BL Companies Director of Recruitment and Talent Management Bret Boudreaux wrote an article for the Hartford Business Journal’s special Construction & Design issue with the headline, “In crowded architecture, engineering and construction market, firms must compete beyond pay.” Competitive salaries aren’t the issue — available talent is difficult to find, so companies are willing to pony up. But for the mutual benefit of both the employee and the firm, there are ways to attract and retain talent in a win-win relationship.
As Bret explains, the challenge companies are facing is how to differentiate themselves. After all, retention is the key to both stability and long-term success. Here is an excerpt:
What if we train these people and they leave? But what if we don’t and they stay?
It may be an old joke, but it rings true. No firm is going to retain 100% of their people, and there will be external opportunities for people to leave for myriad reasons.
What’s most important for the people who are staying is to foster and create opportunities for rock stars to rise into leadership roles, while also creating mechanisms through which those that are simply rock solid are able to do really good work.
In addition to leaders, you also need people that are just going to come in and do their job. They have no interest in big strategic conversations about the 10-year plan. They’re engineers that love engineering, and they want to be a really good engineer.
It’s advantageous to have a mindset that retention starts on day one. There’s long-term value in a comprehensive onboarding program. Lay out what to expect immediately and continuously.
Focus on demystifying the onboarding process, because any transition is tough. Starting a new job out of college is challenging, but so is joining a new firm in a managerial role later on in your career.
Read the full article here.