Business owners, managers, and HR departments are often faced with the expensive and difficult issue of employee retention. The key to retaining employees can elude many companies, but in reality, it’s a simple, straightforward process. Here are three ways to hire employees and keep them:

1. Recruit the right people. When you work hard during the recruiting process you end up reaping the rewards as time goes by. When you’re interviewing candidates it’s important to get to know them, so you know whether they’ll believe in your mission and company. The more time you and your employees spend around candidates the more you’ll learn whether they fit into your company’s culture, if they are able to handle their new position, and if they can contribute to the success of yourself and your company.
2. Provide competitive compensation and benefits. This might be a hard step for some companies to take, but if you want to have high employee retention this is an important factor. At least conduct a yearly analysis in order to make sure your total compensation package is keeping up with the market. If offering competitive pay is not an option for your company there are other benefits you can provide such as generous PTO and the option to work from home.
3. Be appreciative. Showing your employees gratitude is so easy, but oftentimes companies can overlook it. Showing appreciation can be done in several ways such as flexibility when handling employee’s needs, willing to hear new ideas, and creating employee appreciation programs. Acknowledging your employee’s work and being grateful towards them is one of the easiest ways to increase employee retention.

These three steps are not foolproof ways to bring employee retention to 100%, but they are essential practices that can help your company keep your employees.