Alright, here is the long awaited PART 3 of my employee retention series. (I have linked parts 1 and part 2 if you missed them)
Today I want to talk about one of my favorite things, stay interviews; and share some of my favorite check in questions that will help you actually know how your team is doing and if they are planning on sticking around or saying sayonara!
So what exactly is a stay interview you ask… it is a consistent 1:1 with your team that helps you keep a solid pulse on them. Instead of having an “exit” interview – which we all know is too late – stay interviews are proactive and strategic to help you clearly see when you are on track or not.
I recommend scheduling one of these every quarter at the minimum. The question is simple.
“What needs to stay the same or change for you to stay with us for another year.” Then you let them share.
Address and correct what you can, and if something raises a big red flag you can’t fix then you are at least forwarded and thus forearmed.
Now, as promised, I am going to leave you with a few of my favorite monthly check-in questions for those first 90 days. In general I ask these same questions at the 30-60-and 90 day mark and then once a quarter.
Here’s an important caveat; these are not the ONLY questions I ask … they are simply the ones I ask with my neuroscience hat on that help me have clarity on where they are at so I can nip anything in the bud or adjust accordingly.
Here they are:
- Do you have any frustrations around your role? Are you finding yourself getting stuck anywhere?
- Do you feel connected to the company mission/vision?
- Do you feel connected to the company culture?
- Do you feel connected to the team as a whole?
- What aspects of your day do you like the most?
- What do you like the least? (I know this sounds like the first one, and it is meant to, sometimes they need to warm up and have it asked a different way to tell me where they are getting stuck or where we have missed the mark)
- On a scale 1-10 tell me how much you are: (if they have a particularly low or high number I always ask why)
- Fulfilled:
- Satisfied:
- Feel successful:
- Valued*:
- Appreciated*:
- Connected to the role:
- Connected to the team:
- Fairly compensated:
- Happy:
- In Life:
- In Work:
Value would imply that they have worth, whereas appreciate implies you recognize that worth and acknowledge them.
Why I LOVE these questions is it gets down to the human factor and allows me to see where they might need more support and where they are really excelling so if I can shift things to put them even more in their happy zone of genius I will.
Remember this. As human beings we really just want to be heard and know we are valued and appreciated.
I see a lot of business owners throw someone in the deep end and hope they can swim, but when you think about onboarding this way, and dig deeper by asking these questions, your team, culture, and business will thrive – and momentum breeds momentum which is something I know we all want.
Plus you will find your hires pay much bigger dividends and stick around much longer so it gets you off that dreaded hire/fire merry-go-round which I think is a win-win-win.
Until next time!
Lauren
