Excessive Turnover (ET) Management
This subject is addressed time
and time again. Some retailers have more
Store Manager and Assistant Manager
positions open than they have filled. Take
a look at on-line job sites and you’ll see
that even large, well known retailers are
trying to fill positions that should be
filled with candidates from within the
company. In fact, if a solid internal
promotion policy was in place – one that
really worked - the majority of vacancies
would be at entry level.
The concern is that this is not
just an occasional problem for many
retailers and other companies in the
service industry. It is an on-going state
of affairs. It has become a ‘mission
critical’ item that goes unrecognized as
such. C level individuals absolutely must
become involved with this epidemic called
excessive turnover.
The research is out there. We
know it’s very expensive to attract and
train high caliber employees. Why, then,
do so many organizations treat excessive
turnover as normal and acceptable? The
answer, simply and unfortunately, is lack
of awareness.
Often top management is unaware
of the root causes of excessive turnover
and, as a result, their questions to high
level subordinates focus on the activities
taking place to attract people to fill
vacancies (job fairs, advertisements here,
there and everywhere, possibly the use of
a professional recruiter, word of mouth,
etc.) and those activities are pushed very
high on the priority action list. The
question to subordinates should be “Why do
we have excessive turnover?” and “What is
being done to ensure that we keep the good
people we already have?” Why not put
‘hiring and keeping good people’ high on
the priority action list? And I mean
high…right up there with sales and profit.
When you define ‘good people’
for your particular business it is highly
likely it will include some form of
performance or productivity criteria. You
don’t want to attract and retain nice
people, or sweet or happy or kind people.
You want to attract and retain people who
are ‘good’ based solely on your particular
company’s definition of ‘good’. Someone
else’s definition of ‘good’ just won’t cut
it.
Why not set up a new department
to delve into this area? With all due
respect to Human Resources professionals
everywhere - and I mean that sincerely -
the HR department is not the place to
start with this new endeavor. An ‘attitude
survey’ alone won’t serve the purpose. An
‘open-door policy’ won’t serve the
purpose. Exit interviews won’t serve the
purpose. You must have objective, sales
and customer service oriented individuals
looking at operations and asking quality
questions in order to figure out what kind
of management employees are being
subjected to in the organization. Top
performers, or producers, usually know
what they do and do not like; what
inspires and motivates them to perform.
Getting them to tell you what those things
are is the difficult part.
The main cause of excessive
turnover is inadequate
management practices. Given
the sophisticated society we live in
excessive turnover should have been
eradicated long ago. ET is bad for your
business and bad for employees, as anyone
interested in, or struggling with, this
subject surely has figured out already.
But why are so few companies
dealing with it in a productive manner?
The reasons are many. 1) They haven’t
actually seen the effect on the bottom
line; which is not to say it isn’t there –
it certainly is – but it may not have
gotten enough attention to extract the
actual dollar figure and attack it as a
priority action item. 2) They believe it
is an industry related malady and,
therefore, believe there is not much they
can do. 3) Top management is not asking
the right questions. And the list of
reasons goes on.
Managers and recruiters spend an
inordinate amount of time and energy
scurrying around in a never-ending flurry
of activity to get new people on board. If
we would only spend half as much time and
effort focusing on keeping the ‘good’
people we already have we would be able to
climb off of the hamster wheel and become
far more productive.
It takes great managers to
manage and develop people for maximum
effectiveness.
Among other things, great
managers are consistent; are credible;
promote stability; communicate well and
often:
Consistency
– It is difficult to follow a leader who
is inconsistent. They may be seen
unpredictable and/or wishy-washy.
Credibility
- It is impossible to respect a leader who
has no credibility. They can be seen as
untrustworthy and insincere.
Stability
- It is uncomfortable to work for a leader
who does not create stability in the
workplace and may even appear to promote
instability and insecurity.
Communication
- It is difficult to follow a leader who
cannot, or does not, communicate well.
They are often misunderstood and believed
to be lacking clarity of vision and/or
direction.
ET can be abolished by following
some innovative as well as some solid,
tried and true management/people
development practices. You need to know
what those practices are and how to
implement them successfully within your
organization. Understanding what your good
people need from you is the first, and
crucial, step. Your great managers have to
do the rest.
DMS Retail offers an insightful
guide to people management as it relates
to the eradication of ET. For further
information contact
info@dmsretail.com.
