A recent paper from McKinsey & Company has interesting things to say about acquiring and retaining top-performing employees.  Leading companies are using data analytics to explore what works and what does - and the results can run counter to common wisdom.  Here's one example:

Too often, companies seek to win the talent war by throwing ever more money into the mix. One example was a major US insurer that had been facing high attrition rates; it first sought, with minimal success, to offer bonuses to managers and employees who opted to remain. Then the company got smarter. It gathered data to help create profiles of at-risk workers; the intelligence included a range of information such as demographic profile, professional and educational background, performance ratings, and, yes, levels of compensation. By applying sophisticated data analytics, a key finding rose to the fore: employees in smaller teams, with longer periods between promotions and with lower-performing managers, were more likely to leave.

Once these high-risk employees had been identified, more informed efforts were made to convince them to stay. Chiefly, these involved greater opportunities for learning development and more support from a stronger manager. Bonuses, on the other hand, proved to have little if any effect. As a result, funds that might have been allocated to ineffectual compensation increases were instead invested in learning development for employees and improved training for managers. Performance and retention both improved, with significant savings left over—showing yet again the value of digging into the data at hand. When well applied, people analytics is fairer, has greater impact, and is ultimately more time and cost-effective. It can move everyone up the knowledge curve—often times in counterintuitive ways.

"People analytics reveals three things HR may be getting wrong," McKinsey & Company, July 2016.