip them to succeed, as they learn to connect with others.

2) Retaining

Master “These five essentials, and you’ll increase the likelihood of holding on to Outstanding Talent:

• 1) Clearly connect every job role to your organization’s mission. This will help your employees discover what makes their work meaningful and their individual contribution so important.
• 2) Skill-match the job to the person’s gifts and talents, competencies, experience, and spiritual gifts.
• 3) Give your talent needed latitude that frees each person to contribute his or her ideas, thoughts and style. The more they feel trusted and valued, the more they’re likely to excel and stay in their job.
• 4) Identify fair compensation that’s ‘in the ballpark’ and is close to the benchmark salary.
• 5) Encourage your talent to grow and learn; it will help them to see their next job role in the organization. Greater foresight equals greater retention.

[shareable cite="Giselle Jenkins"]360 reviews can widen the window of an employee’s self-knowledge and leadership development.”[/shareable]

3) Rewarding

“Who doesn’t want to feel affirmed by doing great work? You’re more likely to see outstanding talent grow, improve and excel on the job when you reward people by:

• Giving them additional responsibilities, such as leading a team, or being involved in new change initiatives;
• Assigning them a mentor-coach that can increase their understanding of, and involvement in, the organization;
• Adding a 360 developmental review process that can widen the window of their self-knowledge and leadership development, a true win-win for the person and the organization;
• Offering valuable public recognition that allows every individual and the organization to shine;
• Honoring a person with some well-deserved merit pay or some paid time off.

4) Promoting

“What seems like a no-brainer for advancing outstanding talent can actually help sustain and ensure the future leadership of your organization when you:

• Shift your thinking from merely seeing the future potential of your outstanding talent to actively preparing your talent for the kind of job promotion that makes for sustained success at a new level of responsibility.”

The Bottom Line

What’s the cost of not attracting, retaining, rewarding and promoting your top talent? Research shows it will likely cost your organization at least one-third a person’s salary if he or she decides to leave.

Can your organization afford to let this happen?

Consider Giselle’s four-step alternative that comes with a built-in, easy-to-remember acronym: ARRP. Not that kind of AARP which signals retirement, but rather the ARRP which you can put to work right away to help ensure a pipeline of ongoing, outstanding talent that can keep your organization thriving day after day and year after year.

It's Your Turn

Which of these four essentials—attracting, retaining, rewarding, and promoting top talent—are already working in your organization? On the other hand, which of these four is lacking, perhaps even absent in your workplace culture?

Coming Up Next on our Continuing Series

“The Eight Ways to Build a Flourishing Workplace,

“How to Develop World-Class Talent”
Peter Greer, President/CEO
Hope International
Lancaster, Pennsylvania