Friends – this thought has been meandering in the recesses of my mind for a while.
Imagine you have a workplace where the culture is so wonderful that:
- everyone loves working there.
- everyone treats each other with respect and courtesy.
- while there are problems and challenges, these are manageable.
- people love working with each other and sometimes they even refer to themselves as the work family.
- they know the names of their colleagues’ kids and pets.
- they share stories and reminisce fondly of past events.
- everyone works smart and achieves their outcomes – despite the various systemic challenges.
- very few people leave of their own volition because it’s such a great place to work.
So, what’s wrong with this picture?
This type of workplace is stale, with groupthink and outmoded ways of working because everyone has been there so long.
The dark side of a workplace with a great culture is that no one ever leaves – consequently, there are fewer opportunities for people to step up. Stagnation sets in, inhibiting growth and opportunities for talent to step up, especially in non-growing organizations.
So people leaders, you have a problem if your voluntary attrition rate (at all levels) is suboptimal.
New people coming into the organisation – especially at mid to senior levels bring in fresh thinking, new ideas through innovation and new energy.
And people, if you find yourself working in the same organisation for longer than 4-5 years, ask yourself if you are in your comfort zone. And if you are, then you are not just depriving yourself of an opportunity to earn more (it’s true that getting a job externally accompanies a pay bump) and learn more, but you are keeping the organisation from thriving. You are contributing to corporate atrophy.
So how do we tackle the challenge of culture and people not wanting to leave?
Simple.
No one wants to leave an organisation with a great culture – UNLESS they are going to another organisation with an equally good culture.
So people, work on your workplace culture, and this shadow side of low attrition will fade. 💼🌱 #WorkplaceCulture #TalentRetention #InnovationCulture
