Systems Approach to Retention of Critical Employees

Abstract

This paper aims at developing insight on how employee retention is relevant in present business context. A model Systems Approach to Retention is devised that can be effectively used to plan employee retention initiatives in the organizations. Here, I have discussed number of environmental factors both external and internal, which are responsible for influencing the employees' decision to either leave or to stay with the organization. And on the basis of interactions between these two set of forces: attritive and retentive forces, the organizations can discover the employees who are more likely than others to leave the organization. Moreover after mapping the employees on the proposed productivity potential matrix, the identification of the categories of employees; on which the investment for retention is justified; can be done. And then on the basis of the specific employee needs (identified through employee personality and employee contexts), the organizations should implement only the relevant retention strategies. Since ONE Strategy does not Fit All in the organization there exists a need for the HR Managers to identify the employee needs and then devise the retention strategies. The most relevant of retention strategies, which can be used by organizations in present times, are also discussed in this paper.

Keywords: Retention