Sometimes it's not rocket science....

Now that Christmas is over (and now the bills many will be arriving for many), it seemed appropriate to comment on the CCF agent compensation survey published earlier this month.

This survey had the shock finding that cash, namely salary, rather than the Human Resources buzzword of 'total reward package' was the top motivator for attracting agents. I can't pretend I was surprised that relatively low paid, often young workers found it better to have cash to spend on their own choices than HR offering them a menu of cash substitutes.

It's noticeable that a pleasant place to work was also rated highly by agents, and that is something that salary can't buy. Work conditions, though, really depend on the quality of management. This is something that I've touched on in my posts on reporting ("Reporting - Having your cake & eating it").

My view is that while you might need good pay to attract the best agents, retaining them (and tackling the industry's appalling churn rate) will be done by work conditions. It may seem cheaper to pay a good salary than to provide a pleasant, well run organisation, but investing in the environment agents experience will be cheaper than letting HR try to get discounted gym memberships.