 LEARNING OBJECTIVE:

 At the end of the class students will be able to,

- define employee retention.
- enlist reasons for why do employees leave an organization
- discuss the concept of employee retention.
- describe the need and importance of employee retention.
- enlist strategies for employee retention.
- explain nine principle help to foster employee retention .
- describe performance appraisal.
- enlist phases of employee retention.
- explain reasons for retaining a valuable staff (employee) is essential for an
organization
- discuss role of motivation in employee retention
- enumerate role of human resource department in employee retention
- discuss role of team leaders and supervisors in employee retention
- enlist characteristics of successful retention program
- explain the advantages of employee retention
- enlist five major things in employees retention involves
- discuss guidelines for increasing job satisfaction
 "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush"
 DEFINITION
It refers to the ability of an organization to retain the staff to avoid turnover and to improve the
productivity of the institute or organization. It can be represented by a simple statistic (for example,
a retention rate of 80% usually indicates that an organization kept 80% of its employees in a given
period).
Or
Employee retention refers to the various policies and practices which let the employees stick
to an organization for a longer period of time
Every organization inverts time and money to groom a newly joined employee, make him a
corporate ready material and bring him at part with the existing employees. The organization is
completely at loss when the employees leave their job once they are fully trained. Employee
retention takes into account the various measures taken so that an individual stays in an
organization for the maximum period of time. Employee retention is a process in which the
employees are encouraged to remain with the organization for life time or maximum period of
time. It is a strategic tool for the success of the firm.

 RECIPE OF RETENTION
R- Remunerate competitively
E- Encouragement and expectations
T- Training and development
A- Annual review cycles
I- Inform and involve
N- Nurture

 REASONS FOR WHY DO EMPLOYEES LEAVE AN ORGANIZATION

- Research says that most of the employees leave an organization out of frustration and
constant friction with their superiors and other team members.
- In some cases low salary, lack of growth prospects and motivation compel an employee to
look for change.
- The management must try to its leave best to retain in those employees who are really
important for the system and are known to be effective contributors.
 - It is the responsibility of line managers as well as the management to ensure that the
employees are satisfied with their roles and responsibilities and the job is offering them a
new challenge and learning every day.

 CONCEPTS OF EMPLOYEE RETENTION

- It is not so easy to find an employee who gets well with the system and understands the
work.
- Hiring an employee, training him and making him fit to work in an organization incur huge
costs and thus sincere efforts must be made to retain the employee.
- Every problem has a solution and the management must problem into exact reasons of an
employee’s displeasure.
- Employee sticking to an organization for a longer time tend to know the organization better
and develop a feeling of attachment towards it.
- The employees who stay for a longer duration are familiar with organization policies,
guidelines as well as rules and regulations and thus can contribute more effectively than
individuals who come and go.
- Employee retention techniques go a longer way in motivating the employees for them to
enjoy their work and avoid changing jobs frequently.

 THE NEED AND IMPORTANCE OF EMPLOYEE RETENTIONS

- Employee retention refers to the techniques employed by the management to help the
employees stay with the organization for a long period of time.
- Whenever a talented employee express his willingness to leave an organization, it is the
responsibility of the management and the human resource team to intervene immediately
and find out the exact reasons leading to the decision.
- The advantages of employee retention are fairly clear. Most importantly perhaps, key skills,
ideas, knowledge and experience remain within your organizations. Client relationships
and networks are also preserved in conjunction with all the income that these area generate.
- Conversely, losing your key employees lays open the possibility that these people will that
assume roles with your direct competitors. As a result those invaluable skills, ideas,
 knowledge and experience, relationships and networks are all transferred to another
organizations.
- On top of all these there are also direct costs involved in losing key employees. The cost
of replacing such an individual includes advertising, recruitment agency fees and the time
spent conducting actual interview process. Furthermore it is also worth considering the
time and expense spent on the induction new employees and lost revenue during the
recruitment and bedding in process.
- All though an element of employee churns in both inevitable and healthy. It is nevertheless
clear that retention brings substantial benefits to your organization.

 STRATEGIES FOR RETAINING EMPLOYEE

1) Selecting and Training
- After selecting the nurses, the organization must initiate good policies to invest in the
development of their skills through training, as this is one of the most effective and significant
tools in retaining them.
- These programme help in reducing skill gaps for new employees.
- Because ongoing training helps them adjust to rapidly changing job recruitment and it built
satisfaction and trust and in turn making them loyal and satisfied.
2) An Effective Orientation
- It helps the nursing personnel to understand the work environment and organization.
- It also aid in producing good working relationship and adjust with new environment.
3) Job satisfaction
- Lower job satisfaction translates into higher resignations rate with resulting loss of valuable
competent nurses.
- If they are satisfied, they will become loyal and remain for long time.
- Hence opportunities should be provided to make them satisfied with their work.
4) Creating trust
- The most effective way of building trust in the workplace is to work together or generated
through team work.
- It will form the foundation for effective communication and motivation.
5) Empower each Nursing Personnel
- It is essential to empower each employee in the organization irrespective of her level in the
hierarchy to create a sense of belongingness in each member.
- Each staff will enjoy autonomy while doing the job and ensure accountability and also provide
them skill and authority to take decisions.
- The salary like should be directly proportional to the work put by the employees.
- Partiality must be avoided as it demotivates the one’s and prompt them to look for a better
opportunity.
6) Build Relationship with Subordinates
- Develop healthy relationship with subordinates and create a family like feeling withing the
organization.
- Try to motivate them by providing good facilities for work, value their ideas and recognize
their work.
7) Recognize employee
- Priorities the recognition of each personnel and help them to retain.
8) Stress management
- In order to retain the nursing personnel, focus should be there that they should not be
dissatisfied.
- Attention should be given on innovation, special career needs, determining their other needs
and help them.
9) The organization’s rules and regulations should be made to benefit the employees.
- They should be employee friendly.
- Allow them to take a leave on their special occasions or come a little late once or twice in a
month.
- It is important for the management to understand the employees to gain their trust and
confidence.
- The consistent performers must also have a say in the organization’s decisions for them to feel
important.
10) The responsibilities must be delegated according to the individual’s specialization and
interests.
- It is the responsibility of the team leader to assign challenging work to his team members for
them to enjoy work and do not treat it as a burden.
 - Performance reviews are important to find out whether the employer are really happy with
their work or not.

 NINE PRINCIPLES TO HELP FOSTER STAFF RETENTION

1. Respectful collegial communication and - Team orientation
behavior - Presence of trust
- Respect for diversity
2. Communication rich culture - Clear and respectful
- Open and trusting
3. A culture of accountability - Role and expectations and clearly defined
- Everyone is accountable
4. The presence of adequate numbers of - Ability to provide quality care to meet client/patient
qualified nurses needs
- Work and home life balance
5. The presence of expert, competent, - Serve as an advocate for nursing practice
credible, visible leadership - Support shared decision making
- Allocate resources to support nursing
6. Shared decision at all level - Nurses participate in system organizational and
process decisions
- Formal structure exist to support shared decision
making
- Nurses have control over their practice
7. The encouragement of professional - Continuing education/certification is
practice and continue growth/development supported/encouraged
- Participation in professional association encourage
- An information rich environment is supported
8. Recognition of the value of nursing - Reward and pay for performance
contribution
9. Recognition of nurses for their meaningful - Career mobility and expansion
contribution to the practice
 CHARACTERISTICS OF SUCCESSFUL RETENTION PROGRAM

work with
other
organizations

characteristics

systematic
and
leadership
structured
approach

 PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
• According to Flippo, a prominent personality in the field of Human resources,
"performance appraisal is the systematic, periodic and an impartial rating of an employee’s
excellence in the matters pertaining to his present job and his potential for a better job."
• NEEDS OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
 Provide a review of past work performance.
 Establish lines of communication.
 Create an opportunity to discuss professional development goals and objectives.
 Document employee performance.
 Document corrective action necessary to improve work performance.
 It is the supervisor’s and manager’s responsibility to monitor, evaluate and coach
employees.
  USE OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL SYSTEM
 Raises, Merit Pay, Bonuses
 Personnel Decisions (e.g. promotion, transfer, dismissal)
 Identification of training needs
 Research purposes
 STEP BY STEP GUIDE TO PERFORMANCE APPRAISALS
Develop performance standards
↓
Setting goals and objectives Data collection
↓
Performance appraisal interview
↓
Future goals and objectives
↓
Follow up Rewarding performance

A. PERFORMANCE STANDARDS ARE:

• Based on the position, not the individual
• Observable, specific indicators of success
• Meaningful, reasonable and attainable
• Describe “fully satisfactory” performance once trained
• Expressed in terms of quantity, quality, timeliness, cost, safety or outcomes
B. SETTING OBJECTIVES
• Specific
• Performance oriented
• Realistic
• Observable
C. DATA COLLECTION
• Sources of performance information
 Personal observation
 Reports, documentation, correspondence. Etc.
 Feedback (internal and external)
 Periodic discussions with employee
D. PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL INTERVIEW
• Review standards, documentation and job description as well as the appraisal form and
various ratings.
• Write the appraisal (Complete the Performance Appraisal Form).
• Know the person’s record thoroughly.
• Prepare the employee in advance.
E. FUTURE GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
• At the end of the interview, the employer should allow some time to create a development
plan.
• The employer should record specific goals, targets or benchmarks that the employee will
attempt to achieve.
• Both employer and employee should agree on the steps to be taken to achieve these targets,
• Both should agree on how the employee’s progress towards these objectives will be
measured and set a defined timeframe, even if this is simply the next performance
appraisal.
F. FOLLOW UP
• Follow up means more than simply conducting regular formal performance reviews once
a year.
• If employers review employees and provide feedback as part of everyday management,
both employers and the employee will learn much more about their strengths, weaknesses
and how employers would prefer the job to be done.
G. THE PERFORMANCE EVALUATION REPORT
• Class specification and / or informal job description.
• Job standards, procedures and regulations.
• Established goals, objectives and expectations.
 • Knowledge and abilities to perform the job.
• Job relationships required for successful performance, i.e supervisors, co-workers, county
employees and the public.
• Quality of work, including the nature and consequences of errors made during the
evaluation period.
• Production rate, if applicable.
• Commendations awarded relative to employee performance.
• Use of job skills and efforts to enhance skills.
• Ability to work with others.
• Attendance, use of sick leave, punctuality.
H. REWARDING PERFORMANCE
• Rewarding performance means providing incentives to, and recognition of, employees for
their performance and acknowledging their Contributions to the agency’s mission.

 TOOLS FOR PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

 Field review
 Critical incidence method
 Check list method
 Paired comparison
 Participates in ongoing educational activities

 PHASES OF STAFF RETRNTION

I. Induction Training – It is a brief, standardized indoctrination to an organization’s
philosophy, purposes, policies and regulation given to each worker.
 Increased retention of newly hire employees
 Improved employee morale and Increased productivity.
 FORMS OF INDUCTION
1) Internship – works as an exchange of services for experience between the students
and his or her employer.
 2) Preceptorship – a short term relationship between a student as novice and an
experienced staff person professional who provides individual attention to the
student’s learning needs and feedback regarding performance.
3) Mentorship programs offered to support in program completion, confidence
building and transitioning to further education or the workforce.
II. Job Orientation – It is individualized training to acquaint a newly hired employee. The
process of creating awareness with an individual of his/her roles, responsibilities and
relationships in the new work situation.
 A new employee to his or her job setting so that he / she is aware of his/ her job
responsibility and expectation.
 Present employee to the job responsibilities of his/ her expanded/ enriched role.
 The old employees to the policy changes.
 Provides essential, relevant and necessary information
 Helps employee to gain confidence,
 Lessen the time for the employee to learn about new situations related to his/her job
setting.
 IMPORTANCE:
Provides essential, relevant and necessary information
Helps employee to gain confidence,
Lessen the time for the employee to learn about new situations related to his/her
job setting.
Helps the new employee to develop a sense of belonging
Eliminates :
 Learning by trial and error
 Passing of incorrect information by old employees and peers. Reduces
misinterpretation
 Mistakes and confusion
 Apprehension
 Help new employee in solving initial problems and adjust the new
situation/environment,
  Acquaints her with personnel services readily with in the institution/community
 TYPES:
General orientation
Specific orientation
III. In-Service Education – a planned educational experience provided in the job setting and
closely identified with services in order to help perform more effectively as a person and
as a worker. Continuing Education – all the learning activities that occur after an individual
has completed his basic education.
 TYPES:
1) Centralized in-service training- In nursing service department, one department will
held responsibility for improvement of knowledge, skills, practice of their nursing staff.
They will devote full time for in-service activities.
2) Decentralized in-service education-this is planned for staff members who work
together, giving care for clients with similar conditions and share similar goals.
3) Combined in-service approach-In this, the higher nursing authorities and all staff
development occurs in proposed programme of education. They plan, conduct and
evaluate the programme and further plan their programme basing on the need arises.

 STEPS:
Assessment
↓
Implementation
↓
Evaluation
IV. Continuing education:-
 “Continuing education is all the learning activities that occur after an individual has
completed his/her basic education.” (COOPER)
 “The education which builds on previous education.” (SHANON)
 NEED FOR CONTINUING EDUCATION:
 To ensure safe and effective nursing care as nurses need to keep abreast with
interest, knowledge and technical advances.
To meet the needs of population.
To develop the nurses’ by updating their knowledge and prepare them for
specialization. For career advancement.
With the advancement of technology, new role change takes place and to play those
roles, education is required.
To acquire special skills.
Due to shortage of nurses (because their movement to abroad, more hospital and
training college), more knowledgeable person is required.

 FUNCTIONS OF CONTINUING EDUCATION:

To meet the health needs and public expectations.
To develop the practicing abilities of the nurse.
To recognize gaps in knowledge.
To test abilities of participants to do formal academic study.
To improve the communication between the participants, faculty, community and
health sector.
To shape or support university educational policies and practices.
To ensure the quality of education.
To grant the budget for extension studies.
To maintain the academic standards.
To provide opportunities for educational growth.
To maintain the roles as bed side nurses and to assume more supervisor,
administrative, to specialize and to generalize the practice.
To provide and prepare faculty who see continuing nursing education as a personal
responsibility.
To provide a variety of continuing nursing education opportunities of high quality
to nurses in both education and service changes.
V. Training for Special Function – This is concerned with developing expert technical or
manual skills, communication and helps the personnel to perform their functions
effectively.
  OBJECTIVES:
To help the nursing personnel to perform correct methods and procedures with
understanding.
Establishing standards and quality of nursing services.
Procedure to skill nurses to skilled nurses.

 REASONS FOR RETAINING A VALUABLE STAFF (EMPLOYEE) IS

ESSENTIAL FOR AN ORGANIZATION

The Reasons are given below:
1. Hiring is not an easy process.
- The human resource professional short lists few individual from a large pool of talent,
conducts preliminary interviews and eventually forwards into the respective line managers
who further grill them to judge whether they are fit for the organization or not.
- Recruiting the right candidate is a time consuming process.

2. An organization inverts time and money in grooming an individual and make him ready
to work and understand the corporate culture.
- A new employee is completely raw and the management really has to work hard to train
him for his overall development.
- It is a complete wastage of time and money where an individual leaves an organization all
of a sudden.
- The HR has start to the recruitment process all over again for the same vacancy, a mere
duplication of work.
- Finding a right employee for an organization is a difficult job and all efforts simply go
waste when the employee leaves.
3. When an individual resigns from his present organization, it is more likely that he would
join the competitors.
- In such cases an employee tend to take all the strategies, policies from the current
organization to the new one.
 - Individuals take all the important data information and statistics to their new organization
and in some cases even leak the secrets of the previous organization.
- To avoid such cases, it is essential that the new employee is made to sign a document which
should be made which prevents the employee to join the competitiors.
- This way to retain the employees.
4. The employees working for a longer period of time are more familiar with the company’s
policies, guidelines and thus they adjust better.
- They perform better than individuals who changes job frequently.
- Employees who spent a considerable time in an organization know the organization in and
out and thus are in a position to contribute effectively.
5. Every individual needs to time to adjust with others.
- One needs time to know his team members well, be friendly with them and eventually trust
them.
- Organizations are always benefited where the employees are compatible with each other
and discuss things among themselves to come out with something beneficial for all.
- When a new individual replace an existing employee, adjustment problems crop up.
- Individuals find it really difficult to establish a comfort level with the other person.
- After striking rapport with an existing employee, it is a challenge for the employees to
adjust with someone new and most importantly trust him.
- It is human tendency to compare a new employee with previous employees and always
find fault in them.
6. It has been observed that individuals sticking to an organization for a period are more
loyal towards the management and organization.
- They enjoy all kinds of benefits from the organization and as a result are more attached to
it.
- They always think in favour of the management and hardly tell badly about the
organization.
- For them the organization comes first and all other things later.
7. It is essential for the organization to retain the valuable employees showing potential.
- Every organization needs hardworking and talented employees who can really come out
with something creative and different.
 - No organization can survive if all the top performances quit the organization.
- It is essential for the organization to retain those employees who really work hard and are
indispensable for the system.

 ROLE OF MOTIVATION IN EMPLOYEE RETENTION

- The management plays an important role in retaining the talented employees who are familiar
with the working conditions of the organization.
- Motivation plays an important role in employee satisfaction and eventually employee
retention.
1) Nothing works better than motivation to retain the employees.
- Motivation acts as a catalyst to an individual’s success.
- The team leader and the managers must constantly motivate the employees to extract
the best out of them.
- If an employee has performed exceptionally well, do appreciate him, simple words like
“well done”, and “Good’, “keep up” actually go a long way in motivating the
employees.
- It is essential for the employees to be loyal towards their organization to deliver their
level best.
2) The superior should seed motivational emails to their team once in a week. Display
inspirational posters, photographs on the notice board for the employees to read and
stay motivated.
- In the natural for an individuals to feel low sometimes, but the superiors must ensure
to boost their morals and bring them back on track.
- No individual should be rejected or criticized.
- This demotivates the employees, if they fail to perform once, motivate them and give
them another opportunity.
3) Organize various activities & events at the work place.
- Ask each one to take change of something or the other.
- Engage the employees in productive tasks necessary for their overall development.
- The management must slow its care and concern for all the staff members.
- The employee must feel secure the work place for them to stay motivated.
 4) Incentive cash prize are a good way to motivate the employees.
- The employee who have performed well consistently should be felicitated infront of all
the staff members as well as the management.
- Give them trophies or badges to flaunt.
- Ask the audience to give a loud applause to the employee who have performed well.
- This is the good way to motivate the employees for them to remain happy and work
with dedication for a longer duration.
- Others who have not performed upto the mark also gear up for future.
- The names of the top performers must be put on the main notice board for everyone to
see.
5) Appraisal are also an important way to motivate the employees.
- The salaries of the performance must be appraisal at regular intervals is an effective
way to retain the employees.
- Carrier growth is important way to retain the talented employees.
- Give them power to take some decisions on their own but management must leave a
close watch on them so they do not misuse their power without motivation, it is not fair
to except the best out of the employees.

 ROLE OF HUMAN RESOURCE DEPARTMENT IN EMPLOYEE

RETENTION
1) Whenever an employee resigns from his current assignments
- It is the responsibility of HR to intervene immediately to find out the reasons which
prompted the employee to resign.
- No one leave an organization without a reason.
- There has to be and human resource team must probe into it.
- There can be innumerable reasons for an employee to leave his current job.
- The major ones being conflict with the superiors, less salary, lack of growth, negative
ambience and so on.
2) It is the duty of the HR to sit with the employee and discuss the various issues face to face.
- Understand his problems and listen to him as well.
- Remember that HR should not focus on conducting exit interviews, rather more emphasis
should be laid on retaining the employees.
3) Try to provide a solution to his problem
- Hiring is a complex process and it is really difficult to recruit the right candidate and train
him once again.
- Check the record of the employee who wishes to move on.
- It is really essential for the management to retain those employees who have the potential
and are really in dispensable for the organization.
- If they leave and join the competitors, the organization would be loss.
- If one fees that the employee is not very happy with his team leader, try to shift to a new
team.
- If the employees feel his salary is not justified, try to give him a hike but make sure he is
worth and should see that others should not get upset.
4) The HR person must ensure that he is recruiting the right employee who actually fits into
the role.
- A right person doing the wrong job would never find his job interesting and certainly look
for a change.
- Make sure every individual has been assigned responsibilities according to his
specialization and interest.
- Every individual works for money and HR must quote a justified salary acceptable to the
other person.
- Don’t compel any one to join at a less salary.
- He might join at that moment but would most likely quit after some time.
5) The human resource department must conduct motivational activities at the work place.
- Organize various internal as well as external training which help the employees to learn
something extra apart from their routine work.
- Make them participate in extracurricular activities important for their overall development.
- Encourage them to interact with each other so that the comfortable level increases.
6) The HR must launch various schemes for the performers to motivate them.
 - This way the employee feel important for the organization and strive hard to perform even
better the next time.
- The employees who show good performance should be awarded with cash prizes, giving
certificates to make the individual stand apart from others.
- Send a mail wishing the employees on their special occasions or congratulating them when
they perform exceptionally well or come out with something innovative.
- Arrange a small bouquet them as a gift from the organization’s side
- This way the employees feel attached to the organization and are reluctant to look for a
change.
- A friendly atmosphere is essential for the employees to feel safe and secure.
7) Performance reviews are must.
- The HR along with the respective team leaders must monitor their team member’s
performance to ensure whether they are enjoying the work or not.
- The any growth or learning, job rotation can be one of the effective way to retain
employees.

 ROLE OF TEAM LEADERS AND SUPERVISORS IN EMPLOYEE

RETENTION
1) The team members must be assigned responsibilities as per their specialization, qualification,
interests as well as experience.
- The team members must find their job interesting for them to enjoy and work hard to
achieve the organization goals.
- Problems crop up whenever there is a mismatch or the employees have to do something
out of compulsion.
- Let them accept the responsibilities willingly.
- An individual with an analytical that bent of mind would not do very well in a marketing
or branding profile.
2) The team members must be assigned responsibilities as per their specialization, qualification,
interests as well as experience.
3) An overburdened worker never finds his job interesting and would always be eager for a
change.
4) Rules and regulations should be same for everyone.
5) One should never fear his boss. Hitler approach does not work in the current scenario.
6) The team leader should be accessible to his team members.
7) The superiors must maintain transparency in communication.
8) The team leader must appreciate those who perform well.

 THE ADVANTAGES OF EMPLOYEE RETENTION

- Employee retention is a financial gain for organizations.
- Acquiring Talent
- Training and Development
- Skilled Labor Force
- Impact on Customer Service

 EMPLOYEES RETENTION INVOLVES FIVE MAJOR THINGS

Compensation
Growth
Environment
Relationship
Support

 GUIDELINES FOR INCREASING JOB SATISFACTION

1) Extrinsic Reward
- Refers to motivation that comes from outside an individual. The motivating factors are
external, or outside, rewards such as money or praise. These rewards provide satisfaction and
pleasure that the task itself may not provide. Reward must be meaningful and unique Reward
must match individual preferences Link rewards to motivational behaviors Link rewards to
performance
- Examples: Salary increase, gadgets, house loan and car loan
2) Intrinsic Rewards
- The personal satisfaction a person derives from a sense of self-accomplishment related to
personal or business goals.
- More powerful motivator in doing responsibilities.
- Assign employees to jobs that meet their needs for work characteristics.
- Provide clear communication to employees.
- Design fair reward allocation system. Ensure supervisors provide a positive environment.
- Provide programs to enhance work-life balance
 BIBLIOGRAPHY:
1) Deepak. , Sarath Chandran. C, Mithun Kumar.B.P, A comprehensive text book on Nursing
Management, 3rd edition; EMMESS medical publishers, Bangalore-2017, p.g.no.203 to
205
2) Jogindra Vati, Principles and Practice of Nursing Management & Administration, 1 st
edition; Jaypee Brothers Medical Publishers (P) Ltd-2013, p.g.no. 352, 408,412
3) Employee Retention -Perspective of Employees, Cited on: 29/01/2020; available on: https:
//www.researchgate.net/publication/291274474_Employee_Retention_-
Prespective_of_Employees