{"id":57021,"date":"2018-12-06t12:00:09","date_gmt":"2018-12-06t17:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/48e130086c.nxcli.net\/?p=57021"},"modified":"2024-08-14t11:27:02","modified_gmt":"2024-08-14t15:27:02","slug":"battling-staff-turnover","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.g005e.com\/2018\/12\/06\/battling-staff-turnover\/","title":{"rendered":"battling staff turnover"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a>how to see it coming and what to do about it.<\/strong><\/p>\n by steven e. sacks, cpa, cgma, abc<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n while the consideration of succession planning has taken up a lot of airtime in recent years, there is something even more important to consider and that is how to\u00a0attract\u00a0and\u00a0retain talent.<\/p>\n more: <\/b>today\u2019s workplace challenge: communicating across generations, cultures, and diversity<\/a> | the damocles sword of staff retention<\/a> | how enthusiastic is your staff?<\/a> | can you recite your mission statement?<\/a> | your firm\u2019s biggest assets walk out the door every day<\/a> questions most often asked by a cpa firm managing partner or a ceo when someone leaves:<\/p>\n there are multiple problems with this. first, why\u00a0after\u00a0the fact were these questions asked? was there a system in place to regularly gauge employee satisfaction? did the firm ever survey the employees on their attitudes about work, personalities and culture?<\/p>\n more important than employee satisfaction \u2013 and a much bigger issue \u2013 is employee\u00a0engagement<\/strong>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n when a cpa firm or business is small, maybe with a single office, it is easier to have a handle on the views and attitudes of employees. something as simple as bringing someone into an office for a confidential, yet informal chat can help reveal existing or potential problems. how often does this really happen?<\/p>\n as a firm or business grows in revenue size and increases its headcount and number of offices, it becomes much harder to take a regular pulse on the employee engagement. when this happens, you can miss critical signs, such as if the firm is communicating timely and relevant information to its staff, and if the firm\u2019s overall mission and purpose is evident to all staff.<\/p>\n what is meant by engagement?<\/strong><\/p>\n the looming challenge for cpa firms in the foreseeable future is to recruit and keep top talent. an engaged firm focuses on its staff, clients and leaders. the firm will ensure that each staff member is given an opportunity to develop skills, and given a career roadmap and opportunities to learn from partners. an added bonus would be for current staff to tout the benefits of working in the firm to new candidates. with respect to clients, the firm wants to ensure that there is two-way communication, and encouragement for feedback is frequent. the firm would also desire that your current clients sing your firm\u2019s praises to potential clients. finally, firm leaders want to confirm that their partner group is aligned with the goals of the firm, provides useful feedback to their direct reports, and is supportive of the staff\u2019s career goals.<\/p>\n what you don\u2019t know can hurt you<\/strong><\/p>\n historically, cpa firms are loath to conduct surveys of their people. \u201call too often, firms think they can do the surveys themselves, or more accurately, believe there\u2019s nothing to be gained from the survey because they don\u2019t have a turnover problem,\u201d said lee eisenstaedt, co-founder of chicago-based\u00a0leading with courage academy. \u201cthese are not the only reasons,\u201d eisenstaedt observed. \u201cthere\u2019s the reality that firm leaders are afraid their employees will only focus on the negative things and what is revealed will force them to deal with areas that need to be addressed.\u201d<\/p>\n from his experience, eisenstaedt knows that these beliefs don\u2019t hold water. his exposure to firms that operate with blissful ignorance will only serve to delay the inevitable, whether it is the loss of key employees or important clients, or a general malaise that blankets the entire firm.<\/p>\n \u201ci have found one of the biggest things firm leaders don\u2019t want to discover is that their leadership skills aren\u2019t as good as they think they are,\u201d eisenstaedt noted. \u201cadding to this angst is the possibility that the survey\u2019s results will create expectations among the employees to change things, which will take time, and the worst of it is that any corrections made will take away from what otherwise would be billable time.\u201d he further noted, \u201cthere will be behaviors partners will have to change or actions they will have to take, such as coaching or resolving disputes. the bottom line is that hearing the truth can be painful.\u201d<\/p>\n silence is not golden<\/strong><\/p>\n findings show that there is a direct correlation between poor internal communication and reduced motivation. not having an open channel of communication, or at least encouraging one, will only allow issues to fester until they cannot be easily resolved. \u201caccording to a study conducted by about.com, a lack of transparent communication is the number one reason employees leave their jobs,\u201d eisenstaedt said. \u201ca lack of transparency about how the firm is doing, combined with no guidance on employee performance or a career track, is a formula for leadership failure.\u201d<\/p>\n it is crucial for firm leaders to have their finger on the pulse of the firm. the practice of\u00a0management by walking around<\/strong>\u00a0is not a new leadership tool, but how often its benefits are overlooked. an informal discussion here, a quick chat there, can provide a collection of business intelligence on matters, most of which are lurking just below the surface.<\/p>\n \u201cthere is a wealth of data to collect by asking, listening and learning,\u201d said eisenstaedt. \u201ctwo major red flags that can appear are low morale and reduced productivity. the latter can easily be noticed, given the available digital dashboards firms have come to rely on. the connection of low morale to reduced productivity is evident.\u201d he noted that employees of firms and companies need to be given good reasons to stay in their jobs.<\/p>\n there is an obvious linkage between reduced productivity and the eventual loss of employees. \u201cit is a known fact that people leave their firms because they work for \u2018lousy\u2019 managers and leaders,\u201d eisenstaedt said. \u201canother factor is a greater tolerance for poor performance and sticking too long with underperformers, which results in managers leaving. finally, keeping c- and d-level clients is another reason.\u201d if no one speaks up, irrespective of staff level, the problem just continues to get worse.<\/p>\n a survey may be awful-tasting medicine, but it\u2019s still medicine<\/strong><\/p>\n taking the first step in any endeavor is always the hardest, and the development and issuance of a survey is no exception. \u201cwhy this is such a battle is that we find many firms don\u2019t want to take the time to learn the real reason behind the loss of an employee or client,\u201d said eisenstaedt. \u201cwe even find many partners are reluctant to inform the firm when these losses occur, which skews the retention and \u2018win\u2019 metric.\u201d<\/p>\n there are reasons for this lack of curiosity and interest in learning from these events. he added, \u201cthese events are usually the same reasons firms don\u2019t want to understand employee engagement.\u201d<\/p>\n as is often the case, fees and salaries are the reasons attributed to the loss of clients and staff, respectively. but these are rarely the primary factors.\u00a0to find out the real reason(s), eisenstaedt emphasized the need to have someone unrelated to the client or staff member reach out to learn what the firm could have done differently.\u00a0\u201cthis person could be another partner or an independent third party. it\u2019s then critical that the insights be shared with the team and other partners so everyone can learn from events.\u201d<\/p>\n you\u2019ve got the data. now what?<\/strong><\/p>\n a big challenge is converting the survey findings into action plans. this can only happen if the leadership team is committed to acting on the results. \u201cthey\u2019ll receive plenty of insights into what employees need from their bosses and leaders to get the most from them at work,\u201d eisenstaedt observed. \u201cthe best action plan focuses on two or three initiatives that are communicated across the organization.\u201d he noted that it should be mandatory to share the progress made on these initiatives with\u00a0all <\/strong>employees and discuss any existing obstacles.<\/p>\n the importance of sharing progress with all employees should not be ignored. \u201ca firm needs to share the survey\u2019s purpose with everyone and be consistently transparent,\u201d eisenstaedt said. \u201caddressing key issues with only some staff levels will not lead to the best result and neither will glossing over their urgency or how they will be approached.\u201d<\/p>\n there are unmistakable signs that a firm is committed to following up on the survey\u2019s findings. employees who are present, focused and energized are signs that things are heading in the right direction.<\/p>\n eisenstaedt said, \u201ccommitment is visible in how partners, staff and clients work together to make decisions and that setting priorities are consistent with the firm\u2019s mission, vision and objectives.\u00a0i also wouldn\u2019t overlook adherence to the values of the firm as a signal of commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" how to see it coming and what to do about it.<\/strong>
\nexclusively for pro members. <\/span><\/strong>log in here<\/a> or 2022世界杯足球排名 today<\/a>.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n
\nby steven e. sacks<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1892,"featured_media":50100,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1363,3120,3002,2297,2301],"tags":[643,715],"class_list":["post-57021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-pro-member-exclusive","category-special","category-staffing","category-talent","tag-hiring","tag-jobs"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n