Ryan Englin on Reins: Why Your Employees Aren't Staying

I went on Reins with Chris Buttenham to talk about why employees in the trades aren't staying and what owners need to fix first.

Chris asked the question everyone asks: is it true that people are leaving the trades at high rates? Absolutely. They're leaving employers and they're leaving the industry entirely. But here's what's not the reason. It's not about the money. Nobody leaves a job for a slightly bigger paycheck somewhere else. They leave because they're tired of being treated like a set of hands, a number, a cog in a machine that gets replaced without a second thought.

People in other industries see their employers investing in them as human beings. Helping them buy a home. Helping them get out of debt. Offering flexibility when a kid is sick on a Tuesday morning. Meanwhile, the trades still have leaders saying "leave your personal world at home." That mindset needs to die. It already has in most other industries, and that's exactly where your people are going.

Chris brought up the classic line: "People don't want to work." I finished the sentence for him. People don't want to work for you. It's human nature to want to produce, to belong, to be a part of something bigger than yourself. Nobody wakes up excited to work a job they hate. They wake up thinking about their family, their future, their goals. And if their employer doesn't care about those things, they'll find one who does.

We got into the generational debate, which comes up every single time. Here's the truth. If you strip away the technology piece, what we're seeing with Millennials and Gen Z is what we saw with Gen X and Boomers at the same age. There's a quote from Socrates, 3,000 years ago, complaining that kids are entitled, won't listen to their parents, and don't want to work. The kids haven't changed. Every generation of twenty-somethings looks the same. The difference now is technology. A 23-year-old grew up in a digital world. Asking them to leave their phone in the car with no explanation isn't going to fly. You need to meet people where they are.

I told Chris about one of the biggest mistakes I see. Owners think they can hire someone who thinks like them. They set that as the bar and then disappoint themselves every single day. The people out there who think like you are called your competition. They went and started their own business. They're not coming to work for you. Stop looking for a clone and start looking for people who align with your core values, vision, and purpose.

We talked about money and incentives. A client just had someone turn down $15,000 more a year to stay. That doesn't happen because of a paycheck. That happens because the person wants to be where they are. Financial incentives work when they're layered on top of a place people already want to belong. Without that foundation, you're just bidding against the next company willing to pay a dollar more an hour. I've seen electrical contractors in a market where eight shops kept outbidding each other on pay and the same guys just bounced from one to the next. Complete disregard for anything beyond the number. It never works.

Chris asked how I coach owners who have never thought about culture or values. I don't even use the word culture most of the time. I call it core. It comes down to three things. First, how do people behave? What's the standard for behavior inside your organization? Values need to be verbs. If I can't see it in action, it's not a real value. Second, why do you do what you do, even on the days you don't want to? That's your purpose. Third, are your people excited about where the bus is headed? If the bus breaks down or gets stuck in traffic, people who care about the destination get off and push. People who don't get off and find another bus.

The problem I see over and over is communication. I sit down with owners who say they've got their core values figured out. I ask them to recite their values and they're digging through emails, shuffling papers. If the CEO doesn't know them, nobody on that team of 55 knows them either.

We also talked about how much of retention actually starts before someone is even hired. Most companies have a hiring strategy that boils down to "if they show up for the interview, they're hired." That's not a strategy. That's desperation. When you hire people who don't align with the way you behave, aren't excited about where you're headed, and don't connect to your purpose, you're just going to keep turning people. One client started with 12 or 13 employees, hired nine of the right people in six months using the Core Fit Hiring System, and the owner told me the company culture is what he always wanted but never thought he could achieve. It all came from hiring the right people.

For owners running around with their hair on fire because they're short-staffed, the first step is filling every open position. Not with anyone who fogs a mirror. With the right people. Once you do that, you have the margin to work on everything else. And here's what I've found over 15 years: when the owner gets out of the business, the team thanks them for it. "Now I can take it and run with it and not have to wait on you."

If you liked this conversation, I go deeper on all of these topics on Titans of the Trades. And if you want the full playbook, grab a copy of Hire Better People Faster.