63. Plugging A $1 Million Leak In Your Company

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On today's episode...

A trillion dollars.

That’s what US businesses are losing every year due to voluntary turnover. 

But here’s a hard truth for you:  most of this is self-inflicted.

Hey, Team welcome back to Lead Thru Values. This podcast exists to help you ensure that every person on your team has the skills, knowledge and confidence to do their job exceptionally well.

And today, I want to share something I’m seeing in my work companies across a variety of industries and sizes.

Turnover is expensive. According to Gallup the cost of replacing an individual employee can range from one-half to two times the employees annual salary (a very conservative estimate.)

So a company with 100 employees that provides an average salary of $50,000 could have turnover and replacement costs anywhere between $660,000 and $2.6 million per year.

That’s according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report that measured an annual turnover rate of 26.3%… in 2017. That’s 5 years ago and pre-pandemic.

Losing your best people means you have a leadership performance gap. And there’s no denying it. But, that means it is also fixable.

It would be too easy to say that this is natural or inevitable. 

Yes, people move. Get married. Get divorced.

Some people pursue their own dream to start their own company.

Here are some additional statistics.

• 52% of voluntary exiting employees say their manager or organization could have done something different to prevent them from leaving their job.

It would be easy to assume or say, “we did everything to make it right and keep that person…”

But over half of exiting employees tell that in the 3 months prior to them leaving, neither their manager or any other leader spoke with them about their job satisfaction or future with the company.

Don’t miss that!

In 3 months, nobody asked them how they felt about their job. No one talked with them about their future.

This is the leak that I’m seeing and I want to help you know how to plug it.

You train your managers to have consistent, meaningful conversations with employees.

I train and coach my clients on how to have a real Progress Meeting where a productive, 2-way conversation occurs every 30 days.

Now before you stop listening because you either *think* you’re already doing this, or you can’t stomach the thought of another meeting, stick with me.

Here are 3 keys:

The meeting gets scheduled out a year every 30 days. The goal is that a minimum of 10 meetings occur per calendar year. 

Why is scheduling them ahead of time so vital? Because what’s easy to do is also easy not to do.

Getting them on the calendar creates accountability and an expectation that they’ll happen. All too often this simple step is taken for granted, resulting in gaps of 2, 3 or even 4 months.

The progress meeting must be a conversation.

Conversations create clarity, but you cannot get clarity without be an active listener. Managers, it’s not your job to do all the talking. You should be asking questions and listening to learn, not to respond.

How are things going on the XYZ project?

Have you run into any unexpected challenges or roadblocks?

Do you have everything you need to hit the target?

And the best managers learn the communication and behavior style of themselves AND of each of their team members.