No manager wants a productive employee to leave.   The time it takes to find a replacement, as well as train them, impacts a manager’s ability to do business.   Yet, employees do leave and an exit interview is a perfect way to find out what caused them to make that decision.  Do you know why employees leave your company?

On About.com, read “Top 10 Reasons Why Employees Quit Their Job” by Susan M. Heathfield to breakdown areas that enhance employee engagement and retain talent.

Studies show that employees that communicate and connect with each other during the business day increase productivity and helps with retention.   Employees need roots in the company in order to feel a part of the organization and their relationships within the workplace help with their overall happiness at work.  Some ways these employees connect:

• brainstorming
• over lunch
• on Monday sharing the weekend with each other
• water cooler is the typical image of employees gathering

They share their personal lives, work issues as well as gossip.     Gossip is the one area you will want to help educate each employee of its potential destructive quality.

Hiring new people is a lot of work and most of the time we manage to find the right person to add value to the company.   What happens when you hire a new person who doesn’t seem to fit?

What does “fit” look like in your company?    Here are some areas where most managers evaluate their employee’s effectiveness and productivity:

• Work performance – for most companies, depending on the role, what is important is an employee’s attention to detail, how they handle customers or their creative abilities.

When you are managing employees, you quickly recognize that people come with different skills, abilities and personalities.    It would be great if you had only high performers, who easily followed everything you set out to do and with a wonderful warm personality.   People come to work with their personalities and that is one of the hardest aspects in managing people.

How do you work with an individual, who is performing, and you find annoying?  If an employee isn’t performing, then you have a different issue.  For this post, we are addressing performers who you just don’t like.

When managing employees, you need to know why each employee may want to leave the company.    You can’t control external circumstances in an employee’s life as that is outside of your sphere.   Creating a work environment that encourages communication will help retain good employees.

Employees leave a company for many reasons:

• Relationship with their manager:   This is one of the top reasons employees leave a company.   Review your relationship with your team members.   Do they respect you or fear you or believe you don’t stand behind your words?
• Is the work challenging enough to hold their attention?