Attracting and retaining top talent is the #1 challenge most businesses face in today's competitive marketplace.  Organizations that practice OBM (open-book management) have a major competitive edge that they should use to their advantage in all recruiting efforts.  

  Unemployment is under 4%, the lowest it has been in 10 years, and today’s talent market is a lot more competitive. Is your talent strategy ready? Don’t let the best candidates fall into the laps of your competitors. Instead, up your game to become and remain an employer of choice. Here are three impact areas that will elevate your employer brand to attract and retain top talent:

  You have probably heard the cliche, "People want to buy from people they know, like and trust." Undoubtedly, you could change that to employees want to work for companies they know, like and trust. Let's have a discussion about attracting talent and employee retention.  As growth consultants, we witness companies intensively focus on acquiring new customers and put far less emphasis on customer retention or workforce engagement. These businesses are ignoring critical economic drivers of success. It is essential to establish a People+People Plan to create a positive brand experience for all stakeholders. So how do you build a brand reputation that attracts both customers and employees?  

Everybody loves a great story. So what’s yours? The benefits of good storytelling ripple out from gaining exposure to new customers, partners, and even employees—all of whom may be inspired to join your cause. Your story should be part of your brand and, at a minimum, be part of your website. But you don’t have to stop there. You can also use your story to connect with the media, or as an internal tool to help on-board new employees to help them understand what your company culture is all about.

  There’s a big elephant in the room business owners need to start looking at if they haven’t already: the looming workforce shortage. While the media seemed to focus solely on the lack of jobs in recent years, the real story that’s going to impact businesses of all kinds in the coming years is the shortage of workers caused by the constant stream of Baby Boomers leaving the workforce. But what can those businesses that are already feeling the pain do about attracting new talent? Just as importantly, how can they better engage and retain the employees they already have?

This is the second in our series of weekly blogs on the Annual Gathering of Games, the world's largest conference on open-book management.  This year marks the 26th anniversary of the event, which attracts business leaders from companies of all sizes, in all industries, from all over the world, who recognize that they can transform their businesses by valuing and elevating their greatest resource: their employees.  These articles are written by Great Game employees to highlight some of the highest rated sessions at the 2017 conference.  We hope to give you a flavor of the content-rich sessions that can be found at The Gathering of Games.  Click the link below to hear the entire audio recording from this breakout session. 

    This is NOT a regurgitation of the obvious reasons great employees stay. Because great employees show up, deliver results and consistently go above and beyond to support the company, they could easily jump ship for a better job offer, or, if bold enough, strike out on their own. But they don't.

Have you ever considered how open-book management can make the process of attracting top talent into your organization easier? What about employee retention? My company – Netmail, a 100+ employee company – has been practicing open-book for the better part of a decade. During that time, I’ve found that leveraging our transparent culture has significantly increased our ability to attract, acquire and retain top talent in our organization.