We know that hourly positions, particularly in the hospitality industry, often have high turnover. With the demand for quality talent very high across every industry, retaining your top employees in your country club is very important. Here’s how to hang on to your best employees longer to benefit your club and its members.
Keeping Top Employees Longer
Your members appreciate the staff that serves them. This makes it very noticeable when a top employee leaves your club for greener pastures. Sometimes your members may even leave and follow their favorites elsewhere—it happens. So, the cost of losing a valued employee resonates across your organization.
Your employees have choices for where they can work. This is especially true for skilled staff, such as bartenders, chefs, and more. High performers may seek greener grass because they know there are opportunities out there for their skills. Many may look for ways to improve their skills, make more money, or have more career advantages. Your goal is to discard the lower-level disengaged workers for A-players and then keep them. But how can you do that? Here are some tips:
- Pay your top producers well. The opportunity to make top money will keep your top performers around. Consider offering incentives for performance that benefit both your club and your employees. Use some creativity on this. Connect financial rewards with performance whenever possible. Consider rewards based on positive comment cards turned in by club members. Or, offer performance reviews in six-month increments along with even small raises, to keep your employees around. As an alternative find ways to supplement the base pay to keep your employees engaged.
- Connect the work your employees do with a greater goal. Serving guests is a part of the country club experience, so connecting the work your employees do with a mission of service is important. Align your business rewards with these mission-based goals but also offer additional perks such as flexible schedules or discounts on meals or even free golf.
- Treat your employees as valuable. Their opinions should matter. Give them responsibilities that will engage them. Ask them to help you solve problems. For example, assemble a team of valued employees to help interview new employees. Set up a mentoring program where existing teams can befriend and teach new workers. The data shows this will not only help you retain new workers but also keep your existing team members.
- Include everyone in the process of pay-for-performance. Develop a plan for everyone from receptionists to the cleaning staff. You want to keep every employee that is a top performer no matter what their role is.
- Consider sharing profits with your employees. Talk about the mission of the organization and how improved membership benefits everyone. Then share successes with the entire team so everyone is working toward a mission to build the business. Then reward everyone for achieving that success.
Keeping top country club employees is everyone’s job. To set yourself up for success, talk with Gecko Hospitality about how we can help your business.
