www.tjprc.org editor@tjprc.org A STUDY ON THE EMPLOYEE RETENTION STRATEGIES FOLLOWED BY STARTUP COMPANIES R. P. SUVETHASHRI 1 & Dr. A. VICKRAM 2 1 Research Scholar, Department of Commerce, Loyola College, Chennai, Tamilnadu, India 2 Assistant Professor, Department of Commerce, Loyola College, Chennai, Tamilnadu, India ABSTRACT As far as organizations are concerned human resources are its important livelihood. Though organizations are driven by technology, yet they require human resources to operate these technologies. With the overall development and technological up-gradation, there is an increase in the level of competition in the market. As the competition increases, business organizations are expanded hence there is the availability of lots and lots of opportunities in the hands of the human resources. The biggest challenge that the organization faces today is managing and retaining the employees. In this fast-paced working environment and labor-intensive market retaining the qualified employees is the biggest struggle that companies faces, especially the startups. Usually startup companies try to bring in new products/services/ideas in the market, thus it creates a lot of challenges for the employers such as uncertainty about the future, managing competition, government regulations and policies, irregular earning or less profit at the early stages, high salaries offered to employees by the competitor firm, etc. All these become a hurdle to the employer for retaining the employees in a startup company. Thus it is very important for organizations to follow effective motivational strategies in order to retain their employees. Keeping this into account, this paper studies the various factors affecting employee retention and also suggest a few tactics for startup companies to motivate and retain their employees. KEYWORDS: Human Resources, Technological Upgradation, Competition, Opportunities, Retention & Startups Received: Oct 21, 2019; Accepted: Nov 11, 2019; Published: Feb 10, 2020; Paper Id.: IJBMRFEB20209 INTRODUCTION Employees are the most important resources of any organization, but at the same time, they are the most difficult resource to manage. They are referred as the key assets of the organization. The diverse nature of human begins and their importance to the organization has motivated researchers to focus on human resources. And each looked at it from a different perspective. Though researchers have studied about the employees in startups, usually their motivation and retentions issues are ignored. In this present era, startups are the new trend of organization and they have to be looked at from a different perspective. Strategies that work for other organizations may not work for a startup. Therefore, a study specifically concentrating on the issues and challenges faced by employer in motivating and retaining the employees in startup companies has to be addressed. This paper studies the challenges that the employer of Startup Company face while motivating their employees and also suggest a few motivational strategies in order to retain employees and improve their performance. Original Article International Journal of Business Management & Research (IJBMR) ISSN (P): 2249–6920; ISSN (E): 2249–8036 Vol. 10, Issue 1, Feb 2020, 59–66 © TJPRC Pvt. Ltd.