How to keep part time employees in your small accountancy firm

When you’re starting to grow your firm and you’re looking at your first, second, or third employee, very often, you’ll go and look for part-time employees, partly because you can’t afford to get a full-time employee, but often it’s easier to get a very loyal member of staff on part-time hours.But how do you keep them? How do you retain them?How do you keep part-time employees in your accountancy firms?Well, actually, it’s just the same way that you would with a full-time employee.

Regular dialogue

So, the first thing is, you want to have a regular dialogue with them. You want to make sure, ideally, that even if it’s just a really short conversation once a week, you’re just having a quick chat,“How are things going?”,“How are you feeling about it?”,Make sure at least once a month that there’s a longer conversation on“How are things? Are you happy? What do you need from your role to feel happy and fulfilled?”

Know their motivation

Then, really understanding what motivates them, why they come to work, and making sure as much as possible that you, within your firm, can accommodate their needs and requests.For example, do they need to reduce their hours during school holidays?Maybe if they’re looking after an aging parent, which is one of the reasons why they need part-time hours, they might need a little bit more flexibility occasionally to work from somewhere else, say, for example, if they need to be on-site with their aging parent.And so really understand why they want to be part-time and look how you can really help address that.The second thing is to make sure that they’ve always got work that’s interesting.There are always going to be times when somebody’s got to pick it up, but knowing what motivates them and being able to match that as much as possible is one of the reasons it’s going to keep them.

Know their value

Now the next is just because they’re a part-time employee doesn’t mean to say that they aren’t interested in progression or in pay rises.Always make sure you’re not taking them for granted.Where are they valuable? And make sure that you know that value and that you are making sure their pay and their benefits are matching that value.So, to sum up, how do you keep part-time employees in your accountancy firm, or how do you retain these great part-time employees in their accountancy firm?Firstly, by following pretty much the same rules as you would for a full-time employee.Make them feel wanted, make them feel valued.The next thing is, really understand their motivations for being part-time and see how you as the firm can be flexible to make sure that you’re meeting those drivers.And then the third thing is don’t forget that they still may be looking for progression. They still may be wanting to see their pay is going up with the value they give to their firm.