Press Release: Retention - when employees are a company’s most important customers, debated at the first HR Breakfast Executive Learning by Romania-Insider.com & Ideograf

Romania-Insider.com, the most read English – language portal dedicated to Romania – and Ideograf brought together over 35 leading HR executives and professionals from large Romanian companies to talk about employee retention in today’s market, at the first edition of the HR Executive Learning Breakfast series.

Cristian Popescu, HR director at ProTV and Sergiu Negut, Associate Dean at the Maastricht School of Management Romania, spoke about retention strategies in an event moderated by Sandra Jitianu, management consultant and trainer at Ideograf.

The event took place on March 28 at the Maastricht School of Management Romania and was supported by 7Card, Nespresso, Sweeteria and MsM Romania.

“Our intention is to cross-pollinate ideas by inviting lecturers with fresh perspectives, while also allowing time for exchange and networking” said Sandra Jitianu from Ideograf, who co-designed the series.

Retention is the topic of the moment in Romania, as more and more companies struggle to keep valuable employees which are hard to replace on today’s market.

Good systems are only a part of the retention solution nowadays, when the quality of the relationship between management and employees bears more significance. Moreover, the context created by the organization has a huge impact on employee behaviour, said Cristian Popescu, HR director at ProTV. In a positive and empathic environment people tend to feel more trusted and valued for their knowledge and contribution, thus increasing the chances they will remain within the company and/or return at some point if they decide to leave, added ProTV’s HR manager.

On the other hand, companies which successfully retain their key employees picture them as their most important customers, said Sergiu Negut, Associate Dean at the Maastricht School of Management Romania. He also spoke about the retention of millennials, who need to feel they give their support to something greater than a company. Companies need to be more willing to see things from the employees’ perspective and think of ways to give teams the freedom to build their own workplace and their own tribes. Letting people create their own agenda is a valuable way to keep them engaged.

Empathic and authentic leadership is key, but it is not enough. Managers need to also take action, keep things in motion in order for people to be engaged. This is a time in history when young people care more about causes than about companies, and those companies where the HR and marketing departments team up and find out what motivates their employees will be the winners, added Sergiu Negut.

The interaction between the participants and the speakers brought up other hot topics in today’s HR field in Romania, including about many Romanians who fall prey to the glamour of working abroad, although financially many would be better off if they worked in Bucharest or another big city in Romania, and about loyalty that people never feel for a company, but rather for another person.