Have you heard of Stay Interviews?

A Stay Interview is the exact opposite of an Exit Interview.

A Stay Interview is defined as a regular conversation with your employees so as to maximise the “stay rate” of your employees. In other words, it is to miminise employee attrition rates.

So instead of waiting to talk to the employee at the Exit Interview after the employee resigns, a Stay Interview is an on-going process to engage your employees to encourage your employees to stay.

When I was managing my team in the corporate world, I never had to resort of any Stay Interviews, because I had built a bond so strong with my team that we enjoyed 0% attrition rate for 13 years.

Here are 10 things I did with my team that kept my attrition rate at 0% and employee engagement at 100% for 13 years and eliminated the need for any Stay Interviews:

• I had regular personal conversations with each and every team member
• I genuinely cared for their professional career development and growth
• I genuinely cared for their personal growth
• I took pains to plan their career paths
• I regularly asked for their feedback, suggestions and comments
• I delegated important tasks and projects to them
• I encouraged them to run their own race
• I always gave credit where credit was due
• We celebrated every success
• We solved problems as a team

Stay Interviews are a great concept, and it has the potential to help organisations increase engagement levels and lower attrition rates.

However, the fact that you need to implement Stay Interviews is evident that you are not engaging your employees enough, and that you are not having deep conversations with each one of them on a regular basis.

If you have been engaging your team members on a personal level and you have already built the bond and the trust with them, you need not worry about attrition rate and least of all, Stay Interviews.

It’s important to keep in mind that employee engagement is a two-way street, and to be successful, you as the manager or the leader need to be available, genuine and authentic. The fastest and surest way to kill employee engagement is to be arrogant, fake and ungenuine.

The fastest and surest way to kill employee engagement is to be arrogant, fake and ungenuine

So in today’s highly volatile labour market and cut-throat competition, what will you do today to raise your employee engagement and minimise your employee attrition rate?

Are you prepared to be available, genuine and authentic?