A new report released today reveals the priorities for bosses when it comes to trying to retain staff and keeping them positive in the workplace.
The new study of 750 senior business professionals by Arch Apprentices provided an insight into employee retention – uncovering how to have a happy and productive workforce. Enabling employees to learn new skills was top of the list (73 per cent) – followed closely by promotions (67 per cent) and pay rises (65 per cent).
Other ways to keep people content in their job included investment in training programmes (55 per cent), praise (60 per cent) and working within a knowledgeable team (53 per cent).
Training has many benefits in the workplace – it means a team can acquire new skills, increase contribution to the business and build self-esteem. By enlarge bosses are aware of the benefits, with around a third of UK businesses spending between £1,000 and £5,000 each year on training their employees, with most of the surveyed professionals saying they offer 5-9 days of training each year.
Productivity is often cited as the key to business growth and if it is maintained it can be a major success factor. Further results from the 750 business professionals illustrated that 70 per cent say that informal training took place within their business at least once a month, with 88 per cent offering on the job training opportunities.
An increasing number of businesses offer apprenticeships, with 39 per cent stating they currently do so. More than a quarter (27 per cent) say they felt enthused to learn from new digital natives in their business, with more than a third (36 per cent) also admitting to learning a lot from young people in the business.
Incorporating young people within a business through schemes such as apprenticeships can be essential for both bosses and workforce as a whole and statistics from the House of Commons show that 904,800 people were on an apprenticeship in 2015/16, up from 871,000 the year before.
It is now easier than ever for large and small businesses to introduce an apprenticeship scheme with the introduction of the apprenticeship levy which happened in April 2017. This new ‘co-investment’ scheme, means the government will support businesses by covering the cost of training apprentices.
Ben Rowland, founder of Arch Apprentices says, ‘It’s really positive to see that learning new skills tops the list when it comes to keeping employees engaged, beating promotions and pay rises. In the apprenticeship space, we’re seeing businesses such as Google and Facebook tapping into this appetite for learning through their digital apprenticeship training programmes, helping them to supercharge their investment in digital skills and retain their top talent.’
Further reading on strategies to retain staff
