In a historically tight labor market, people are more choosy than ever when weighing employment options. Unfortunately, that doesn't leave organizations much room for error in their hiring strategies.
This also makes it more important than ever to retain the talent you already have. Because, as we've said before, your people and culture are your organization’s biggest competitive advantages. Or at least they can be. So on that note, I’m going to discuss four ways your senior living community can use video to retain the talent you need for success, both today and tomorrow.
1. Recognition and Employee Appreciation
According to recent research from SurveyMonkey, 82% of people say recognition is critical to being happy at work. Naturally, we don't need a scientific study to say happier employees and lower turnover rates go hand-in-hand.
This is an area where video really shines, providing an efficient and highly effective way to recognize employees that have gone the extra mile or accomplished something special. For instance, when a longtime server gets promoted to line cook in the kitchen, a quick but meaningful video shines a well-deserved spotlight on the worker.
In the meantime, this highly engaging form of employee appreciation can inspire other workers to excel in their roles as well. As a result, such recognition and appreciation drive employee engagement in ways that a mass-distributed email just can't touch, helping you retain employees along the way by maximizing job satisfaction.
2. Quick Shout Outs and Thank Yous
Video isn't just ideal for those larger, more grandiose moments of recognition and employee appreciation, though. It's also adept at quick shout-outs and thank yous for the smaller moments, too. For example, maybe a teammate stayed 30 minutes late to help set up for an upcoming event. Although such help won't make a massive difference on occupancy rates, at least directly, it certainly helps foster the teamwork that can.
Granted, it might only take a couple of minutes to record, edit, and distribute a quick shout-out or thank you video on a platform like OneDay's. Still, the impact of those couple of minutes can be significant in driving the employee satisfaction you need to keep turnover in check.
3. Leading by Example
I understand many organizations and industries have yet to fully embrace video in their operations. Thus, when the time comes, there’s often a bit of a learning curve involved since it's something new for the workforce.
However, just like virtually any other innovation or transformation in a workplace, leadership can give video for internal operations a tremendous boost by just embracing it and leading by example. In other words, when workers see management using video to recognize accomplishments and give shout-outs or thank yous, people will be much more open and willing to use it.
With a bit of time and repetition, video recognition can become part of the organization's culture. And when that happens, all the benefits I've previously discussed happen naturally and frequently. Put another way, using video becomes habit across the workforce and continuously drives employee satisfaction and, thus, improved retention rates.
4. Convey Genuine Empathy
Video is an inherently engaging and immersive medium. It connects at much deeper levels with the audience than text or even pictures, making it especially powerful at conveying emotions and empathy.
In a work environment, sending a personalized video to an employee when they are struggling with something at home has so much more positive impact than a card or email. When the viewer can hear your voice and see your facial expressions as you wish them the best and express how you're thinking about them, it's going to drive a powerful connection that keeps a person loyal and committed to an organization's vision.
Obviously, we are all pretty passionate about this subject here at One Day. We absolutely revel in seeing our partners use the OneDay platform to retain talent, engage prospects, and drive occupancy. And even better, we’re still just getting started.