Attrition within an organisation is commonplace. However, when turnover within the organisation reaches unhealthy levels, that is when organisations should start to worry.
HR will then began the mad scramble to recruit new employees to fill up the vacancies. More often than not, in the desperate attempts to ensure that exiting employees are quickly replaced, HR or even managers will simply “accept” any candidate that meets the job requirements.
While that method will certainly help to rectify the problem of turnover rates in the short run, it might have a detrimental impact on the organisation in the long term. Given that potential candidates are not properly screened, they might not be an entirely good fit for the job or the company culture. At the same time, these new employees might not be properly trained given that the intention was for them to quickly replace any vacancies. Eventually, this might contribute to the high turnover as well.
Essentially, organisations should not simply view recruitment as a way to replace staff or support more tasks and processes within the organisation. Instead, there are many other ways in which turnover rates or work overload can be managed without having to rely heavily on recruitment.
MONITOR STAFFING LEVELS REGULARLY
The key to manage turnover rates is to plan ahead instead of waiting for an opening to occur before recruiting. For certain positions, it might be possible to request for additional headcount. As such, if HR or managers were to come across any good candidates, it would be best to hire them. That way, if there are any employees that decided to leave eventually, HR can be certain that there are still sufficient staff to manage the workload.
CONSIDER CROSS TRAINING OF STAFF
Organisations can consider training staff to take on other roles with the team or department. This will come in extremely helpful especially when HR is unable to find replacements in time. Organisations may simply fill these open positions with an employee from another team or department. At the same time, this provides employees with the opportunity for lateral movements within the organisation and to upskill themselves.
MAXIMISE THE USE OF TECHNOLOGY
Technology can be a great way manage staffing levels and to enhance processes as well. For instance, if supervisors have to reshuffle workload due to the absence of an employee, they can easily reschedule shifts or workload without having to go through manual approval or verbally communicate it to employees. Today, rescheduling or reshuffling of workload can easily be done via technology.
Employee turnover within the organisation is part and parcel in order for organisations to welcome new talent and fresh ideas. However, when emergencies do happen, hasty recruitment need not necessarily be the only option to cover open positions. Instead, there are many alternative options in which organisations can consider which will still ensure processes run smoothly.
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