Page 58 - Retaining Top Employees

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46 Retaining Top Employees

and deal with the operational issues as well as the employee
issues.
To establish the main operational issues caused by the loss
(or potential loss) of any key employee, take the perspective of
the key employee’s clients. We don’t mean (necessarily) the
organization’s clients or customers, though they might be
included. The clients could be the employee’s manager or
supervisor, other staff, suppliers, agencies, customers—whoever
the employee most impacts.
Once you’ve identified the key employee’s client, put your-
self in the client’s place. Try to get inside his or her mindset and
think about the main impact of losing that key employee. Talk
with the client, if you can do so without raising eyebrows, and
ask the question, “How are you most impacted by turnover in
this key position?”
We’ve already seen some examples—the tax managers
whose departure leaves unhappy clients and the R&D scientists
who cause a “knowledge vacuum” when they leave. What about
the CEO’s assistant? The in-house attorney? What is the main
operational impact on their clients if they should leave?

Employee clients The individuals or organizations for
which the employee provides the most added value.
For instance,an in-house attorney for a toy manufacturer
might have as his main client the marketing department,for which he
must obtain copyright and patenting clearance before a product can be
sold.The main client for the tax manager in Jones Painterman & Co. is
probably the end customer,for whom she must perform timely and
accurate assignments.The main client for an assistant to the CEO is
almost certainly the CEO.
If you have trouble ascertaining the employee clients for a specific key
retention group,an excellent way to get an overview is with an “added
value chart”—a sort of loose organizational chart with lines indicating
the flow of added value among employees.You can use the techniques in
Tony Buzan’s excellent book, The Mind Map Book: How to Use Radiant
Thinking to Maximize Your Brain’s Untapped Potential (Plume/Penguin,
1996),to help you produce such a chart.