You are nothing without your employees, how do you create a sense of belonging and retain the best talent?

After hiring them, the first thing I tell my employees: “You are the company. While the customers pay, you create the value for which they are paying. You are the most valuable assets to the customers and our entire company.” — A successful glass manufacturing industrialist

In this article, I will give you my insights, but please note that I am always learning new things and will often change my views and opinions, so please comment and share your thoughts if you believe I missed something.

Most founders have to go through a superhero phase where you feel you have to do everything by yourself. However, the art of delegation starts to set in over the months when you have hired some employees and begin to get used to having support around you. Your employees start adding their flavour, and they start creating what you call a business.

Somewhere in this process of growth and delegation, most founders do not realise that they are becoming leaders of a vision that is their business. The most recent lesson I have learned is your employees often look up to you. You are, in a sense, a mentor, a guide and a teacher to everyone who joins your company. However, if the only thing you can give your employees is a salary, then you are doing it very wrong.

With great power often comes great responsibility, and running a business is no different (Noblessè Oblige). We often mention how we have a sense of responsibility to our stakeholders and our customers, but we often forget about something fundamental. You have a sense of responsibility to your employees, which make your company.

When people start working for your company, some will join you because they want to be part of your vision, and most will join to gain experience and money. But they will only stay with you and keep improving themselves for you if they believe to belong there and start treating the company as their home.

It would help if you started by leading by example. Then, your staff will start emulating your behaviour and take off in your image because you are a leader. Leading means not saying things that you do not or will not do or follow. If you want more accountability, start taking credit for your mess-ups in front of your employees. Taking responsibility for failure will not lower your credibility but gain you something called respect.

That customer meeting, where your staff got the financials wrong? Instead of a verbal beating to your team, apologise to the customer and accept the mistake to be yours. After the meeting, talk to your team and kindly explain the error and ask them for the cause. Make them feel comfortable, and do not be accusatory. After finding the reason, you will often find that you did not delegate concisely; if so, accept the fault, and say you will try to do better. If it was their fault, take the time to explain to them how to avoid a mistake like that in the future and be extra nice to them.

Even saying all this, there genuinely are instances where some employees are just bad people. I see it this way; there are three types of people:

• The Givers — Who Give and Help their co-workers, taking the initiative without asking for something in return
• The Matchers — They will help if someone has helped them before and expect them to give back any extra help they provide
• The Takers — They will take help and steal the credit, never giving anything in return

Usually, it is the case that only matchers and takers go up the ladder as the givers typically do not broadcast their contributions. To avoid this and create a company filled with givers, you need to stop ignoring the people at the bottom. Instead, look out for quiet people who deliver a lot. Ensure to check the reportings you get often and train your executives to look out for givers and takers.

Stop looking for experience, and start looking for moldability and the ability to learn. Experience is significant for immediate value creation, but long-term value gets built on a solid foundation. As a rule, you should give six months to train a single employee to work to a standard you can appreciate.

Yes, you can hire talent, but the talents that remain with you are the ones you nurture. Do not expect them to be brilliant. It is your job to make your staff bright.

Start educating your employees. If you are worried that giving them more certifications will allow them to look for better jobs, you are not doing your job correctly. Instead, fund their certificates, degrees or whatever they want to do to increase their knowledge. Help them find mentors within your own company and give them time to grow. Share articles and create useful material, put them on the payroll to learn. This culture will compound over time and will help genuinely build a good business.

Building a business is no different than building an empire. Start with a solid foundation and a system where there is belief, belonging and education. Then, let your staff share in the profits; do not be distracted by greed and short term benefits. If your company, just like an empire, has a windfall, invest in infrastructure, give your staff suitable hardware, upgrade their health insurances, help contribute to their deposit, help them with their kid’s schooling. Doing this will only build gratitude for you and belonging, be transparent with them and let them know it.

Motivate your staff to give their opinions, if they have a suggestion, a way to do things better, show them that you are willing to listen and allow them to prove themselves. Do not forget to give them credit for something they do. Stealing credit will not make you a bigger or better business. Has your employee helped you create a fantastic breakthrough? Make sure to list it in big words whenever you write or talk about it.

Remember the mentorship? Do not just think about business, be there for emotional support if something happens. Show them you genuinely care about them by knowing their wants. Ask them about what they enjoy doing and keep this in mind if the answer is different from their current role. Give them advice on saving a certain percentage of their salary and investing it to compound.

Motivate them to innovate, do not put your ego in the way. Instead, if your staff has an idea for your business, support them in its execution. If you have created a sense of belonging, your team will stay with you through the tough and trust you. You will not build trust overnight; you will have to earn it by showing through actions and earning their trust in you. Your role is to create value for your employees just as you do for your customers. Let them be intrapreneurs.

To start building the all-important trust, make sure to give them room. Do not try and micro-manage your staff. Instead, show your belief in your team by providing them with the option to work remotely if possible. Take their input on deadlines. Allow them to participate in brainstorming on your sprints. Make sure to let them know your vision and allow them to build upon it so they can see possibilities of growing with you.

I prefer them to treat me like a friend and share memes with me while being casual. You put hierarchy and accountability through reporting, but general interactions should be open and approachable. No one should feel below someone. That is it for today’s blog. I will keep trying to share my experience and views with you. Thank you for reading!

I am the founder of Vast Dreams, where we design intelligent systems to make your data work for you.

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