Effective Recruitment and Retention
Effective recruitment and retention of staff can and should lead to improved quality of services. The cost of recruitment and training can easily spiral if staff turnover increases. Most of these costs are attached to advertising, interviewing processes and development activities.
Most organizations have a recruitment and retention plan, it’s worth reviewing the plan taking into consideration the good practice documents available.
There are three key documents that cover recruitment and retention in the substance misuse field:
- Recruitment Guidance for Employers – Home Office
- NTA Briefing Paper 4 – Recruitment and Retention
- Taking a Competency Based Approach to Fair Recruitment in the Substance Misuse Field by Jackie Campbell MCIPD Sept 2007
nta_recruitment_and_retention_2004_ddsp4.pdf [601.47KB]
Recruitment guidance for employers.doc [76.50KB]
Using competencies for fair recruitment2.pdf [642.37KB]
The following are taken from the NTA briefing paper. Good recruitment and selection can result in:
• an effective, better motivated workforce
• reduced labour turnover
• reduced absence
• reduced stress levels
• the demonstration of adherence to good anti-discrimination practices.
A recruitment process should be:
• efficient – cost effective in method and sources
• effective – producing enough suitable candidates
• fair – ensuring that decisions are made on merit without discrimination.(ACAS, 2003).
Staff Retention
It is important that the right staff are recruited and offered training and opportunities to expand their skills to help retain experienced and skilled workers in the sector. The cost of recruiting new staff and training them can be huge and a high turnover rate can affect a service’s image and culture (LearnDirect, 2003).
The key to retention is to address the primary reasons given for employee dissatisfaction, which include:
• boredom or lack of challenging work
• limited opportunities• lack of appreciation
• ineffective co-workers• lack of leadership or poor supervision• unreasonable workload• unreasonable work hours
• insufficient pay.(University of California, 2000).
Useful links:
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development recruitment resources
