Take it from Google — your employees can make or break your organization. While hiring the right candidate for your company and job position is one obstacle, retaining your current workforce can be an even bigger challenge.

Companies have to figure out how to constantly offer incentives and create an enjoyable work atmosphere without breaking their bank accounts. Today, offering a salary and exemplary work benefits are simply not enough to keep employees motivated. Among other things, today’s workers want constant feedback, exciting incentives and an amazing office environment.

Retaining employees can be a nightmare for companies, particularly with limited resources. Even with a decent salary and benefits employees are often looking for better and more exciting opportunities. Regardless of how dedicated and hard-working they may be for you, there is always the constant fear that they are looking for a company that will give them a raise and will leave you hanging very soon. Retaining and maintaining your best workers is key, along with getting the best out of all of your employees on a regular basis.

Similar to quarterly and annual performance reviews, timed promotions are not adequate in today’s workforce. It’s no secret that employees work off of several different motivating factors (money, recognition, reputation, etc.) and only having the slight chance to be promoted once a year may crush their spirits.

When an employee knows that the only time they will be promoted is in January along with their annual performance review, they may be inclined to work hard a few months prior to their review. Managers are often too busy to pay close attention to others’ work except when they have to write up the daunting and detailed performance reviews. This makes it easy for an employee to step up their game when they know they are being watched.

Instead of having set times to promote those that work hard, try to be continuous about the promoting process. If you have an employee that has been doing well for several months and shows signs of further growth in the future, offer them a promotion to show that you are noticing their hard work and appreciate it. While it does not make sense to offer a promotion every time an employee impresses you, it is also not enough to only offer them with promotions once a year.

Whether your startup just received a new round of funding or your company landed a new account, take the extra capital and try to invest it in your current workforce. You spent resources interviewing and onboarding them and they made a significant amount of effort getting acclimated to a new office environment. Instead of leaving it at that, make it a point to check in with them and reward them through promotions when they do an exceptional job.

Basing promotions on an employee’s yearly performance review is not effective in today’s workplace, and employees expect to be recognized for their hard work on a much more regular basis than ever before. Do you need to rethink your promotion and recognition strategies?

How often do you offer promotions at your company?