A colleague sent me this article from the Studer Group called “The Long Goodbye”. It caught my eye because it formalized something I’d been considering for a long time: When someone decides to leave his or her company, it’s rarely an immediate reaction to a shockingly negative experience. On the contrary - it’s often the delayed result of an experience that “left a bad taste.”
The article tells the story of a nurse who applied for a position for which she was ultimately not selected. What left the bad taste was not that she didn’t get the job, but rather that she found out that she wasn’t selected when the new hire was announced and it wasn’t her. That’s an understandably difficult blow. If your organization doesn’t have enough respect for you to talk to you personally in such a case, why would it be reasonable to invest your loyalty in it?
Now, such an occurrence doesn’t mean the nurse is headed out tomorrow – but “will she return calls from another organization if called? Yes. Will she look online for openings at other organizations? Most likely. Will she leave? Yes, if something doesn’t happen to retighten her loyalty.”
The negative experience plants a seed of discontent that may one day grow into full blown rejection. So how do you avoid alienating your employees like this? The article first suggests a specific communications program for employees who aren’t selected for promotions -but that seems to me to be a point solution. The second suggestion is more appropriate: talk to your employees.
September 28th, 2006 at 6:09 am
“Now, such an occurrence doesn’t mean the nurse is headed out tomorrow – but “will she return calls from another organization if called? Yes. Will she look online for openings at other organizations? Most likely. Will she leave? Yes, if something doesn’t happen to retighten her loyalty.—
Max,
I appreciate this response. Personally, I’ve also seen the effects of mis- or even non-communication with important people. Just last week, in fact, I met with someone on the east coast and she was handling a very similar situation – only the participants were not employees, they were her children!
It seems that a little talking CAN go a long way. It’s one of the things we find most important in the work we do.
Thanks for sharing this with us readers…
Jason
(www.JasonWomack.com)
December 28th, 2006 at 2:42 pm
I am a psychologist and management consultant. For the past 27 years of my career, I have been amazed by how managers – even top level executives -avoid communicating the ‘hard’ messages to their employees. As in the story of the nurse, they frequently let the grapevine do it for them. I believe that this is an abdication of responsibility. Why would employees be loyal to companies in which the leaders neglect their roles as primary communicators?