setting the scene.
Talent is now the driver. HR needs to get smarter and adapt.
our research – who we spoke to:
We conducted quantitative research among employers and employees from across the world and verified results with senior HR leaders to gain additional insights that feature in the report.
Employers – we interviewed 262 HR decision-makers and people leaders across seven countries: the US, the UK, France, Germany, India, Singapore, and Australia.
Employees – we spoke to 508 workers across the same seven countries either in full-time employment in organizations with annual revenue of over $10 million and 100 employees, or actively seeking new roles.
Our research is very clear. Talent retention, engagement, and mobility are the top talent priorities for businesses globally in 2022.
Retention tops every business segment size as the priority. Still, talent mobility, which appears third on the average across sectors, is second most important for large-scale enterprise organizations of more than 5,000 employees.
But, the real story here is that the results of our research clearly show that coaching is already a top priority for nearly three in ten (29%) organizations surveyed, with its value set to rise further if employers can work out how to make it central to achieving the stated three business priorities.
- improving talent mobility
- improving talent engagement
- improving talent retention
the case for action.
According to a Human Capital Institute (HCI) and International Coach Federation (ICF) study, 54% of companies that are classified as ‘highperforming’ have a strong coaching culture. This figure drops to only 29% among organizations without one.
Coaching can be the enabler of the conversations that inspire and support the ongoing development, satisfaction, engagement, and performance of individual employees' careers in all facets. The right coaching solution not only empowers an organization's employees to consider staying, but it enables an HR department to proactively affect an array of other workforce deliverables such as career development, talent mobility, onboarding effectiveness, and supporting a more inclusive workplace.
There is hope for HR who can forge an allpervasive culture of coaching. Employees who want to move to another organization, our Randstad RiseSmart research shows, are also likely to be open to another position internally. Nearly half (45%) of the employees surveyed say they will “definitely” or “probably” move to another organization, but 4 in 5 of these (36% of our total respondents) say they are also open to an internal move, which offers hope if you can make your organization a compelling and attractive place to stay.
The case for action is strengthened in other ways.
Nearly all employees (87%) who want to change roles would prefer to do so in their current organization.
While they don’t want to leave their own organization, they do want to feel a sense of progress, and will leave when they see no possibility for this.
Internal applicants are typically highly engaged, and losing an employee of this nature has dramatic effects on companies' productivity and financial performance.
Talent needs to be taken care of across its lifecycle. High-performing organizations already know this; they need to focus on retention, drive engagement, build a compelling career development program, and enable mobility within their organization.
We’ve been in firefighting mode for too long. Someone leaves the business and we automatically look externally to fill a role. We aren’t looking at why they are leaving? We are just focused on the backfill. Our churn rate has gone up drastically since 2019 and we can’t seem to get ahead of it.
the cost of doing nothing.
Until now, coaching has been reserved in many organizations for current or future leaders, or to develop specific skills for promotion. It's not been explicitly linked to retention, engagement, or career mobility objectives across all employees. Previously, it has been about high-level coaches working with these select individuals, helping them develop, but it has been cost-prohibitive for it to be rolled out beyond specific groups deemed worthy of investment.
Isn’t coaching really expensive? We can’t afford to provide it to everyone, despite us seeing the benefit of coaching with our leadership team.
Can businesses afford to do nothing about their approach to coaching? Definitely not.
The cost of replacing an employee can be anywhere from 50% to 200% of their salary. Using 100% as a benchmark, an organization with an average salary of $50,000 potentially faces that amount for employees who leave. Whether your turnover rate is 3% or 20%, that’s the kind of cost that an organization cannot sustain.
What else are we missing by not stopping to reevaluate? Well, our research clearly shows a high price of inaction in three respects:
- Nearly all of the employees we surveyed (93%) feel open and receptive to new job opportunities. The restless search for something new holds true across generations, gender, and geography.
- Almost half (45%) are considering a move to another organization in the next 12 months. Here, there are discrepancies between the generations. Explicitly there is a desire for moving on which is most evident among Older Millennials.
- There is a high expectation (58%) among employees for internal mobility to be facilitated by an employer, so they can switch to another role within the same organization.
In many organizations, these employee expectations are likely to not be met. But now more than ever, employees are looking to develop within for their current role as well as new skills for the future. This puts employees and employers on a collision course.
There is further trouble ahead when you look at coaching needs and wants. It's a recipe for disaster.
First, consider that most organizations use external certified coaches for wellbeing and not for development. Add into the mix the current outdated perspectives on coaching, plus the lack of understanding about how its application to wider groups of employees can benefit an organization. Finish things off with low employee engagement. Finally, you get the reality that the cost of not introducing coaching, along with career development and mobility, is very significant for an organization looking to retain employees in 2022.
the good news.
(nearly) everyone sees coaching as valuable.
There is little doubt that both employers and employees understand there are clear benefits to be gained from coaching. Appreciation of the value of coaching is already well understood in most leading organizations and becoming more widely understood elsewhere.
among employees:
- 97% are somewhat or very satisfied with coaching
- 93% find participation in programs very or extremely valuable
- 98% will probably or will definitely seek to continue with their coaching
among employers:
- 93% see coaching as very or extremely valuable
- 99% see it as having a positive or very positive impact on the wider business
Employees who are engaging with coaching appreciate the opportunity, view it as valuable and hope to continue. Even those not currently engaged with a coaching program clearly want to do so. Therefore, it is clear that coaching can be an attraction tool for new hires or a retention tool for existing employees.
Of those not currently being coached, 90% say they would engage with an employer’s coaching program if offered the opportunity to do so. And expectations are running high; three-quarters (75%) of those without a coach, would expect to find it a very or extremely valuable experience if they did.
It is also an accepted fact that coaching has wider benefits related to life as well as work. It supports an employee's well-being at work and their commitment to their own career development. And it allows them to set and achieve goals to improve their life at work and, at its best, provides a confidential safe space to step back, think, and reframe.
The evidence shows that when employees are empowered to thrive, organizations thrive with them. So, what is getting in the way of an accelerated commitment to coaching for all, to serve the obvious talent needs of every business?
There are several challenges to the wider adoption of coaching. All of them are solvable but need to be acknowledged first before being remedied.