Higher Pay
Nothing keeps an employee from bolting to another job better than a healthy paycheck. The company that provides high wages and performance bonuses is going to experience a much more robust atmosphere of employee loyalty than the company that immediately looks to trimming labor costs in an effort to save themselves from all the other bad business decisions they made.
Training and Continuing Education
Another excellent means of inspiring employees to stay with you even when enticed by a higher salary to bolt to one of your competitors is the institution of a program that provides paid training and at least some sort of financial assistance for continuing education. You can count on increasing the potential for employee loyalty by offering to pay for college classes, paying for employees to attend conferences and seminars and extending opportunities for training that can result in advancement as a result of gaining new skills.
Performance Reviews and Rewards
Employees will be more likely to actively engage in becoming better workers if they know their work is being noticed and appreciated. Regular performance reviews instill confidence in employees that the company is taking note of their contributions and are offering rewards for a job well done. The performance review process can also have the effect of revealing which employees are not doing their fare share, which can result in a more efficient and open working environment.
Improved Working Conditions
If you really want to make sure that you can keep a good employee from taking a hike to accept a better paying job, take note of the conditions in which he works. Steps ranging from providing more spacious cubicles to upgrading and maintaining the bathroom to providing free donuts and coffee or installing a soft drink vending machine in the employee lounge can increase worker loyalty. If the worker honestly believes that you are aware of working conditions beneath your executive suite and that you are making a concerted effort to improve those conditions, that worker is much more likely to stick with the devil he knows than take a chance on a devil he doesn’t. (There are no angels in the world of American commerce: get used to it.)