Earlier this week I read at least two articles that spoke of how startups in India are having a hard time retaining their employees. One spoke of startups now having higher employee churn than Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firms!

The article asserts “The reason for this high churn rate is that young professionals come to startups for all the wrong reasons.” While understanding why startups, particularly in India, are having this employee turnover problem is important, it’ll have to wait for another post. What should startups do to retain the employees they already have?

As Lao-Tzu (or was it Confucius?) put it “When the student is ready, the master will come,” my daughter shared this video by Amy Cole, CEO of Amy Cole Connect, on 4 Tips to Retain Your Talent. For those of you who are too busy (really!) to watch the 2.5 minute video, here’s the TL;DR version

  • Excitement – are you exciting your team members from the day they come on board? Many simple things can make the job and your company exciting – do it!
  • Engagement – how are you engaging your team – making their job meaningful and laying context rather than assuming they’ll stay motivated and engaged
  • Encouragement – are you explicitly encouraging them – from paying attention to active inputs, are you helping them grow and not taking them for granted
  • Empowerment – do you trust and provide them flexibility, as long as the work get done? Are you all about control and not empowering them?