As the impacts of the pandemic are slowly becoming the new normal, and with organizations now facing the impending economic recession of 2023, employee retention is becoming an increasingly difficult task for many businesses.

Recent research finds that 63% of businesses report employee retention as being more challenging than employee hiring, while 81% find employee turnover costly.

With job insecurity rising due to insolvencies, employees who remain employed become uneasy with their own job security, driving them away from their current organization in a bid to find stability elsewhere.

In light of employee retention increasingly difficult, companies should explore leveraging technology-driven solutions such as robotic process automation (RPA) and artificial intelligence (AI) in hiring processes to gain a competitive edge. Doing so can help attract and retain top talent.

Employee Retention Automation

To combat the rising challenge of employee retention, companies may employ technology and automation to help ensure that their employees are engaged, and productive, and feel secure in their positions. Robotic process automation (RPA) and artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to automate processes such as on-boarding, performance reviews, and data collection.

How Does Automation Help in Retaining Employees?

It’s ironic that automation can help a business retain employees when a significant number of people were actually concerned that automation can replace workers in the first place.

Here are some ways that automation can help businesses convince workers to stay:

Automation Can Deal with Tedious, Repetitive Tasks

Many workers today (especially those tasked to deal with endless documents) have to do tasks that are basically repetitive and tedious. This type of work can be just downright boring and frustrating, using up valuable hours without requiring workers to actively use their specialized skills. What happens is that employee morale and engagement go down the drain, eventually resulting in resignations.

But dealing with repetitive tasks is one of the primary goals of automation. Automation takes these tasks in hand so that workers are then freed to do more interesting work. That this interesting work also offers increased value to the company making this a win-win proposition.

Automation Allows Workers to Work at Home

With the waning epidemic, more businesses are trying to entice their workers back to the office. But an increasing number of workers aren’t returning, since they’ve come to realize the many benefits of working at home. These benefits include the reduced need for travel, less eating out, and more flexible hours. There’s no one breathing down their necks.

As a result, more businesses are offering hybrid work spaces that allow for the option of working at home. Workers can come and go into the office at any time they want. And this is possible even with automation, as automation can be made available as RPA-as-a-service via the cloud. You can deploy your automation tools everywhere.

Automation Gives Workers the Tools They Need

Automation doesn’t fully replace workers. In many cases, the automation tools work with human workers to end up with optimal results. Actual employees have discovered that automation tools can make their work more efficient, with faster times and fewer errors. And that’s very satisfying.

In fact, businesses can even enable their workers to develop their own automation tools. This is possible with a “low-code/no-code intelligent automation platform”. Basically, this is a platform with predesigned tools in place and the workers can just drag and drop various tools to come up with the virtual assistants they need.

This also allows workers to get better at their jobs, and this allows them to move ahead in their careers. It’s better to allow your workers to advance, or else they might just want to move elsewhere for that possibility.

Better Work/Life Balance

Another survey among workers found that a better work/life balance is the most critical factor for a good employee experience. It’s even more important than being part of a team, having the right tools for the job, and being listened to.

And automation does that for employees. With more of their work automated, workers can find more time for other things in their life besides work.

The Bottom Line

The vast majority of businesses today recognize the importance of retaining employees. One survey revealed that up to 92% of businesses regard it as a top priority in the post-Covid world to enhance employee experience.

But that same survey also showed that only 30% of businesses actually have a strategy in place for enhancing the employee experience. And only 9% of businesses have an employee experience strategy that’s integrated with their business strategy.

You can have that type of employee experience strategy when you use automation. With automation, you’re treating your employees the right way and helps you to keep them working for you. When you consider that this is just one of the benefits of automation for your company, it should be obvious that you need automation for your business.