Skip to main content

Retaining Talent

Read an article the other day (somewhere) that the war for talent is hotting up (again?). It makes sense in Australia where unemployment is just on 4% - a 30-year low.

Being a newly minted entrepreneur – in Aus at least – I wonder about that. How and where will I find good people? People who will care as much as I do about my customers? I care because I know very personally that they are the people who allow me to eat and look after my family. Can any employee care as much? As soon as you are an employee, the person who feeds you is the boss – one step removed from the customer, and employees will always act accordingly: please the boss before the customer – that is only human.

Even when I consider myself as an (ex-) employee, I must be honest and say… ‘I guess not!’ As much as I considered myself to be a valuable employee (no comments required on this one, thanks) I still did not care as much as I care now. And it is only when you are the owner of your own business that you get that first hand experience of what customer service is all about.

So, my contrarian advice to large companies who are struggling to hang on to talent is this: FIRE THEM!

That’s right: let them go out there and stretch their legs and start a business that is funded by the corporate and let them build a business where they are the top dog. If they are truly talented, the corporation would soon have a pretty nice investment/ subsidiary. If not, they weren’t that talented anyway. (And you can hire them back with a good dose of humility and gratitude.)

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hey Bruce Springsteen; you hypocrite

Bruce, I love your music man. It is old-fashioned, but I like it. My favourite song is actually not Born in the USA or the like, but Streets of Philadelphia. Not only is it a nice tune, I really like the message too. But you know, I don’t like how you play your politics. Make no mistake, I don’t MIND your politics and I am sure we can agree on a lot of things – and even in this case I may even agree with your belief. So the point is not where you stand on the issue.  But I don’t like the hypocritical way you play it. So you cancel a concert and boycott a state that you disagree with. I am sure you think that it is your way to express your support for people who are getting the short straw. I am sure you see it as your right to play in front of whoever and wherever. But Bruce, can I ask you this: Have you refunded all the money you made from selling songs to the states that hold a different view to you? Have you asked those citizens not to buy your...
Post a Comment
Read more

How to be a Proper Grown-Up

  A child who throws a tantrum in the supermarket, demanding a treat, is clearly not a grown-up. This is obvious to most people older than that child; such ‘childish’ behaviour stands in stark contrast to mature, grown-up conduct. But what happens when you’re supposed to be a grown-up—by age, at least—but find yourself caught up in your own life? How do you recognise that your thoughts, beliefs, actions, and reactions may not be particularly mature? Most of us assume that real grown-ups want to be ‘grown up’—for their own good, and for everyone else’s. There’s a collective belief that if every adult acted like a grown-up, the world—and the individuals in it—would be better for it. To understand what it means to be grown-up, we must start by understanding what makes behaviour childish. And that part is simple. Take the child in the supermarket who desperately wants an ice cream. They see a fridge full of options and a parent nearby with money. They sense the possibility that the wor...
Post a Comment
Read more

An Open Letter to the CEO

Dear Mr CEO You said your job is to develop a vision and create an organisation with the right values that will make that vision a reality, so I thought I would drop this note in your lap for consideration. It is my contention that what goes for ‘strategy’ and ‘best practice’ in the modern corporate boardroom is a terminal degree of “me too-ism”. I think you have bought into a narrative that is promulgated by people who have a gnostic view of the world and specific agendas that appeal to the pseudo-thinkers of the world, but are in reality going to lead your organisation to its premature demise. OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY Over the years business organisations have been eaten away slowly from the inside by social justice warriors (SJWs). How this happened, requires us to go back a few years and in the evolution of the business organisation. Once you understand that, you will see how it has infested your organisation. Business organisations used to have a simple, clear obje...
Post a Comment
Read more