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Employee Retention

blog.samaltman.com

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31–40 of 95 posts

Re: Employee Retention

#31

Post by mahyarm »

Apocryphon wrote: post #8
zinssmeister wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It wouldn't hurt for SV to allow some focus on fixing local issues. Housing being the most important problem in my opinion.

Why oh why aren't more companies returning to the South Bay, specifically San Jose? Downtown SJ is tiny compared to San Francisco's. And there are plenty of tracts for office parks in the suburbs. Sure, all of the hip young hackers want someplace cool to go to, but it's only an hour away to the north.

Dating is absolutely horrible for men in the south bay. That 1 hour barrier puts many brakes on even getting a date with all the single women live in SF and the north east bay area. SF is where all the other young people are. The south bay is suburban families.

Re: Employee Retention

#32

Post by joezydeco »

normloman wrote: post #30
joezydeco wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think people really want to change the world. I believe the phrase is a coded message along the lines of "we're the next Facebook!", an application or service that will radically change the landscape of {insert something here} and turn into a massive public company and insanely huge IPO. That's what the mission is about. Since you can't guarantee success, you put the carrot at the end of the stick and it star…

Yeah, that's another possibility. Or it could be coded for "we're the next Apple," after all the mythologizing that took place in the wake of Steve Job's death.

Oh good point, Apple had the "change the world" message long before anyone else. But any startup that came out today and said "we're the next Apple!" would probably not get much traction.

Re: Employee Retention

#33

Post by a3n »

PaulHoule wrote: post #20

The big mistake everybody makes is thinking the issue is about hiring and retaining individual employees. You don't want to "hire good employees" but you want to "create a great team". If an employee feels like he's part of a team where he can create more value than he could someplace else, it makes sense for him to stay. If he feel s like the team is holding him back, he ought to leave in a heartbeat. It's said that…

Indeed. I've been the happiest when I've felt a part of an obvious team, and the unhappiest when it was just individuals working on their todo lists. In a really large organization a team can be project-based. I'm not very sociable, but I definitely gain energy from "sharing a foxhole" with team mates, and looking back on something and saying "we did that."

I don't care about my todo list type projects other than to do a good job and keep my job.

Re: Employee Retention

#34

Post by MrBuddyCasino »

PaulHoule wrote: post #20

The big mistake everybody makes is thinking the issue is about hiring and retaining individual employees. You don't want to "hire good employees" but you want to "create a great team". If an employee feels like he's part of a team where he can create more value than he could someplace else, it makes sense for him to stay. If he feel s like the team is holding him back, he ought to leave in a heartbeat. It's said that…

I wished more people would understand this. A good example is Pixar, before everything else they concentrate on building teams that can execute.

Re: Employee Retention

#35

Post by DrJokepu »

I wonder how you get people to believe in a mission if scepticism forms an inherent part of the culture. I‘m talking about the UK specifically. I feel like it would be very difficult to get the English guys and girls on my team to take our "mission" even remotely seriously.

Re: Employee Retention

#36

Post by danielweber »

lumens wrote: post #21

Another very important factor in retention not mentioned here is better understanding the aspirations of those people you're considering bringing on to your team. A person's response to questions like, "What are you most interested in professionally?" and, "How do you see yourself developing career wise?" becomes a blueprint for what to do organizationally to retain them. Sometimes the simplest approach is the best:…

The problem is that candidates see "What are you most interested in professionally?" and "How do you see yourself developing career wise?" as questions with right or wrong answers that will get them hired. "Send someone highly trusted over to clean my house every week" could be a great thing that lets me concentrate more on the rest of my life, but saying it during an interview would paint me as weird.

Re: Employee Retention

#37

Post by seiji »

physcab wrote: post #18

I think the author misses one important factor in employee retention - work / life balance. If a start-up hires a bunch of employees, everyone will be tempted to trade work for life in favor of "rocketship growth". In essence, they believe in the mission of the company so much that they are willing to sacrifice their mission for themselves. Companies who are empathetic to employee needs stand a much better chance of…

In essence, they believe in the mission of the company so much that they are willing to sacrifice their mission for themselves.

In a SV scale-to-the-moon startup, you hire cult members, not employees. You want them to work for minimum wage and equity only.

Sometimes that means hiring people who are naive but can be manipulated in the right directions versus experienced people who have done it all before.

Re: Employee Retention

#39

Post by danielweber »

tarpden wrote: post #11

I think these basics are most important: * don't constantly push to have your employees stay late * if you need your employees to travel, while they're away don't pressure them to work more than their usual work day. * don't disrespect and be a jerk to your employees * provide reasonable sick and vacation benefits

* Automatically raise their pay every year. It doesn't necessarily need to keep up with market, but they need to know that they aren't being suckers by staying at the job.

Re: Employee Retention

#40

Post by hkmurakami »

fecak wrote: post #29

In my experience the biggest retention issue is for an employer to deliver what was promised during the hiring process. Employers that are competing for talent are known to paint the picture of how they see their ideal instead of how things really are. This sets the new hire's expectations to an unreasonably high standard, and when those expectations aren't met they walk. Being honest with potential hires and showing…

One thing I never understand about the bait and switch is how employees don't get everything in writing :(
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