Black means profit, red means loss, but what exactly does high turnover mean for your business? Turnover rate marks the amount of employees that resign, quit, or leave a facility within a specific number of weeks, months, or even years. A high employee turnover rate not only suggests that employees are leaving, but also that their employment is short-lived — and this can be devastating to companies of all sizes at any point in their lifetime.  

Consequences of High Turnover 

Employees aren’t inventory. They aren’t easily replaced or assembled. Because each member of your staff serves a specialized and highly important function in your overall operations, turnover can hurt your business in multiple ways, including: 

• High costs — Just like customers, it’s more affordable to retain existing employees than to hire new ones. Re-training, insuring, and onboarding employees costs money. 
• Low employee morale — When employees see their coworkers come and go, it can influence the way they perceive your company and cause them to lose morale. 
• More distractions — The more focus you have to put on posting new job positions, interviewing candidates, and training new employees, the less time you have for your other obligations. 
• Poor performance — Without enough time to properly train and mobilize employees, you can expect to see a dip in overall performance. 

Causes of High Turnover

Turnover isn’t as clear-cut as other issues that healthcare facilities commonly face, and it can be especially difficult to track down the main cause. Employees might choose to leave for a number of personal or professional reasons — some of which you can minimize. Reasons that employees most commonly cite as the cause of their decision to leave include:  

• Advancement — If employees feel like there’s no room to grow, either laterally or vertically, they may start to look for a company with such opportunities.  
• Leadership —When staff members feel disconnected from leadership, it can affect the way they perceive their position and personal value. 
• Compensation — Failing to offer additional compensation for tenured or high-performing employees can drive them to look for companies that will.  
• Benefits — Company benefits that don’t effectively meet the wants and needs of your employees may be a significant factor in their decision to leave. 
• Stress — All other variables held equal, companies with high-stress positions are far likelier to experience turnover than those with low-stress ones. 

Lowering Employee Turnover 

Whether you need to reverse the cycle of employee turnover or want to preemptively prevent it from starting, the team at Professional Employer Resources (PER) can help. At PER, we’re a human resources provider, which means we coach management teams on how to be better leaders, mentors, and coworkers — all of which are vital to high employee satisfaction and low employee turnover. For more information, contact us today.