People Stay Because They Are Free to Leave

We all knew it was coming. In case you missed the announcement, here are the statistics from today's "News & Trends" by Joe Light in the Wall Street Journal.

"In February, the number of employees voluntarily quitting surpassed the number being fired or discharged for the first time since October 2008, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Before February, the BLS had recorded more layoffs than resignations for 15 straight months, the first such streak since the bureau started tracking data a decade ago."

Of course we need more than a month of data to call it a trend. (Just thought I'd mention the obvious given what the Market did today.) Nonetheless, we all know the pent up desire to dash is there, and we all know why.

So what to do when 20% of the members of the Ladders.com (job board specializing in salaries over $100,000) participating in a questionnaire indicated that it would take a raise of more than $25,000 to get them to stay? And 42% of techies on Dice.com (job board for tech professionals) said they wanted a higher salary in order to stay? Face it, you won't be able to throw real money at this for a while.

What to do? It's simple, really. Start at the beginning. Absolutely great advice in the article from Alyson Parker, Director of Human Resources at Florida Hospital Flagler, "We're trying to catch people before they even start looking for a new job . . ."  She's conducting one-on-one "stay interviews" to find out what's on people's minds and what she can do about it.

For some employees, it may be too late. But truthfully, what are they going to find at those other companies? They may get a salary bump, but they'll be back in a setting where leaders are doing their best to rebuild employees' trust in the future.

Do you want to keep all of your talent? That's a valid question, given the fact that a degree of voluntary turnover is healthy for companies -- bringing in new ideas, experiences and talents. So decide that one first. But if you haven't started working on employee retention yet, what are you waiting for?

We'd all like (and sometimes, need) more money, but people stay because they have interesting jobs, opportunities to learn and move ahead, recognition for their work and managers they like to spend time with. All of these can be turned into engagement intiatives, career development programs, and so on. And really good chats -- person to person -- followed by action, as Alyson Parker suggested.

As our Trusted Advisor, Charles Green has pointed out:

"Great firms don't mistake restraint for retention. Their people stay because they are free to leave -- and choose not to. And those who do choose to leave are celebrated as alumni, not shunned as disloyal."

Check around you. Are you leading a great firm?

Margaret O’Hanlon is founder and principal of re:Think Consulting.  She has decades of experience teaming up with clients to ensure great Human Resource ideas deliver valuable business results.  Margaret brings deep expertise in total rewards communication to the dialogue at the Café; before founding re:Think Consulting, she was a Principal in Total Rewards Communications with Towers Perrin.  Margaret earned her M.S. and Ed.S. in Instructional Technology at Indiana University.  Creative writing is one of her outside passions.

Comments

[Drew Hawkins]

Really enjoyed this post. A huge key to engagement and retention begins with simple communication. Sometimes easy to forget that

[Margaret O'Hanlon]

Thanks, Drew. I think so many people in our profession must be so tired by now, it's good to remind them that they can make a difference.

Nonetheless, I love the picture!

[Derek Irvine, Globoforce]

Yes, catch people before the leave, but do it through your company culture -- by creating a company from which they wouldn't want to leave. How do you do this? Establish a culture of recognition in which employees feel valued and appreciated for their contributions and efforts. And how do you do that? By consistently and deliberately recognizing and thanking employees every time they demonstrate a company value and help achieve a strategic objective. This communicates to the employee how much you value them as well as how valuable their personal, day-to-day efforts are in achieving company success.

Tom Peters wrote brilliantly about this in his new "Little Big Things" book. More on this here: http://bit.ly/ciZSGu

[Margaret O'Hanlon]

Thanks for the recommendation, Derek. We'll be on the lookout for more from Tom Peters.