Young colleague wants to resign; I would like him to stay

manpreet Best Answer 2 years ago

I've started a new position recently where I'm managing, orchestrating would be more the term, a wide range of software developers.

One of the guys, a 20 to 25-year-old, has seen his previous team decimated by resignations. He is now the oldest in terms of this workplace experience and technical know-how.

Because of his young age and despite his valuable experience, my direct line manager does not trust him with more powers. One of his weaknesses is that he is not great at explaining technical matters to people who are new to the technical know-how of the company.

I know he is thinking of resigning, as he is often taking calls from external employers (I caught a glimpse of his personal mailbox, which was full of LinkedIn requests asking him if he is considering, joining forces with another company.)

I would like him to stay. He is young, ambitious, he knows things and he has the potential to grow.

Other than raising his wages, which I doubt is a good strategy in the long run, what can I do to make him stay?

• Provide him training?
• Involve him more in the day to day of the decision making?

Thanks for any insights you will be able to provide as I wish to gain more skills in retaining people.

Update:

Thanks for all your precious advices. I will talk to him, I need to find the right time for that.

I've talked to my line manager also for some advice and without giving specific advices, he said if there was people who wanted to leave, I needed to talk to him as he values the current team.

manpreet 2 years ago

Talk to him. Don't guess what you think he wants, get him in a one-to-one meeting and ask him about his career goals, about what he likes about the company, about what he dislikes. Then work to further those goals, keep the things he likes and deal with the things he doesn't like.

And while you're correct that pay rises may not be a sustainable long-term strategy for keeping staff, they can be pretty effective in the short term.