When A Good Employee Leaves Do You Know Why?
Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009There is an expense associated to losing any employee in the time it takes for them to be replaced, the effort required to find a replacement as well as any recruitment and advertising costs on top of which there is the cost of losing knowledge and experience that is specific to the organization; Losing good employees is a problem where prevention is most definitely the best cure.
It is inevitable that employees will leave from time to time but a good employer will want to know why an employee has decided to leave to ensure that personnel are leaving for the right, and not the wrong, reasons.
Concerns of employees can be identified early by the regular use of well designed job satisfaction surveys, allowing for problems to be resolved and helping to minimize needless loss of staff. However, some problems, especially those that involve personalities, are not always brought to the surface until it is too late.
Poor management and/or a lack of any real career development are two common reasons that can result in employees deciding to leave an organization. Both of these problems can be difficult to identify even for organizations that adopt regular 360-degree appraisals (i.e. where as part of the overall appraisal employees are requested to evaluate their line managers).
While still employed employees can be very reluctant to criticize their managers for fear of reprisal; they can however be more candid when completing an employee exit survey.
It is unlikely that an Exit survey will prevent any individuals from leaving but it will help identify problems that could, if left unchecked, could result in poor staff moral for the remaining staff and worse case scenario, more resignations.
Lack of Career Development
Not all employers can offer, and nor do all employees desire, a clear and long term career path. There are just as many people that find comfort and security in doing one job well as there are people that need to feel that they are continual being challenged, learning new skills and moving onwards and upwards with respect to the corporate ladder. Organizations that succeed and excel need the balance of having high flyers and steady Eddies.
Where losses due to a lack of career development are occasional they may also be inevitable, but where they are frequent, then changes to the organizational structure might need to be considered to allow for greater career development of the employees.
Poor Management
Many managers achieved their position through promotion, but it does not always follow that a good worker will automatically make a good manager and often people are assigned management position without any formal management training.
Managers who perform poorly can be quick to discredit the views of disgruntled staff, ‘I am glad they went it saved me getting rid of them’ and ‘they were useless anyway’ may prove to be common responses to those managers being asked if there are any problems that might be causing people to leave the organization.
It is proper and natural for senior management to support their line managers by giving them the benefit of any doubt, after all a good managers can always be slighted by poor employees. But by conducting exit surveys, if a man-management problem were to be identified early there is a good chance that it can be addressed and resolved with the appropriate formal training and guidance.
Records
It is not that unusual for a person to leave an employer and put in a claim for constructive dismissal at a later date. With legal representation now adopting the ‘No win no fee’ model even good employers are finding this to be a real problem. Exit surveys will at best, provide a valuable record of the employee’s reasons for leaving, and at worse, provide early warning that a possible claim might be expected.
A tribunal may not readily accept the word of an employer that when the employee left they did so without indicating any grievance.
Timing of the exit survey
With the employee’s agreement Exit surveys can be delayed for a few months or be conducted as part of the termination process.
If the timing of the exit survey is delayed for a month or two it could allow for a period of reflection where the ex-employee may be less prone to emotion and more objective and if they have started a new job they may be in a position to compare their previous role with their new role.
Conducting an exit survey as part of the termination procedure has the advantage that although the leaving employee may be emotional their views may be more reflective of their true state of mind and therefore closer to the real reasons they have decided to leave. If delayed any comparison between the ex-employee’s old and new roles may be the result of them putting on a brave face, and if the reasons that are given require action, the delay may have prevented the problem from being resolved.
Summary
Organizations will generally benefit in a number of different ways by including exit surveys as part of their employee termination procedures. Having good records could prove to be very valuable later and they will also provide management with information that can help them improve an organization’s moral as well as the bottom line.
See the following survey for sample exit interview questions.
