And finance executives shouldn't lose sight of a quicker and cheaper fix that is perhaps equally as effective: a verbal or e-mailed thank-you. Singling people out for praise at an all-department meeting, or inviting them in for a meeting in the C-suite, can do wonders for making people feel good, Gochman notes. As Hosein says: "Throwing money at the problem is not always the answer."
Building on research that shows that employees are less likely to leave a company if they feel they have friends on staff, many companies are aiming to step up their team-building activities. Community-service projects are one popular way to do this, says Jodi Chavez, senior vice president at Ajilon Finance.
At Odyssey, Alberico is currently spearheading an effort to get his finance team, along with the rest of the company, to work together on a community-service project instead of simply donating money to a cause. "We believe that an employee who is involved in a good project sponsored by the company will feel good about belonging to the company, so indirectly, it should translate into better retention," he says.
A longtime member of the organization Junior Achievement, which puts business executives in K-12 classrooms, Alberico now has a cross-functional team coming up with recommendations on which not-for-profit organizations would be the best fit. He says the company's philanthropy budget is likely to stay the same, but expects to get a lot more bang for the buck.
Some Fixes Aren't Quick
A word of caution: setting up these programs can take time and may not be immediately fruitful. "You may not get a huge turnout the first time, but the people who do it will probably come back with great stories about how they were touched, and you'll likely get more next time," says Dernavich. It's also important to figure out whether people are willing to do such projects on their own time, after work hours, or if they need to be scheduled within the 9-to-5 timeframe.
Company culture can also be a big factor in the success of such initiatives. Michael Porcelain, CFO of Comtech Tel, says his company's finance organization purposely stays away from team-building activities because such activities "feel contrived," and instead tries to let the 20-person finance team develop friendships on their own. "They don't want team-building activities; they want to go home," he says. (In fact, offering extra days off and flexible hours is one strategy that nearly every finance executive interviewed for this piece is using, one that creates almost no cost to the business if done right.)
Does It Work?
Measuring the effectiveness of any of these programs is maddeningly difficult and can generally be seen only over time. As Porcelain says, success or failure "is in the turnover numbers and in the number of people complaining." That doesn't mean companies don't try to get a quicker read on whether their retention efforts are working. Anonymous surveys of employees are one common method and can turn up some useful information, such as how much importance employees put on soft benefits such as flex time and time off. Alberico says that employee retention is a topic of discussion at management meetings "at least quarterly, and as often as monthly." Meanwhile, executives like Hosein and Provenzano say they are trying to get more one-on-one meetings going on to get a sense of how employees feel.
Whatever the strategy, CFOs would be well advised to be proactive rather than reactive, says Gochman. Once an employee gets an offer from another company, almost no counteroffer can patch up the relationship. "Sometimes people stay because companies throw a lot of money at them, but it isn't the same, and there's some anger there about 'Why did I have to go through this to get the promotion?'" says Gochman. And those employees usually leave within two years, anyway.
Smart managers, therefore, should take steps now to ensure that when recovery arrives it does not inspire a raft of departures.
Alix Stuart is senior editor for human capital and careers at CFO.
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