Give Your Team a Better Option

Stock options are a great retention tool-but why should employees have to bear your risk? There's a solution for that.

- By Carey Smith

Big Ass Fans founder Carey Smith led the fan and light maker from $0 to its $500 million sale. He started working at age 9 and has never stopped. His secret” to success is common sense, and he's happy to share it. His firm, Unorthodox Ventures, focuses on finding small companies with big potential.

These days, we're quick to label everything great. There was the Great Recession, which lasted barely a year and a half-not really that great, in the scheme of things. Now, it's the Great Resignation, though when you actually examine the data, it's more like a somewhat higher-than-average resignation.

Regardless, whether it's to gaze at their navels or to take new positions, a lot of people are leaving their jobs. And that has a lot of other people asking: How do you get them to stay? Now, that is a great question. A recent article in The Wall Street Journal's The Future of Everything section posed it to five people in the fields of management and human resources. Their suggestions included more flexible time off, more get-togethers, and a focus on the team rather than on the individual when it comes to compensation and rewards.

What would I say if asked? Well, first of all, of course you should try to foster a strong company culture. Frequent get-togethers help. Working with friends is a powerful incentive to stay at a workplace, though it helps if there's an actual physical workplace.