
6 reasons your business struggles with finance talent retention
Employee turnover is growing in the finance sector. Not even promising team members a large pay cheque is necessarily enough for businesses that struggle with finance talent retention.
Of course, you can never guarantee that your key team members will never leave. But you can certainly try to minimise the reasons they might do so.
By watching out for these six reasons why people with accountancy and finance jobs start looking for something new, you give yourself the best possible chance of minimising your finance recruitment spend in future:
Why your business struggles with finance talent retention
1) Not enough compensation or benefits
Although the overwhelming majority of employees say they want something more than just a good salary, a rate of compensation that doesn’t fall notably far behind the industry average is still usually counted as a minimum.
Reasonable benefits are another basic consideration for most accountancy and finance companies if they want to retain their talent. Things like remote and flexible working options are increasingly viewed as standard these days.
Make sure you aren’t falling behind what your competition offers in terms of benefits. It’s worth noting that not all benefits have to be expensive. Your team might place a high value on something that costs you nothing.
2) No professional development opportunities
Almost 19 out of 20 employees would stay with their current employer if they knew they were going to get some attention paid to their professional development.
More than almost anything else on this list, if you master the ability to offer good professional development, you will see a dramatic improvement in your employee retention levels.
This is particularly vital in an industry like accountancy and finance, where changing tools and technologies necessitate regular upskilling team of your team.
From a talent retention standpoint though, investing in this is a win-win.
3) No career growth opportunities
“Lack of career advancement” is one of the biggest reasons people in the accountancy and finance industry say they end up looking for a new job.
Almost everyone wants to know they are going somewhere. Or, at least, that they have the option to get more responsibility and the possibility of promotion when they are ready.
In a recent survey though, only around half of employees said they felt this was possible in their current role. Hence why it’s so vital to make sure each member of your team understands what their route to advancement is at all times.
4) Not enough appreciation of hard work
Everyone wants to feel valued. Thankfully, business leaders who expect their team to work incredibly hard with little-to-no recognition are rarer and rarer these days.
However, it’s surprising how far properly recognising a team member’s hard work can go to keep someone happy and content.
Again, this doesn’t have to be a costly exercise. Sometimes, completely free gestures like public recognition or “employee of the week” schemes can go a long way.
5) Burnout
Around 43% of the entire UK workforce showed signs of burnout in a survey taken back in 2023. This might have been the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, but it is still a shocking statistic.
It should go without saying that burnout is a serious issue. Not only does it result in resignations of team members who are costly to replace, but it also has a big negative impact on workplace productivity.
Conversely, while burnout levels are potentially higher than ever before, employee willingness to put up with it for long is at its lowest ebb. Perhaps this is because burnout has become so common and literature on how bad it is so widespread.
To nip potential burnout issues in the bud, there are several things you can implement:
*Mental health and wellbeing support
*Steps like gym memberships to improve physical health (tied to good mental health)
*Any measures that might improve work-life balance
*Education on how to separate work and free time when working remotely
*Making out-of-office hours disconnection mandatory (i.e. not expecting work out of hours)
6) Hire team members that match your culture
Sometimes, the reason team members move on is that they weren’t the right fit for the culture you’ve built in the first place.
At Ernest Gordon, we have an open, honest, and transparent approach to accountancy and finance recruitment. Making sure both parties understand the other going in is always going to be beneficial for talent retention in the long run.
Why not reach out to one of our specialists today? Set up a cost and commitment-free consultation about your recruitment needs.