The moment you find that new hire you’ve been looking for and can say with confidence that they’ll be a perfect fit for your team is always exciting, if not a downright relief. However, while retaining long-term employees may not offer the same buzz that comes with finding untapped potential that’s right on the cusp of being realised, I believe it’s even more crucial when it comes to ensuring the very best for businesses and their clients.
At Randstad, we know that no matter how talented a new team member might be, it’s our long-term staff that can be counted on to be the most effective for our clients. This is due to the time and effort required to develop essential networks and relationships that optimise productivity and in turn ensure client satisfaction.
None of this happens overnight, which is why changing consultants – as skilled as they might be – can throw a temporary spanner in the works as they get up to speed in a complex, devil-is-in-the-detail job, that’s also in a constant state of change.
Similar hurdles can be found in almost every industry across Australia, so companies must recognise the value of their experienced employees and remain vigilant when it comes to ensuring their employee value proposition (EVP) is enticing.
As such, Randstad is always looking for new ways to let our team members know how much we appreciate the skills and expertise they bring to bear for our clients.
our most recent examples of this are:
- two new leave offerings we’ve rolled out that I’m confident will help encourage staff to remain with us for the long term via the combination of more days off per year
- more flexibility in accessing leave than they’ve had in the past.
The first of these is the introduction of loyalty leave, which will see Randstad team members receive an extra day of rest for every year of service for up to five years. It means long-term employees can enjoy up to a whole additional working week of leave annually.
I want to note that these additional days do not accrue as traditional leave does but rather reset with every individual team member’s work anniversary.
This is an important detail as it provides a way of encouraging staff to actually take advantage of and enjoy their additional leave, rather than allowing it to sit unused.
I often see companies with generous leave packages whose staff fear taking said leave because of concerns. Doing so will either set them back or result in the view that they somehow lack dedication to their job.
Such a scenario is the last thing we want, so we hope this new offering illustrates our strong endorsement of Randstad staff making the most of their time off and striking a healthy work-life balance.
The importance of which has never been more evident than in the wake of COVID-19’s unprecedented challenge to the work-life status quo.
The second measure we’ve introduced is a purchased leave option that will enable our team members to access up to two weeks of additional leave, which they will then pay off over an agreed time.
This should inject more flexibility into our leave offering and encourage our colleagues to take time off when they need it, even if their accrued leave is running a little low – we’ve all been there at some point, haven’t we?
Our Randstad team has carefully designed these measures to enhance our EVP further and make work more meaningful for every member of our extended working family.
As we keep a close eye on the engagement and wellbeing scores that come courtesy of our monthly pulse staff surveys, I expect we’ll see an abundance of evidence that by encouraging the taking of leave and incentivising team members to stay with us for the long term. We can build an increasingly happy, healthy, highly skilled team of specialists.
And I’m confident that by doing so, we will only achieve positive outcomes for Randstad and even better ones for our clients and candidates.
If you want to learn more about what it’s like to work at Randstad, click the link below.
Felicity Empson
human resources director
