If you own a small business that you operate from home and you need to hire a few employees, should you have them work at your home office, or work at their own home office?

According to Workforce Management newsletter, most employees rate the top reasons for leaving their current jobs as:

• Not getting along with their direct supervisor
  
• Desire for more money
  
• Need for better work/life balance
  
• Lack of career growth, challenging assignments
  

There are other factors to consider, of course, but if retention is a concern to your home business, consider letting your employees work from their own home offices. Unexpectedly, almost every single employee retention problem can be solved by allowing employees to work from their own homes! Here’s how:

Reason for leaving: Not getting along with their direct supervisor

BUSINESS SOLUTION: Employees that are allowed to work at home, assuming that their job can be suitably tailored to the home-based environment, will most often greatly reduce the amount of contact and the type of contact an employee may have with a disliked supervisor. Often a problematic or unpopular supervisor can be far less unpopular and problematic when his or her exposure to employees is reduced to a few phone calls and emails instead of constant visual and verbal contact. Work at home. Problem solved.

Reason for leaving: Desire for more money

BUSINESS SOLUTION: It may not work in every single case, but if you give an employee who is also the mom of two young children the freedom to work at home, you may as well give her a $35,000 a year raise! That’s about how much of her hard-earned pay may go to childcare. In some areas, it’s even more. Even if the employee you’re trying to retain is not a parent with kids in child care, you can still give them a ‘virtual’ raise by eliminating their costs of commuting, parking, outside meals, dry cleaning, union dues, parking and more. You also may be surprised to discover that when given the option of being able to work at home, many people will give up that raise for the more flexible work at home lifestyle. Work at home. Problem solved.

Reason for leaving: Need for better work/life balance.

BUSINESS SOLUTION: There is no better way to balance one’s life than to work at home. Working at home gives one the flexibility to accommodate virtually anything into their life, while still being able to earn a living. Often your new telecommuting employee will gain up to two hours a day, or more, simply by no longer having to drive to and from work. Your employee will no longer constantly feel behind, sleep deprived and guilty from feeling they’re forced to make the wrong choices because of their job. By working at home, parenting challenges, social challenges, marital challenges, time management challenges and emotional conflicts that spring from many of these challenges can all be resolved by simply working at home! Problem solved.

Reason for leaving: Lack of career growth, challenging assignments

BUSINESS SOLUTION: Working at home generally makes one’s job easier, not more challenging and it is unlikely that if one’s job had virtually no growth potential in that brick and mortar building, it won’t suddenly have far greater career promise just because one is allowed to telecommute. However, if you look past the obvious and explore the underlying personal issues that may be frustrating your employee, you may find that allowing him or her to telecommute may still be the solution. Once free of the endless meetings, the water cooler chatter, the interruptions, the daily commute and the office politics, your new telecommuting employee may be able to perform his or her full time job in less time at home, allowing him to explore other interests. On first impression this idea may go against your grain, but evaluate it further. If this employee really is bored or frustrated with his job, he could become a much better performer if his creative interests were allowed the opportunity to be challenged in another way. If you have an employee that expresses this type of frustration with his job, try to gain a full understanding of what he really needs, and see if working at home can help form a solution. You may be surprised.

Voila. Four dicey business turnover challenges. Four unexpected work at home solutions!

This article is not intended to give legal, tax or business advice. Consult competent professionals concerning any matter involving the law, taxes or other important matters.