None of us want to lose good employees, but what can leaders do to increase retention? One thing that doesn’t often get addressed in many businesses is helping employees with budgeting. US households average around $7,000 in credit card debt. Do your employees understand the repercussion of what that even means?
We appreciate the importance of mental health for employees and should recognize that financial stress can cause lost productivity and take a real toll on employee mental health. Providing education to help improve personal finances can make a difference.
As leaders, we certainly should be practicing good financial habits in our businesses, and we need to help our employees establish good personal financial habits. Unfortunately, often individuals receive limited, if any, education regarding how to manage a household budget. Encouraging conversations about budgeting basics and providing resources and education can help managers and staff.
Do you provide any type of savings opportunities at your company? Retirement savings? Health savings accounts? Flexible spending? Emergency savings? Are employees taking advantage of them? Do you provide education about what they are and how they can be used, and, if so, is the education centered only once/year around open enrollment?
We need to have more frequent conversations about our benefits and how they can affect employees’ lives (hopefully for the better!). Creating productive conversations about budgeting can encourage understanding about utilizing these benefits and/or making staff aware of area resources and the differences they can make. Discussions can be formal (like bringing in a financial expert) or informal, asking each other about best practices (depending on your company/culture/need).
The important thing is to open the door to these discussions, why it’s important to have a budget, and what can be done to help. Caring about our employees and their finances can affect retention and improve lives.
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