Turnover is a symptom of a deeper disease in most companies. A consistent turnover level typically speaks to one of two problems – poor management skills or hiring the wrong employees. Corporate culture, compensation and other topics can come in to play, but I want to focus on the former topics. One of our placements resigned this week after only 6 weeks in the role. This is not a sales position so it is somewhat outside of our expertise. Nonetheless, I contacted the former employee and discussed with her what went sideways. She laid most of the blame at the feet of one of the co-owners of the company and… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Etiquette Of Retention
Does ‘Thank You’ Help Keep Associates? from CareerJournal.com takes a look at turnover/retention issues at a major law firm. Scary, I know. However, there is a good lesson in here in regards to retaining top employees. First the setup from the article: Faced with a surge in turnover of its associates, the prestigious law firm Sullivan & Cromwell LLP has been putting on a charm offensive to hold onto junior lawyers. The presentation showed that the New York firm, now with about 625 lawyers, lost 31% of its associates in 2004 and 30% in 2005. The average associate attrition rate for law firms of about that size or bigger for… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen Drivers Of Retention Are Misaligned
I’m a little late to the party on this post from Spherion’s The Big Time blog. The post covers many interesting topics. To start (emphasis mine): 23 percent of companies are already dissatisfied with the talent available. One-third of HR managers mention turnover/retention as a key concern. On average, employers expect 14 percent of their workforce to leave within the next year. 31 percent of workers believe there is a turnover or retention problem at their company, and 39 percent of workers themselves expect to leave in the next year. Less than half (44 percent) of workers believe their company is taking steps to retain its employees. You can see… Read More
Continue ReadingEmployee Retention Wake-Up Call – Part 2
A couple of months ago we posted on an article from the Pioneer Press titled Speaking Up Helps Keep Star Workers. One of the surprising findings was that 47% of the 16,273 stellar workers surveyed are mailing out resumes, going on job interviews, even contemplating other offers. I just recently caught up to an article from a WorkForce Management newsletter of a survey Yahoo HotJobs conducted on 5,300 people. They found that nearly two-thirds are open to switching jobs, with an improving job market cited as the chief cause for such optimism. Here are some interesting points they found: 39% cited unhappiness with wages as the chief issue 75% cited… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Sales Hiring Security Blanket
There is a security blanket in hiring salespeople and it is this – experience. Experience is the balm to bad sales hiring. Companies start with a desire to hire primarily from their industry. If someone has multiple years selling in the industry, skill and talent are assumed to be sufficient and transferrable. But this approach works far less often than you think. We see it play out almost on a weekly basis. There is no truer example than one of our customers who sells in a distribution market. They sell electronic parts that are integrated into larger machines. These parts can be purchased at numerous other companies in the Twin… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen Turnover Is Good
We met this morning with a sales manager from one of our clients and had an interesting discussion about turnover. This company is in an “old-line” industry and has an established salesforce. In fact, the newest salesperson has been with the company for more than 5 years. Most have a 10 to 20 year tenure – retention is not a problem since this is a good employer. The problem is this – their business has had to change over the past year to match the marketplace. There has been no layoffs, but some restructuring and new management has been added. These changes, according to our sales manager, have caused much… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Perfect Storm
CNNMoney.com offers this quick story – Planned job cuts take big Dec. dip. The phrase “planned job cuts” is a poor construction, but it essentially means expected layoffs. Planned job cuts for all of 2006 fell below 1 million for the first time since 2000, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc., an employment consulting firm. Be wary of the naysayers spouting an impending doom for our economy. The economy is robust and it truly is an employee’s market right now. The reason why you should be aware of this fact: “With the American economy at full employment for the first time since Sept. 11, 2001, the latest job-cut data… Read More
Continue ReadingUpward Mobility
Thomas Register has a blog. If you have worked in the industrial market, you probably are familiar with their encyclopedia-like register. I used to be a sales manager for a high precision sheet metal fabricator and was quite familiar with researching the Thomas Register. The fact that they have a blog today speaks volumes. ThomasNet.com (online name) has a post that plays off of the CareerBuilder.com 2007 Job Forecast that was released earlier this week. Their 7 tips are all excellent including number 7: 7) Better training In light of a seeming shortage of skilled workers within their own industries, employers are looking for transferable skills from other industries. Seventy-eight… Read More
Continue ReadingSocialize With Your Younger Employees
From Rasmussen Reports – Younger Workers Want More, Connection That Is. Not really a surprise here, but a reinforcement: On top of everything else, Generation Y employees also prefer more frequent social interaction with their managers. One-quarter (26 percent) would like to socialize with their boss at least monthly. This is compared to 21 percent for Generation X, 16 percent for Baby Boomers and 17 percent for Traditionalists. That seems to be a strong trend towards socializing amongst the younger workers. If you have a retention problem at your company, this survey provides a good place to start correcting it.
Continue ReadingOne of Them Must Be Wrong
A quote from my post on Tuesday: And don’t assume its about money. When someone quits her job, 89 percent of managers assume it was over money, whereas 91 percent of the workers who quit say it was anything but, Murphy said. From a CareerJournal article titled Opportunity Knocks, And It Pays a Lot Better: Managers like to say employees leave companies because of bad bosses or lack of career growth. A new report suggests a more straightforward reason: money.In a survey of about 1,100 U.S. employees, 71% of top performers listed pay among the top three reasons they would consider leaving their employer. Yet in a sister survey of… Read More
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