WHY PEOPLE LEAVE

Retention, Retention, Retention! I’m sure you are aware of how important it is to retain your
employees. On the flipside of retention is another concept to understand. One of the questions you need to ask yourself is WHY do your employees leave. The answer to this simple question could make the difference of you keeping or losing your people. If you take the time and energy to really key in on reasons why employees leave your company, it allows you the opportunity to make the necessary changes. One easy way to gain this knowledge is during an Exit Interview. When an individual is leaving your company, regardless of being fired or on their own, take the time to sit down with them. HR Departments realize now that during the Exit Interview, it is no longer about the “necessary paperwork” required to close the personnel file. When conducting these interviews, the goal should be to obtain as much information as possible. If you approach your employee in a non-threatening manner, speak in a soft voice and ask open-ended questions, you are creating a comfortable atmosphere. This individual will trust you more and is likely to give you honest and helpful answers to your questions. One of the questions you should always ask is…What are the 3 things that YOU would change if you could? These answers will provide you with great insight into your organization. The employee has already left your company and no longer has any personal reason why they wouldn’t give the information you seek. Graciously thank them for their input and make sure you are keeping all feedback organized in a manner in which you can later retrieve and analyze the data.

The second way to gain insight into your company is to ask for it! Often companies gather information during performance reviews. This gives your employee the opportunity to talk about what they want. This is a way for people to be heard. Often, if your employee feels that you are sympathetic to their concerns, they will leave your meeting feeling positive!

The final way to gather information is probably the most accurate way to obtain the insight you want. Employees will talk with you about concerns, however, they may not be completely honest for fear of the possible ramifications. If there is a way to create and organize a system to gather pertinent information from your employees, you have a great realistic perception about what your employees think of your company! The key is finding a way to gather this information anonymously! If your employees are confident in the fact that their information will be “heard” without their name attached, you will obtain “all kinds” of honesty. If you do implement a survey/suggestions questionnaire, you must be able to do two things. First, you must be ready for what people will say. Second, you must be ready to address the problems that are discovered and willing to make changes to keep your employees happy.

Information is powerful. If you want to know what your employees want and what they don’t want, just ask them! If you take care of your employees, they will not leave!

Nancy J. Phillips, CPC

In today’s job market one of the most important skills you must master as a Hiring Authority or Owner of any type of company is retaining your people.
The trend becoming more evident than ever is there are more job opportunities than there
are qualified individuals. This will be the case for the near future and for the many years following. Therefore, it is critical that you fine tune your skills that will play a part of retention. People stay with a company for many different reasons. Some of the following reasons are why people stay: job security, flexible work hours, flexible work days, recognition for their work, a work culture that recognizes the importance of work-life balance or a sense of loyalty and belonging!

The above reasons are generalities and will vary from company to company. They can also vary widely from country to country. However, in cultures in which it is assumed that people change jobs on a quite frequent basis. It is not uncommon for the average American to change jobs every 3 to 4 years. Even more surprising, they may actually change their career altogether 2 or 3 times in a lifetime.

The major motivations for staying at a company are as follows:
A Respected Superior: It is extremely important that the employee has a good relationship with their direct report. People will stay if there is a mutual respect between them and their supervisor. Employees spend a lot of time at their job and enjoying the people around them can make all the difference.
Fair Compensation: This point is simply stated, people want to work for a company that offers them a fair compensation package. The amount of actual compensation and benefit package are the obvious points. The second point deals with the intangible compensation in the form of opportunities to learn, grow and succeed.
Pride in the Organization: People want to work for highly reputable corporations. They search for well-managed companies lead by skilled leaders. They want a clear Vision and Purpose outlined. They also want to know the future of the company.
Affiliation: The opportunity to work with professionals of all levels.
Meaningful Work: It is very important that people view their work as meaningful. Satisfying work stimulates interest and that is a great way to keep employees productive.

Overall, the key component is focusing on these motivations as well as any others in order to retain the employees that you need and want to retain!

Nancy J. Phillips, CPC