Every company has a backbone; they are the people who are making you successful. One company I worked for, it was EMTs – Paramedics. In another company it was the sales department and production. The backbone is always the people who have the most direct impact with your customers and your product or service. The employee turnover in these areas will create the most pain and will have the greatest impact on your success. Therefore, the level of turnover in these departments is of the utmost importance.
Many organizations have a dual problem of employee turnover and chronically open positions. They already have a problem filling all of their positions. On top of that, they are also losing people and not replacing them quickly enough. Therefore, the number of open positions is constantly increasing.
Instability in these departments is the last thing you need.
The backbone of your company is the perfect place to start getting control of your employee turnover. It will have both the greatest immediate and long term benefits. It will also help you determine the root causes in your other departments. In every company I have worked for or with, there was a huge problem with employee turnover in the backbone of the company. The pain was always so great, something had to be done.
A healthcare company had a problem with their backbone. The first problem was that they had a worldwide shortage of people in this profession. In addition, this company was more regional and had a problem competing for talent with the larger companies in their industry. They were experiencing both employee turnover and chronically open positions. We had to start with the fundamentals.
Why do people work for us and why do they leave?
In some cases, it is because they are trying to get on with the larger company and for one reason or another can’t get hired. So we are Plan B. Sad. But, the other employees have a multitude of answers to both of these questions. The variety of responses has always astounded me. They also gave me lots of hope and ideas. All of the reasons are very personal and logical. The reasons provide a path forward for the organization. We now have our competitive advantage and can now start fighting back.
Ready to fight back?
