The 2022 Employee Retention Handbook

Want the playbook on how to directly attack retention in 2022? If you answered yes, don’t miss this short training because that is exactly what I’ll be sharing today.

If you’re like most franchise operators in the quick-service restaurant space, you’re facing issues with employee retention. To help you overcome some of these challenges, we have developed an approach to help you directly attack retention in 2022.

Our guidance is based on 800+ consultations with franchise operators and more than 21,000 exit surveys with hourly workers.

What we’ve found through these engagements is that most operators are not attacking retention directly.

They are trying different tactics, sure. But they are having trouble putting together a custom plan to help their specific locations.

Here are a few things they are trying:

• Wage hikes
• Instant pay
• Shift swapping
• Redoing their website
• Health benefits
• Referral bonuses
• Paid time off
• Management training
• Free food
• Faster applications
• Loyalty programs
• New onboarding processes
• Celebrations
• Annual surveys

If you’re struggling with retention, these are good initiatives to pursue. You can implement some of them and have some initial success, but they won’t necessarily be the high-impact answer you’re looking for long-term.

Building a Direct Approach

When it comes to improving your retention, a direct approach is best.

There are two steps to pulling this off:

Step #1: Figure out why employees stay or leave.

Step #2: Decide what to do about it.

Let’s break them each down to make more sense of this.

Step #1: Figure out why employees stay or leave.

The key to this step is understanding why employees stay and leave through their own words. We see a lot of companies doing annual surveys that result in feedback like this:

“21% of employees rate the scheduling process as ‘needs improvement’”

Does this sound familiar? And while this is certainly pertinent data to consider, does this statement alone give you enough to build a new retention strategy?

Ask yourself what your employee is trying to say with this feedback.

• Are they not getting enough hours?
• Do they think the scheduling system is unfair?
• Are they upset about not being able to swap shifts with co-workers?
• Are they not given enough notice when new shifts are announced?
• Do they not understand how to access the schedule?

All of these are relatively easy to fix, but you’ll never get this specific with a generic annual survey.

Step #2: Decide what to do about it.

When you take action, it’s important to focus on one or two of the most important problems or opportunities to address right now.

But with today’s challenges facing operators across the world, where do you start?

The good news is you don’t have to reinvent your retention program.

Many of our QSR customers have found that employees appreciate small, consistent action from their employers. Things like one-on-ones with management, recognition, celebration, or minor improvements to the orientation process.

We have developed a retention action plan worksheet for operators to use in a quarterly or monthly review scenario.

The worksheet will help you sift through feedback, prioritize solutions, and brainstorm ongoing action.

You’ll find that sticking to this type of formula will keep you on track and paint a clearer picture of what’s causing retention issues.

Need help getting started? HourWork’s best-in-class retention software platform is your solution.

Reach out to put your retention issues behind you.

Our monthly mini-trainings are designed to help you better recruit and retain your hourly workers in an understaffed world. We’ve built world-class technology that uncovers what matters most to your employees and automatically checks in at key milestones. Have a topic suggestion for our mini-trainings? Email [email protected].