I am always amazed when I am approached by a client who has a retention problem. It’s always interesting to note that they have not dealt with some of the small things that can be done to somewhat lock the door from the barbarians at the gate, those pesky headhunters.
Rule #1: Make sure employee/telephone directories are not available for download and make it extremely difficult for anyone including employees to print or copy it. It’s incredible how often I have been able to go on a clients website and download a complete employee directory with employee titles, phone numbers and email addresses. What are companies thinking? Nortel Networks (now defunct) had a downloadable application of their entire employee population, including all executive employees when I first got there. It was one of the first things I got rid of to slow down poaching.
Rule #2: Train admin’s, secretaries, executive assistants and any and all staff and or services that manage incoming calls and emails to the ruses headhunters and recruiters use to identify or access company talent. I train corporate teams in these approaches to both recruit from companies and or repel competitors. Believe me when I say how porous most companies doors are. Secretaries handing out entire organization charts, employees talking about who the most gifted engineers are, even employees within your own company potentially poaching from you for the competition. Amazing.
Rule #3: Complete an audit of your companies security defenses against poachers and headhunters as well as the biggest threat your own employees, especially the ones that are disgruntled and on the way out. Once you have gone thru a structured process looking at all the possible routes headhunters use you can start blocking the holes, at the very least making them much smaller.
These tactics will not stop employees from leaving and or prevent headhunters from poaching your employees but it will reduce attrition as well as reduce the noise in the company about recruiting offers that employees have received. These are only a few approaches I have used to help companies, if you want to hear about the full portfolio, get in touch.
The Turning Point 