Welcome to the era of Great Resignation
“An Ounce of Prevention Is Worth A Pound of Cure.” Benjamin Franklin coined this timeless phrase in 1736 in order to remind the citizens of Philadelphia to remain vigilant about fire awareness and prevention. As is true of many of his quotes and advancements, it still has great relevance today, so we can feel free to use it by talking about the great resignation era.
Organizations that are able to realize the value of their employees in time have already started to prevent the phenomenon of large-scale resignations by improving the internal well-being of their organization and by listening to their employees: this attitude can eliminate all the costs that have to be incurred later in order to ‘cure’ the misjudgments of employers who see their employees leaving without notice.
In Italy, starting from July 2020, the resignation had a strong impact on the termination of employment, as evidenced by the data collected by the Ministry of Labour drawn up in collaboration with the Bank of Italy and the ANPAL (Agenzia Nazionale Politiche Attive Lavoro). The pandemic situation has surely also played its part in creating a breeding ground for this new phenomenon.
The statistics referring to the Second trimester of 2021 draw attention to an increase of employees’ resignation: + 37% compared to the previous quarter and even + 85% compared to the same period in 2020.
The major part of employees that leave their work place are often professional figures with high and specific competence for the company.
The consequences of a departures for a company
Each resignation will became a cost for the company in terms of:
Time and energy
The company will have to spend time (and therefore money) to find the new figure capable of replacing the previous one.
Assumption
All the costs referring to the hiring process for a new candidate chosen.
Education
The candidate must be trained on how the organization is structured and for the tasks related to his role.
Work pending
The company will have to take care of all the work left pending during the search for the new candidate, thus coping with delays and loss of efficiency.
Performance
The new figure in the initial phase will obviously be less productive than a person already well integrated within the company.
Excessive workload
It compromises the productivity of those who remain on duty or increases the stress levels of those who – in an emergency phase – find themselves doing extra work to make up for temporary shortages.
Loss of focus
Loss of focus on the organization’s mission and vision.
According to Organizational Science’s study, each employee resignation can cost (with a relative income of just over 7 euros per hour) between 3.000 and 20.000 euros, a real loss for the company.
Why does this happen? Why do talented and important figures for the company decide to leave their jobs?
The reasons could include generational factors, the pandemic itself with the temporary freeze on layoffs, the high demand for specialized staff in some sectors and significant levels of stress in others.
These are only some examples to explain the current situation, but the truth is the pandemic: it has changed our outlook on life, putting the individual’s psycho-physical well-being back at the centre of attention. Contrary to what one might think, the most of time it isn’t money’s questions (many workers leave their jobs despite not having an alternative in hand at the time of resignation). The truth is that the pandemic has shifted the priorities not only for workers, but for people, shifting the center of gravity towards the pursuit of a qualitatively better life.
Now most of the workers prefer a good corporate culture capable of investing in talents, rewarding them and recognizing them more freedom in managing commitments.
So how can the company meet the new needs of workers avoiding unnecessary costs and waste of time?
There’s some ways to satisfy the needs between these two parts. In a win-win situation: the company, will receives more inner value ( therefore also external), and the employee will feel more involved and more fulfilled. To increase responsabilities for the workers in the most efficient and fast way as possible, there are 3 behaviours:
- Introduce a Corporate Welfare system, for each employee but also for his/her family in order to reduce part of the taxation in charge of the company.
- Introduce smart working. This will bring a double benefit in the well-being of the worker: more freedom in management of their work-flow and a better reconciliation between personal life and working life. Empowerment will also lead to a greater awareness on each role and their self-realization.
- Introduce the habit to analyze the company climate, to communicate more and better. This will improve the inner communication to generate corporate value and then a better clearness on corporate’s vision and mission. The comparison can bring to light critical issues dell’organizzazione unknown to most, with a view to continuous improvement
In conclusion, how the wellness of the worker can be reconciled to prevent major resignations?
As pointed out at the beginning, proverbs are always right: prevention is the key.
Based on this concept, I want to draw attention on the needed and the importance to review the corporate’s priorites, especially today. With a proactive attitude, manager will be able to gain trust and respect from his collaborators, to win corporate infidelity and then to prevent the Great Resignation. As Steven Covey teaches in 7 rules of success , taking a proactive attitude is essential:
“And unless they are proactive and learn to adapt and overcome obstacles, they will not survive.”
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