Employee retention has become one of the most overcomplicated conversations in leadership. There are countless articles, tools, and “best practices” promising to help organizations keep their people. But in my experience as chief people officer of a thriving, locally owned public accounting firm, retention doesn’t come from programs, perks, checking boxes or chasing trends. It comes from how seriously you take your responsibility to the people who choose to work for you. At its core, it comes down to three things: hiring well, developing people thoughtfully, and most importantly, being the kind of workplace people can’t imagine leaving.
We often think about retention as what we need to do to keep employees happy, so they don’t leave. But before focusing on keeping people, it’s essential to ensure you’re bringing in the right people – those who can thrive at your organization and for whom your organization is the right place too. Hiring poorly has a significant impact on turnover, and it also affects teams, culture, and trust. If you’re interested in improving retention, start by looking closely at your hiring practices and outcomes.
A good hire is someone who can do the job well (or has the aptitude to learn how to do it well), someone with a strong attitude, someone aligned with your culture, and someone who genuinely shares your organization’s values. Hiring with intention is one of the earliest ways leaders demonstrate care for their people. Prioritizing thoughtful talent acquisition and candidate selection is critical if you want to avoid the pain, disruption, and cost of a bad hire, whether that’s someone who lacks the skills and capacity for the role or someone who simply isn’t a values fit.
In addition to hiring well, it’s equally important to be intentional about how you develop your people. That work begins the moment someone signs your offer letter. Good development starts with good onboarding, and good onboarding starts with good preboarding. During the preboarding process, you should focus on building connection and clarity, helping new hires feel welcome, prepared, and confident before their first day by sharing expectations, introducing them to your culture, and eliminating as many first-day unknowns as possible.
A thoughtful onboarding experience should address both the technical components, like processes, systems, and software, as well as the cultural ones. Beyond formal training, onboarding should create space for connection. Individuals do not commit to organizations – they commit to relationships. As such, it’s important to build in opportunities for new team members to form meaningful connections through virtual or in-person meet-and-greets, coffees, lunches, or group events, giving them time to understand what truly makes your organization unique.
While the initial onboarding phase may last a few weeks, the reality is that it can take up to a full year for someone to truly feel settled in a new role. That means ongoing support matters. And once someone hits that one-year mark, the need for intentional development doesn’t go away – it actually becomes even more critical. Underperformance needs to be addressed quickly and clearly, with honesty and respect. Average performers should be coached to strengthen their skills and close gaps. High performers, in particular, need to be thoughtfully stretched.
Most high performers crave growth, and what meaningful development looks like will vary based on individual skills, goals, and motivations. When development is neglected, your strongest people can become bored, disengaged, and frustrated. When development is prioritized, people feel seen, invested in, and valued. Whether the goal is reducing exits due to poor performance or retaining high performers, intentional development plays a critical role in long-term retention.
Ultimately, the strongest retention strategy is becoming a workplace where people can’t imagine leaving. That doesn’t mean trying to be everything to everyone. It means being clear about who you are, what you value, and how you show up for your people, consistently. People stay where they feel challenged, supported, respected, and connected to something that matters. When employees can see a future for themselves, trust their leaders, and believe their contributions make a difference, staying stops feeling like a decision and starts feeling like the obvious choice.
If you’re looking to improve your retention rates and aren’t sure where to start, begin by examining your turnover data to understand what’s really driving it. Losing poor performers? Revisit your hiring and development practices. Losing strong performers to competitors? Take an honest inventory of who you are as an organization and what you could do to become a place people can’t imagine leaving.
Retention is rarely about a single policy or program. It’s the cumulative result of how you hire, how you develop, and how it feels to work in your organization day after day. When leaders get those things right and demonstrate genuine care and concern for their people, retention becomes a natural outcome. And when they don’t, no amount of perks or messaging will convince great people to stay. Retention isn’t something you fix – it’s something you earn through the decisions you make every day.
