Improving Employee Retention & Well-being


Kenexa's WorkTrends survey gathers input from more than 31,000 workers in 28 countries, and a recent summary report, entitled Trust Matters, highlighted connections between the trust employees feel in their leaders and increased levels of productivity through higher retention of key talent and improved employee well-being.
The WorkTrends  survey indicates that trust in leadership is important in retaining employees, with those who distrust their leaders about 9 times more likely to seriously consider leaving their organisation.
The WorkTrends research also shows that trust in leadership may be important to employee well being, as employees who distrust their leaders are 7 times more likely to report they are mentally and physically unwell and the odds an employee who distrusts leadership will report unreasonable work stress are 15 times higher than the odds for an employee who trusts leadership.
In terms of providing insights as to how leaders can best create higher levels of trust, Kenexa's findings reflect almost exactly FranklinCovey's experience and approach. 
According to organisational scientists, what makes us trust or distrust people is largely a combination of
  • Competence (Can they do the job?) 
  • Benevolence (Do they care about me?) 
  • Integrity (Are they honest)
and to maximise the trust they receive from their employees, leaders should demonstrate all 3 qualities. However, some of these qualities are more important that others to employees' trust in leadership - integrity is the most important at 41%, followed by benevolence at 34% and then competence at 25%
The 3 characteristics described here map almost exactly to the '4 Cores of Credibility' - Intent, Integrity, Capabilities & Results - which FranklinCovey focuses on when developing Authentic, Trustworthy leaders, and we likewise encourage an 'overemphasis' on Intent and Integrity as the foundation (or the 'root system') of those able to develop and extend trust and in turn reap the productivity gains it enables. 

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