According to research* by Harris Interactive on behalf of the Adecco Group, the most serious threat to organizations in this recession may be the recession's end. A company’s most important asset is its employees, and Adecco's latest Workplace Insights Survey indicates that most employers will see a high level of employee turnover when the job market rebounds.
These survey results demonstrate that employees are willing to make sacrifices to keep their jobs, but employers who have used the recession to mistreat their workforce will pay dearly in employee turnover when the recession ends.
Survey results demonstrate:
- More than half (54%) of employed Americans report that they are likely to look for new jobs once the economy turns around.
- Your youngest employees, who bring new ideas and skills to the workplace, are knocking on your competitor's door. Of the employees surveyed, 71% between the ages of 18 and 29 are likely to look for new jobs once the upturn begins.
- More than half (55%) of employees who are willing to accept a pay cut to keep their job, will accept a 10% salary decrease or more. But, recognize that financial difficulties lead quickly to a job search.
- Less than 1 in 10 of the Generation Y employees surveyed are willing to accept a pay cut to keep their jobs compared to 1 in 5 workers from the other generations (Baby Boomers, Gen X).
- 44% of employees over age 60 have been forced to delay their retirement plans.
- Only 22% of employees are saving money in anticipation of a potential layoff.
- 40% of American workers believe the recession will last another full year, and potentially into the third quarter of 2011.
You can reduce this potential employee turnover by the nature of the total work environment you offer for employees. These twenty recommendations about reducing employee turnover are common-sense, basic and incredibly hard to find in organizations today. Do you do these right things right? See Recession-Planning for Employees.
Image Copyright Jack Hollingsworth / Getty Images
More About Employee Turnover
- Keep Your Best: Reduce Employee Turnover.
- Top Ten Ways to Retain Your Great Employees.
- Solve Employee Complaints: Reduce Employee Turnover.
*All data collection was done online within the United States between June 12 and 16, 2009 among 2,274 adults ages 18 and older, of whom 1,268 are employed full time and/or part time.
Results were weighted as needed to reflect the composition of the U.S. adult population ages 18+ using targets for region, age within gender, education, household income, and race/ethnicity. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents' propensity to be online. For complete survey methodology, including weighting variables, please contact Anthony.guerrieri@adeccona.com.
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The only thing keeping me in my job right now, is the health insurance that I get from my employer.
As soon as there is another option for me – are you listening, Congress?? – I am so out of there. Ha!
I am actually holding my job tight right now primary because my employer has always been nice to me by firstly allowing me to take up classes sometimes during working hours. I have taken that as an advantage to get myself prepared for a good job when the world economy gets better. Not many employers in Liberia allow such thing in their entities.
As soon as things get better, I will definitely have to pack my Ghana must go bag out of the office to another; that is, if he doesn’t offer something at the industry level.
I’ve heard from clients that it’s an employer’s market and that companies aren’t necessarily working hard to help their employees feel great. There seems to be an “If you can’t do the job I can find a hundred who will,” kind of attitude in quite a few workplaces. This doesn’t create an atmosphere of great support and caring. The employers who will be well positioned when the recession ends will be those who continued to invest and build up their employees. Others will lose many who just hung on until a better opportunity came along.
Some employers have had to take steps such as freezing salary increases to make sure their companies weather the current storms. If they are communicating effectively with employees, the employees “get” that keeping the companies successful is in everybody’s best interests – more so than a 2-5% salary increase. Of course, these companies are also making every effort to maintain an employee-friendly environment, too. I don’t think they’ll see an employee exodus.