Employee Turnover: Why People Quit Their Jobs

By Marcia Zidle on August 9, 2011

There are many reasons why good employees quit and go to another company, perhaps even your competitor.

Good people don’t leave good companies, they leave poor managers. Here are seven managerial practices that drive good people away. Are they prevalent in your organization?

  1. Managers demand that one person do the jobs of two or more people, resulting in longer days and weekend work. This turns into a morale killer not only for the person but for the team.
  2. Managers don’t allow the rank and file to make decisions about their work. Therefore employees see their job as only a job rather than developing enthusiasm and pride of ownership.
  3. Managers constantly reorganize, shuffles people around and changes direction constantly. So employees don’t know what’s going on, what the priorities are and what they should be doing.
  4. Managers don’t take the time to clarify their decisions. For example it rejects work without an explanation or yells at people without telling them what the problem is. This damages the morale and confidence of the employees.
  5. Managers alienate staff by promoting someone who lacks training and /or the necessary experience to supervise. This leads to employees to feel management shows favoritism and so why do a good job.
  6. Managers set up departments to compete against each other while at the same time preaching teamwork and cooperation. Employees become cynical and only put effort in what they see management wants not what they say.
  7. Managers throw temper tantrums, points fingers and assigns blame when things go wrong. As a result,  employees do the minimum and play it safe afraid of being the target of this negativity.

Management Success Tip:

One way to stop employee turnover is to stop micromanaging. Close supervision, control and bureaucracy kills the spirit of your people – morale goes down and people start leaving.  Instead focus on the big picture, delegate so that the most competent people actually do the work and give up control over the little things. In other words, managing less is managing better.

Do you want to develop your Management Smarts?