Of course you're never going to be able to keep everybody. That's not the point. But I believe you can build a culture that promotes longer-term relationships and a tighter bond. Maybe we'll never get back to the days of life-long employment followed by a gold-watch and a pension, but I think we can do better than the current system that most firms seem to be using.

Another thing I want us to do, is define a career path that allows technical people to continue to advance in pay and prestige, without forcing them into becoming managers. But that issue will be a long way off for us (heck, we're a pre-funding, bootstrapped startup right now... most hiring/retention issues are quite a ways off for us!)