How Do I Make Employees Stay?

Finding good talent is hard. Making them stick around when the competition comes calling can be even tougher.

- Polly And Doug White

Q. My entry-level employees keep getting poached. We’re on a tight budget— is the only way to retain talent by paying higher salaries? —Jessica M., Philadelphia

Jessica, we feel your pain. We had a similar situation at one of our previous companies, where we kept losing employees after only five or six months. The time and money involved in recruitment and training—not to mention the effect the constant turnover had on our business and clients—made us take a hard look at our practices to understand what we could do better to build a long-lasting team.

We started with research. Money isn’t everything, but it’s probably the first factor candidates and employees consider when comparing opportunities. Make sure that your compensation is at least market rate— don’t let a dollar or two an hour be the thing that sabotages your hiring. There are several websites that supply compensation data, and sites like Glassdoor allow current and past employees to self-report pay and can be an eye-opening resource.