Businesses today must be competitive, profitable to be successful. To keep an organization cost-effective and productive, they must retain a dynamic team of highly motivated employees.

The challenge is real and rests with organizations to retain positive and motivated employees. I’ve shared insightful strategies to accomplish this throughout this article.
Motivating Factors to Enhance Employee Success
Businesses must build high-performing teams from the ground up. It's relatively easy to retain successful teams, but the process must begin as employees are onboarded to their positions. Along with an in-depth orientation to the organization, emotional intelligence (EI) training should be part of ongoing development.
Developing Organizational Success
I am privileged to work with teams and individuals to strengthen their emotional intelligence. Team members with strong EI are self-aware and benefit from recognizing, understanding, and managing their feelings/emotions and, believe it or not, those of others. This ability helps them be more intuitive and develop lasting relationships. There are several more strategies I recommend to retain a high-performing team.
Three strategies to retain employees and increase productivity:
- Building trust is vital.
- Express your appreciation.
- Develop a mentorship program.
Building trust is vital
Building trust is vital to developing and maintaining strong relationships and is a key component of a high-functioning team. Team members should not feel the need to protect themselves from each other. Instead, they should appreciate and tap into one another's skills and experiences. Working as a team becomes more manageable and effective when we use our emotional intelligence skills to build trusting relationships. Trust is the glue that holds teams together when faced with challenges and setbacks.
Express your appreciation
There are numerous ways to show your employees you appreciate them and you can begin by consistently demonstrating this. Employees enjoy affiliating with leaders who take them seriously, take the time to get to know them and understand their capabilities. When leaders practise this, they invest wisely in their future by building a bond between the employee and the organization. They're sending a clear message to them by validating the organization cares about them.
Develop a mentorship program
An organization's most incredible resource is its employees. Without a doubt cultivating a mentorship program will lead to increased and sustainable success for all involved. Such programs contribute to managing human resource challenges, including employee retention, succession planning, and the overall well-being of your team.
An in-house mentorship program provides an opportunity for more experienced or knowledgeable employees to guide new or less experienced employees. This type of support builds both skills and teamwork. Offering mentorship opportunities and resources validates the organization's commitment to the entire team.
Lead your organization to success today by using these strategies to develop and retain a high-performing team. Remember that strengthening emotional intelligence across your organization is the tactic to achieve this. Furthermore, it forms the necessary foundation to impact everyone involved positively.
This article was originally published on May 11, 2019, and has been updated (September 2021).
More Motivational Reads Here »
Are you Emotionally Intelligent?
Sign up for Linda’s monthly tips to build your Emotional Intelligence and reduce Emotional Hijacking!