Dive Brief:
- The top reason professionals in a Korn Ferry survey are looking for a new job in 2018 is boredom. One-third (33%) of respondents selected "I'm bored, need new challenge" as their motivation for moving on. The survey queried 4,900 professionals.
- Boredom even beat out higher pay in the survey; just 19% of those polled cited more money as their reason for job hunting.
- Additionally, over half (53%) of respondents said interviewers were "somewhat prepared" or worse for their job interview, and 46% said they were turned down for a job because they felt the interviewer did not take the time to fully understand their qualifications.
Dive Insight:
Turnover is too costly a problem to ignore. Employers pay 33% of a worker's salary to hire a replacement. In dollars, that amounts to $15,000 to replace a departing worker earning $45,000 a year.
Employers also have to consider indirect costs like productivity. The time required to find a replacement, as well as the knowledge and information lost when employees leave, isn't easy to make up. Is the effort spent on getting new hires on board and fully functioning worth it?
Employers must know why workers leave so they can find ways to retain them. When employees struggle with fixable problems like boredom, employers must step up their development efforts. Managers can give disengaged workers more challenging assignments, offer training to expand or upgrade their skills, place them on interdepartmental teams or enlist them in the organization's causes or community projects.
Exit interviews should be part of the separation process. Not all departing employees will want to share their reasons for leaving, but when enough interviews are collected, they can be useful in flagging reoccurring problems that curb retention.
