High Employee Turnover Rate Strategic Issue

Strategic Challenge

The strategic challenge that has had an impact on resourcing – specifically with regard to human resources – in my organization is high employee turnover rate. A few months ago, it was established that my organization had a higher rate of employee turnover than its peers in the industry. More specifically, the employee turnover rate in this case was estimated to be 24%. This is to say that the organization lost 25% of its workforce every year. It would be prudent to note that there are a number of downsides presented by such a high rate of employee turnover. For instance, as a consequence of the significantly high employee turnover rate, my organization has ended up losing skilled and competent personnel to its competitors. This significantly affects productivity. Further, the said high employee turnover rate has resulted in the organization incurring high recruitment and selection costs. The additional resources assigned to recruitment and selection efforts could be allocated to more meaningful organizational undertakings.

To a large extent, human resources happen to be one of the most crucial resources an organization has at its disposal. It is for this reason that I am convinced that the relevance of formulating strategies to reign in this particular concern cannot be overstated. A review of available literature indicates that there are indeed a wide range of strategies that my organization could employ on this front. However, as Cunliffe and Luhman (2012) point out, before an organization starts implementing some of the strategies that have been proposed in various forums, there would be need to first establish exactly what triggers a high employee turnover rate. This is more so the case given that the issues that cause employee departure vary from organization to organization. In the case of my organization, the dominant trigger appears to be tied to compensation and benefits as well as lack of career growth opportunities for employees.