Abstract
Talented knowledge workers play a crucial role in the ever-changing world and in today’s knowledge economy. Knowledge workers should form part of every organisation’s retention plans to stay competitive. However, retaining knowledge workers remains a challenge today due to their mobility and a constant search for greener pastures. Organisations should welcome this challenge as these workers hold a strategic value and can be considered a key differentiator. Knowledge workers are known for their high mobility and when they leave an organisation, they leave a knowledge deficit. Thus, keeping talented knowledge workers ensures that the knowledge in their minds is not lost to the organisation. To understand the retention cognition of knowledge workers, a literature review was conducted to identify factors which affect the retention of knowledge workers and to develop retention measures to keep them. The retention measures ensure that the knowledge remains in the organisation. Archival records, questionnaires and interviews were used to collect data from an engineering department of the Production Unit ABC in relation to factors affecting the retention or turnover decisions of knowledge workers. The knowledge workers were referred to engineering practitioners; those who performed engineering work or provided technical support. From the results it was clear that the following factors, e.g., compensation, organisational culture, leadership and work environment affect the retention of knowledge workers. Compensation and benefits, work environment, training and career development opportunities as well as family support were found to be prominent retention measures. The conclusion that can be drawn is that several factors affect the retention of knowledge workers, their decision to leave or stay within their place of employment and although there are ways to retain the best talent, knowledge workers can simply leave if they so wish.
M.Ing. (Engineering Management)