“I’m Staying Here” Meets “What Else Is Out There?”

What can employers do to understand the level of commitment of their employees? Ask them! By doing so, employers may identify the employees at risk of leaving, plus the honest and sincere communication can help create a better employee experience.

But wait, let’s take a step back. What drives commitment? Three variables affect work commitment—satisfaction, investment, and alternatives. (Do note: It does not need to be equal parts of each—employees can have various degrees of the three variables working together.)

• Satisfaction is the extent to which employees’ expectations are met regarding the company, the job, and the culture.
• Investment is how much an employee has put into the company; things like time, contributions, creativity, projects worked on, and relationships built.
• Alternatives are perceived job opportunities or what employees think they can do and receive if they leave.

Right now, it is an employee’s market, which increases the influence that alternatives have on employee commitment. Companies are hiring, and employees feel they will find what they want elsewhere, making them more willing to leave. In “normal” times, investment tends to have more influence on commitment. The more someone has invested their time and talents, the more relationships and connections they have made, the harder it is to leave.

Ask Them

As mentioned earlier, the best way to gauge commitment is to ask employees. Here are several ways to do that.

• Surveys are a good first step, especially if there is a lack of trust within the organization or if open communication is a struggle. Relying on more anonymous methods often reaps more honest answers. But be warned, it can be overwhelming to see results when the organization or culture has issues. And if many employees are dissatisfied, trying to turn that around will require effort from all levels of the company.
   
• Roundtable discussions between a senior leader and a subgroup of employees is a healthy balance between anonymous communication and one-on-one conversations. Don’t ask everyone in the organization to weigh in, but prioritize the most critical people, the ones you cannot lose right now. Will employees be honest? Will they answer at all? Leaders will need to put in the work to get the responses out. Their emotional intelligence, comfort level, and facilitation skills will help draw out answers that tell the story of what is going on with staffers’ commitment.
   
• Stay interviews are a great way to evaluate how likely it is that employees will remain with your organization. Have in-person conversations, asking questions from those three variables mentioned earlier. Start with “How invested and engaged do you feel right now?” It should be a recurrent discussion, but many organizations are terrified to ask the question because they do not want to face the truth, which keeps them from asking. Also, a critical part of stay interviews is that leaders need coaching on how to talk it to act on what was uncovered during their conversation.

What about remote workers? How can employers make them feel like a part of the bigger picture when many are not onsite anymore? Leaders should shift to become (much) more vocal. Talk with employees. Be equal parts coach and manager. It is time to elevate behavioral competencies for leaders with teams. Checking in on employees is just dialogue—for people to feel connected there needs to be more talking and real conversations happening.

If you want the commitment from your remote employees that they will stay working for you, the relationships you build with them and the degree to which they invest in the work they do are what will make it or break it. It requires more communication than physically being in the same space.

COVID-19 has greatly affected culture, leadership, technology, and workspace. Because of that, employers need to broaden their point of view on how and where work gets done. There are so many knowledge-based positions out there. For any job that does not require a person to be physically present, work location can be negotiable.

On the Flip Side

Now that you know the best practices to measure the level of commitment of employees, let’s look at how employers can get commitment through recruiting and retaining great talent.

There are all kinds of stats about people considering a career change. The pandemic has prompted people to reconsider what they are doing and how they want to spend their time. Employers willing to hire based upon a transferrable skillset, rather than an academic degree or previous experience may be able to increase their candidate pool.

There is no denying that employees’ commitment to their jobs looks different than it has in the past. While employers try to shed some light on where their employees stand by asking questions and having candid discussions, they should notice issues in the organization that may need attention. Taking strides to fix problems may help with unexpected departures and improve the overall commitment to the organization.