Reduce Employee Turnover

Tactics to reduce employee turnover abound in the literature, but when it comes to implementing these solutions in the real world, managers often find themselves frustrated. After all, human beings don't always behave rationally. Sometimes, employees leave for no good reason in particular, and they're unwilling to negotiate terms to stay.

What's frustrating is that employee turnover costs your company money. You invest resources and time into training your staff. When someone receives all that training and then leaves to join a competitor's firm or to pursue another line of work, you're out a significant investment. Unfortunately, such are the perils of working in business. There's nothing you can do about this base attrition rate.

New Ideas for Reducing Turnover

That said, if your firm is suffering from severe and chronic employee turnover, there's likely a serious flaw in your business model. What's worse, customer and employee feedback may not shed light on the problem. Indeed, customers and employees often blame each other, and managers tend to blame their inferiors. Thus, to get the heart of your turnover problem, you may have to bring in an outside consultant

Ultimately, the only tried-and-true tactic to rein in turnover is to experiment by adjusting multiple variables. For instance, you could start by improving office conditions, firing particularly ineffectual managers and employees, and screening new candidates more thoroughly. Don't worry if these draconian measures cost your business a pretty penny in the short run--investing in your company's future is worth it.