Want Employees to Stay? Try Being a Good BossWant Employees to Stay? Try Being a Good Boss

Whether there is an IT skills shortage or not, retaining talent -- which is crucial to a smaller business' success -- can often come down to another, frequently overlooked factor: What kind of boss you are.The New York Times has an article that addresses the importance to a smaller business of having a good boss. Writes Paul Brown: "If employee turnover and absenteeism within the company are too high, and productivity and morale too low, the person in charge may be the one at fault."

A smaller company cannot afford to absorb the fallout that inevitably result from high turnover and low morale and managers would do well to heed the words of Trevor Gay, who is quoted in the NYT article. The attributes of the best bosses, he said, did things like inspired confidence, were humble, had integrity, knew what they were talking about, let employees get on with things, were there when employees needed help, and usually said, "Yes, try it."

The worst bosses? According to Gay, those are managers who never seem to be around when employees need them, always asked employees to justify what they want to do, always want to know what employees are doing, often said "no, we can't do that," give the impression of being distrustful, don't smile much, and talk about themselves a lot.

Do you recognize yourself in either description? It could explain a lot of what is happening in your organization.

The article links to a 10-question quiz created by Working America that is supposed to help employees figure out how bad their boss is but could be revealing -- and instructive  to bosses themselves.

The article also highlights Inc.'s seven signs that your employees detest you.

Number three: "You never see people walk by. Employees would rather circumnavigate the entire office to get to the coffee machine or bathroom than take the shortcut past your door and risk being invited in."

Number five is even better: "People don't volunteer for your pet projects. The idea sucks, and they're afraid to tell you, or it's brilliant, but the consequences for letting you down are too terrible to imagine. And, of course, if it's your pet project, you'll probably work on it as well. Which means more time spentgulpwith you."

If you see yourself in these examples, you've got some serious thinking to do.