7 Reasons Your Best Employees Are Leaving Your Company

A lot of managers constantly complain about how difficult it is to keep quality employees. If you’re losing your best talent on a regular basis, it is tremendously detrimental to the progress of your business.

Here’s something you might not have considered — you are the reason they’re leaving. It’s easy to blame the economy, the mindset of your employees and find a million other reason to rationalize their departure when all it probably takes is a shift in your own mindset.

Here are a few reasons your employees might be quitting.

1. They’re burned out

One of the major reasons why talented people quit is because they’re simply asked to do too much. As a manager, it might be tempting to get the most out of a talented employee while they’re working for you. But research from the Stanford Institute demonstrates that once you cross the 50-hours-a-week threshold, productivity declines significantly, even among the types of workers that employers covet the most. When you get to the 60-to-80 hour mark, you’re just asking for something bad to happen.

If you want your best employees to work harder, make sure their compensation reflects the extra effort. People will rise to the challenge if you offer them a better position or a meatier paycheck.

2. They aren’t acknowledged for their work

The power of positive feedback is often terribly underestimated. As a manager, a kind word or a pat on the back can go a long way towards ensuring an employee’s loyalty. Everyone loves to be told they’re doing a good job. Whether the recognition comes in the form of a bump in pay or public acknowledgment of their contribution, make sure you’re giving credit where credit is due.

3. You don’t empathize with them

Yes, they’re your employees. But they’re also human beings. Occasionally, they might have some lean periods at work because they’re going through some problems in their personal lives. If you don’t make an effort to understand their situation during these times, you are demonstrating that you don’t really care about their well-being beyond their ability to contribute to your bottom line. It’s tough to work for a boss who looks at you like an expendable cog in the machine.

4. You don’t deliver on your promises

When you make a commitment to your employees, it is your responsibility to make sure you come through. If you make a bunch of empty promises just to make someone stick around a little longer, you will quickly lose credibility among your employees. Why should they trust you if you never do what you say you will?

5. You offer promotions to undeserving candidates

If your employees are working hard for you, they expect that their efforts will be recognized when the promotion season comes around. If you bypass a hard worker for someone who has curried personal favor with you, it’s a slap in the face for your other employees. Additionally, when you hire people that are clearly unfit for the position they’re occupying, it makes life difficult for the people that have to work with them

6. You don’t let your employees experiment

The best employees like to have a little freedom to experiment and think outside the box. They might also have some passions outside of work. If you make it difficult for them to do the things they love to do, you’re giving them a reason to quit your company. If you just set broad goals and let your employees improvise within them, you will dramatically increase their productivity.

7. You don’t let your employees grow

Talented people like to constantly improve their skillsets. If you let corporate mumbo-jumbo get in the way of one of your best employees learning a new skill, you will make them tired and listless. If their jobs don’t offer them an interesting set of creative and intellectual challenges, they are more likely to seek alternative options.

Get your employees excited

Your employees should be excited about getting to work when they wake up in the morning. As a manager, it is your job to foster a work environment which nurtures talent and compensates the best people adequately. If you want to reduce the employee turnover rate in your organization, follow these seven straightforward steps!