Most employers will completely agree with the fact that the damage caused to business due to employee turnover cannot be retrieved, it is far higher than the costs incurred to pay the talent for the short-term arrangement. Failing to retain a key employee can prove to be quite expensive from an organisational standpoint – waste of training time, lost knowledge, insecure coworkers and of course, the upfront costs incurred on seeking a new hire as a best replacement to bridge the gaps.

If you wonder about how much the turnover costs significantly, Center for American Progress has the answer. The study states that the cost of replacing an employee ranges from 10 to 30 percent of their annual salary, depending on the industry and length of time on job.

Businesses across the globe, are also facing great challenge in terms of the retirement of the Baby Boomers. This leads to significant gaps of employee loyalty and performance. The next generations (Gen X and Y) seem to have different levels of commitment, and showcase loyalty differently to their employers, which many at times due to poor workforce management results in employee turnover.

It is critically important for HR managers and the business management to retain the best employees to nurture long-term progressive health of the business and avoid turnover costs.

Here are some ways to retain your key employees at work.

Don’t easily change the expectation

Management thinkers from Ferdinand Fournies (Why Employees Don’t Do What They’re Supposed to Do and What to Do About It) to Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman (First Break All the Rules ) agree that a satisfied employee knows clearly what is expected from him every day at work.

Changing expectation from employees brings about some negative effects, such as robbing them of the internal security and making the employees feel insecure, undervalued and unappreciated for long working hours and strenuous efforts.

Avoiding the changing expectation doesn’t mean to keep the work performance remains static. Instead of giving a sudden change, an employer could provide a specific framework within which people clearly know what is expected from them.

See: What Truly Leads to Workplace Happiness?

Provide more trainings

A study recently released entitled Definitive Guide to Building a Better Workforce revealed that best-in-class companies are 22 percent more likely than other companies to increase company training for critical skill areas.

By participating in training, employees especially the young talents can improve the skills, better understand their company and develop valuable leadership skills. Training also should be a great chance to encourage the team bonding and resource sharing, as a good retaining attempt an employer could do.

In the other hand, mature employees who are rich of knowledge and experience, comprehend much how to solve common employees issues and survive to face the workloads. They are indeed, a great source to share and motivate and training could be a retaining attempt where the aging employees could be involved and contributed.

Listen to the feedback

An open communication workplace must be the most ideal workplace every employee can wish for! Employers and employees are humans who naturally need to speak up and being listened at the same time.

Regardless the different roles and levels of positions, a company should give employees times to speak about everything, either personal or professional issues and ask for the response, suggestion and advice towards their issues.

Such healthy and fair working environment could boost people’s productivity and they would think twice to move to another workplace.

Recognition efforts

Employee recognition doesn’t have to be costly, as some simple things could make them hesitate to look for another job. A warm greeting, congratulation email, sending gratitude and motivation cards are some tiny things that would work much to increase employee’s recognition.

Employees engagement is a key role to the company’s development. It needs times and much efforts to dampen the employee’s turnover, but it is not impossible to do. Give the best a company can do to retain the best talents, and get the better results after implementing them.

Read also: How to Give Employees the Assistance They Need, When They Need it the Most?