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Skills to help businesses retain their staff

We recently hosted a workshop for farmers and growers on skills that help improve staff retention.

Alistair Gibb led the workshop.

03/04/23

Management consultant Alistair Gibb led the workshop. It was organised by TIAH as part of its action to help businesses improve staff recruitment and retention.

It’s well recognised that skilled and engaged staff tend to stay in their jobs for longer and not leave prematurely, so the day's main theme was how managers could help their team members develop and feel committed at work.

Alistair shared a technique called ‘non-directive coaching.’ This uses open ended questions to steer a conversation, helping an employee to solve a problem, be more effective, or improve their performance.

Labour availability is now one of the biggest challenges facing the agriculture and horticulture industry.

As part of efforts to tackle the problem, TIAH recently commissioned research into the skills and labour requirements of England's agricultural and horticultural industry. One of the areas the research highlighted was that many farming and growing businesses could use help to improve their leadership and management skills to attract and keep staff. TIAH is now acting to improve access to training in this area.