One of the greatest challenges faced by every CPA firm is to hold on to the best talent. Many employers have resorted to techniques such as “stay interviews” to encourage an open dialogue with staff members, with the hope that this can lead to better results and make the employee more eager to stay.

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Stay interviews are now integral to the process of holding on to your best employees. We discuss this and other ways to make sure that your best employees stay on at your firm.

 Maintain a positive tone with your employees during your conversations with them. The stay interview should be conducted in a neutral venue, outside the office, where your staff members are relaxed, so that they can open up about their issues at the firm.

 The setting for such an interview should not be too formal or structured. It shouldn’t be like an annual interview.  The discussions should be casual and conducted over lunch or coffee. However, there has to a certain structure to the conversation.

The tone should be positive and the employers should try their best to break the ice. They should ask questions on whether the employee has been enjoying their current role at the organization and about what can be done to motivate them to stick to the organization without looking elsewhere.

Make it a point to praise the employee for their contribution to the firm. Tell them that you value their input and want to empower them to take better decisions in the future.

The stay interviews should be held regularly, and not only when there is a critical situation, when the talent is on the verge of leaving. As a manager you should hold these interviews as often as you can, and not avoid them.

 The stay interview should consist of a series of conversations. The important word to note here is that it should be a “conversation”, and not a test or an interrogation. This should be held every few months. The more valued the employee, the most important it is to engage him or her in fruitful conversations about their role in the CPA firm.

 You can also hold the stay interview as a part of a group conversation involving selected staff members facing similar work situations. Groups of 3 to 6 staff members are ideal for this purpose. Anything more than that would be stretching it.

You want your employees to feel a part of a group, and at the same time, you don’t want them to feel neglected. You don’t want to give them the impression that their opinion is not being heard. Every member of the group should be given equal opportunities to make their point.

 Finally, just as important it is to hold the stay interview, following up is the need of the hour. Everything said at the interview could be held against you if there is no follow up on what was discussed. The employee should not be given the impression that it was just an elaborate PR exercise.