The Four Signs of Bad Turnover

Four signs of bad turnover are:

• Your turnover rate is high compared to industry norms
• Your turnover rate is high compared those with whom you compete for employees
• A significant number of employees leave to work for competing employers
• You are losing many of your top performing employees.

In these cases, begin to seek out more information—via exit interviews, focus groups, and employee attitude surveys—as to why employees are leaving. Then piece together the turnover puzzle and respond accordingly.

Why Are They Leaving?

When a high rate of bad turnover does exist in an organization, the employer must be concerned with the underlying reasons. Compensation is rarely the sole motivating factor. There are a number of ways to discover some of the issues involved in turnover.

Conduct thorough exit interviews covering:

• Reason for leaving
• Attitudes toward the company
• Attitudes toward immediate supervisor
• Satisfaction with career path

Additionally, the employer may conduct a survey for existing employees about:

• Job fit
• Job challenges
• Job satisfaction
• Career path at company
• Employer/supervisor fairness
• Employer policies concerning employees
• Benefits
• Person’s individual goals

When Are They Leaving?

The timing of an employee’s departure may give an employer important insights. For example, if many newly hired employees are leaving voluntarily within the first year of employment, it’s likely that there’s a disconnect in the hiring process.

On the other hand, if employees are leaving later in their careers, an employer’s retention strategies may be in need of review.

Retention Strategies

To improve retention, try the following:

• Describe the job correctly (probably the best way to improve retention and reduce turnover is to make good hiring decisions)
• Train managers and others involved in the hiring process to conduct interviews that lead to well-informed, appropriate judgments about each applicant
• Challenge the employee
• Provide training
• Focus on enrichment
• Establish mentoring
• Recognize employee success
• Create a career path
• Promote from within
• Provide excellent supervision
• Encourage free communication
• Provide competitive benefits and p[ay

Preventing turnover and retaining top workers—easily two of the most important tasks of HR and Compensation. But that doesn’t mean they’re easy. Fortunately, there’s a timely webinar …