by Bill Werst- author of Common SenseManaging

This is the fifth in a five part series on achieving Employee Retention. The articles cover:
1. Competitive Compensation & Benefits
2. Sound Organizational Structure
3. Leadership & a Motivating Work Environment
4. Recognition & Rewards
5. Employee Empowerment, Personal Growth, & Dreams

The premise of the articles is that employee retention is not a program or product, but rather the result of effective organizationand leadership practices.

Empowerment
Reduces customer turnover
Allows you to recover fast
Reduces undesired employee turnover
Increases profits

While customers would like your organization to provide perfect seamless service, they don't expect you to do so. However, they doexpect you to fix any problems with no hassles and do so in a timely manner. Only an organization with empowered front line employeescan meet these customer expectations.

Effective empowerment relies on accomplishing the four steps previously covered in building employee retention. In brief, thesesteps are:

1. Attracting and hiring talented people with competitive compensation and benefits
2. Establishing a sound organization structure in which all employees know and understand their organization's direction and values.
3. Providing leadership and a work environment that supports employees' growth and success, ensures that employees know whytheir job is important and what it is they are trying to accomplish, and have the appropriate training and tools to succeed.
4. Recognizing and rewarding people for their successes and correcting or, if necessary, replacing those who are not succeeding.

Attempting to introduce empowerment before you've accomplished these essential steps is a prescription for failure.

To error is human.
To empower your people to fix the error IMMEDIATELY is divine.

Empowered employees are able to provide hassle free and immediate fixes to most customer problems. Authorizing employeesto make decisions also positively effects your employees. It says:

We trust you to make intelligent decisions.

We value your judgement.

Our research has consistently shown that being trusted and feeling valued are two of the most important factors in employeesatisfaction and retention.

To some extent, you already empower your people because you can't be everywhere at once. What's happening within your organizationright now .. . . as you're reading this sentence? When you're on a business trip? On vacation?

To gain the full benefit of empowering people takes a bit of reconditioning. People are used to asking permission and followingorders. We spend our first twelve years in school raising our hands to ask permission and waiting for the bell to ring to tell us when tocome and go. People naturally look to policy or delay while seeking approval before making a decision. Even as adults, we don't want to"get in trouble".

Consequently, to establish effective empowerment you have to clearly define the employees' areas of decision making authority. Onesuggestion is to start with a reasonably small area of authority and expand that area as your people gain comfort and confidence withmaking decisions. One obvious area is to authorize your staff to make decisions on issues in which they already know how you woulddecide.

It is essential to conduct ongoing meetings to support, encourage, and constantly expand the employees' area of authority.

The real test of empowerment comes when an employee makes a bad decision - - and it will happen. Treat it the same as when youmake a bad decision. You don't fire yourself, publicly humiliate yourself, or take away your authority. You review the situation[gently] and figure out how to do it better the next time.

Another concern many managers express is empowering people to handle decisions involving money. Simply stated: "Won't they giveaway the farm?!?" My observation and experience suggest just the opposite to be true. People who earn $10 - $20 per hour tend tothink in $1's and sometimes $10's. People earning over $50,000 tend to think in $100's. People earning over $100,000 tend to think in$1000's.

Front line people tend to think that 'giving' a customer a $5 refund is significant and hesitate in rebating $20 or more. $50,000+ employeesare comfortable refunding up to $100. Top executives are used to making major financial decisions. $1000 seems like a small amount tothem.

There will always be exceptions to these generalizations. However, when front line people handle a customer problem involving money,they usually give back far less money than a manager or executive would. Consequently, empowerment strengthens customer retentionby reducing customer hassles and speeding recovery time, while at the same time costing your organization less money.

The primary increase in profits will result from retaining customers by fulfilling their expectations smoothly and rapidly. Secondary profitincreases will result from reduced employee turnover and less expensive decisions.

Personal Growth & Dreams
At the top of the employee retention peak is:

Providing personal growth opportunities
Learning employees' passions, personal goals, aims, and desires
Helping employees' fulfill their dreams
Many managers and executives fear that if they train and develop their people, these same people will leave for better jobs. Somewill. However, by following this "bare foot in the winter and pregnant in the summer" philosophy they limit the same resourcesthat their organization depends upon for its success.

You're only as good as your people.
Retention studies have found that personal growth and development is an employee satisfier and important retention factor.

Personal growth and development starts with job skills training. It also includes:

Customer communications skills training.
Inclusion in identifying, developing, and implementing opportunities of improving the work environment, processes, and procedures.
Overseeing your operation while you are on vacation or traveling
Representing the department at meetings
Hosting visiting clients
Opportunities to participate and lead special projects
And, of course, empowerment to make customer service decisions.
These opportunities for personal growth need to be tied to each individual's personal goals, aims, and dreams. Doing this requires thatyou first learn each individual's goals, aims, and dreams. The primary means of attaining this information is to ASK.

Ask during their initial interview
Ask during orientation
Ask at the end of their probation period
Ask as you set up the criteria and schedule for their individual performance review
Ask before, during, or after your weekly staff meeting
Ask while you are having lunch with each individual
Ask as part of the employee satisfaction survey you conduct
Ask as part of the individual's performance review
Keep asking on a continuous basis. These are constantly changing personal issues. Record their answers and refer to your notes whenappropriate opportunities occur.

In today's marketplace, people don't want to be treated like a commodity. They want to know that someone cares about their dreams.

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Bill Werst is president of Growth Associates, an international consulting firm specializing in effective customer treatment and communicationskills, customer satisfaction and loyalty measurement, employee satisfaction and loyalty measurement, organizational and staffdevelopment, and continuous quality improvement.

He is the author of Common Sense Managing, Simple Ideas That Produce Results. The desktop guide offers easy to use exercises andsurveys, plus summary questions to support your successfully designing, building, and maintaining your business. Common SenseManaging is immediately available through http://www.growthassociates.orgor Amazon. Bill may bereached at 541-386-1117 or bill@growthassociates.org.