These pages have often featured articles on why employees choose to stay with an employer and why they may choose to depart to other companies.
Here are a few past posts:
Most managers and employees agree that ‘bad’ bosses are the main reason employees quit. The anecdotal evidence and conventional wisdom only add to my own observation from both sides of the divide.
Here comes the Harvard Business Review with a new study which claims, “employees leave both good and bad bosses at almost comparable rates.” The researchers reached their conclusion by studying and interview 700 employees in the IT sector. The conclusions being counterintuitive it is possible that the study confused its cause and effect. In other words, better employees left and were also the same ones who ‘kept their chin up’ and remained positive in the face of bad bosses or other reasons that motivate employees to decamp. Above average employees are likely to have a passion for and be deserving of more senior jobs and better pay, which are already identified as employee incentives. The key is whether it would be at their present job or elsewhere. This is where companies need to be diligent and retain talent.
The study itself believes that the silver lining in this is that employees leaving good managers become better ambassadors and alumni. Even so, the finding is at odds with what has been this writer’s personal and professional experience. Still, the conflicting findings are not a reason to exclude writing about them or to immediately assign a false value to them.
If – and this should not be construed as a leading sentence – the article is mistaken it could be due to it being one sample studying one industry, although it is doubtful to me personally that employee retention fundamentals are that different from industry to industry.
What do you think?
*Things That Need To Go Away: Companies Without A Growth Plan For Employees Who want It.
