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Why You Should Invest In Your Staff

Forbes Finance Council

Roy Ferman is the founder and CEO of Seek Capital.

Any executive at the head of a company with more than a dozen or so employees will need to make some big decisions, particularly surrounding where they should invest their time and resources. There’s only so much time in the day, after all.

I’d like to throw my proverbial hat into the ring and recommend that you invest in staff just as much as you invest in other aspects of your business. Investing in your staff through reorganizing and developing useful training modules, fostering a productive and employee-focused workplace, and making sure each member of your organization is appropriately compensated, rewarded and held accountable can have wide-ranging and beneficial effects on your company.

But why should you invest more time and resources in your staff, specifically? I’ll explain in more detail.

Why Invest In Staff Overall?

There are several key reasons why any forward-thinking finance industry executive would want to invest in their staff as much as or even more than other aspects of their business.

• Improve productivity: Organizations that maintain a high-development culture are more likely to have engaged employees. Plain and simple. This seems obvious, yet it has always surprised me how many executives fail to grasp this simple lesson.

As employees feel happier at work, they become more productive. What they produce for your company is higher-quality as a result. Better work means more quality for your enterprise overall, whether you directly produce fintech products, provide financial services to customers or other businesses, or anything else. And as your organization yields better quality products or services, your reputation will improve, and your company will be more likely to thrive. Happy employees, happy balance sheet and happy you.

• Improve your bottom line: Making it easier for employees to do their work and fostering an environment of creativity, collaboration and empowerment has a direct benefit: It can improve business performance and profit.

• Attract new talent: But investing in your employees by helping them develop new skills is also crucial because it can help you to attract new talent. And as word of your organization spreads, you’ll be more likely to attract top-tier talent in your niche, which can, in turn, help the work your company produces to become even better.

After all, you don’t want the lowest common denominator applicants sending in their resumes for open positions. Instead, you want the cream of the crop, the competitive talent that only wants to work at a top company.

If you have a fantastic employee break room, a solid benefits package and a smooth onboarding experience, word of all that great stuff will get out. Your employees may spread the word and try to get their friends or network to join.

This effect is cumulative. The more high-quality talent you attract, the easier it is to get more high-quality talent to follow.

• Reduce turnover: According to the Work Institute’s 2021 Retention Report, the most common reason for turnover was career issues, a category that includes opportunities for growth, achievement and security. High employee turnover is costly in a few major ways. It forces you to spend time and money hiring replacement employees. It facilitates a company culture of “revolving door” workers who don’t get invested in your organization. It taxes your resources as employees who need to be trained are not as productive as fully trained members of your organization.

Even before the pandemic, employee turnover was getting worse market-wide, but it doesn’t have to be the case for your organization. By reducing employee turnover, you directly contribute to the well-being of your company and allow it to flourish more than it would otherwise. If your employees enjoy working at your company, they’ll be more likely to stick around over the long haul and become mentors to the next crop of employees who join your enterprise when you expand.

In a way, investing in your staff can benefit you by adding direct, tangible benefits to your product and organization and reducing negative effects or trends, such as a big wave of employees jumping ship.

Should You Invest In Staff Over Other Business Aspects?

It depends, of course, on how exactly your business is organized and how other key factors of your enterprise are coming along. You can’t focus on staff to the exclusion of other major things, including your supply chain stability, your product quality and your marketing efforts.

I believe investing in your staff is one of the smartest and most beneficial things you can do for your company regardless of its focus. Take it from me: Invest in your staff, and you won’t regret it.

Want to start investing in your staff? Here are a few quick initiatives you can begin ASAP:

• Make sure your employees have a comfortable workspace that is conducive to productivity.

• Increase salaries if necessary to be competitive with your organization’s direct counterparts.

• Consider adding health insurance or other benefits. One survey found that better benefits was one of the top reasons millennials look for new jobs.

Of course, these are just a few basic ideas. What works for our company might not work for your organization. Consider how you can start investing in your employees today. The sooner you get started, the sooner you’ll see the advantages.


Forbes Finance Council is an invitation-only organization for executives in successful accounting, financial planning and wealth management firms. Do I qualify?


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