Whether you’re a small or large business, it’s prudent to do a retention risk assessment on key people or key positions. Turnover cost can be anywhere between 1 to 3 times that person’s salary when you factor in recruitment efforts, loss of production, training and rebuilding of client relationships.

Create your own assessment and ranking and include a number of questions related to manager-employee relationships, employee’s work-life balance satisfaction, employee’s career goals and the employee’s job satisfaction. Example questions may include:

• Does the manager maintain an open and respectful relationship with the employee?
• Does the employee know his/her objectives clearly?
• Has the employee’s attitude, physical and mental wellbeing been healthy for the past six months?
• Does the employee’s job align with his/her long-term goals?
• Have you had a career discussion with the employee in the past six months?
• Do you proactively support the employee’s development through training or providing new opportunities?

The higher the number of “no” answers to your assessment equates to a higher flight risk. Managers can mitigate the risk by ensuring they have regular formal and informal meaningful meetings and to ensure they ask the right questions of their employee. What are their goals, are there areas that they want to grow their skills and experience, are they happy in their role – and so forth.

Open communication and trust is the key to ensuring managers are aware of their employee’s job satisfaction and potential flight risk.

Post by: Lynn McIlwee