Company Blog

I’m Leaving You

by Adam Zack — May 4, 2016

People quit their bosses, not their jobs

I was thinking about what lengths we go to try and recruit good employees. It seems that especially in the grocery industry it’s a constant battle to find quality people to work in our delis, meat departments, grocery aisles and checkstands. But instead of concentrating on how to find good employees, let’s change the focus to why you need new employees. Expansions and new store openings excluded, the number one reason we need new workers is because someone quit. Few retailers, especially the big chains choose to actually find out why someone is quitting. Sure there are the usual reasons “I’m moving.” “I have to take care of my sick mother.” “I’m joining the Foreign Legion.” “I’m pregnant.” You know the reasonable reasons. But a large number of people are leaving for another job, and the reason why your company has caused them to even look for another job is what the focus should be. I came across a great Forbes article on why people leave their jobs. 2.5 million people per month (30 million per year if you don’t want to do the math) quit their jobs. That’s much higher than I would have guessed. The quote “People quit their bosses, not their jobs” was equally revealing. What most of us do is fail to look in the mirror. That’s right, “If you want to keep the most talented members of your team, it’s time you started looking in the mirror and realize the biggest reasons why people quit have to do with you.” – Forbes. So here are their 8 reasons:

You’ve overloaded your best people with too many responsibilities.
You’re a micro-manager.
You’re never around.
You’re not in touch with how some of your hires or promotions are driving your best people nuts.
You’ve never given your people a sense of where they can go in their careers.
You run terrible meetings.
You communicate that you care more about yourself than the team.
You’ve never given them the big picture vision of where your group is heading or you are constantly changing the big picture.

Check out the complete article . 8 Reasons Employees Quit – FORBES. It’s revealing and thought provoking. If you’re already doing great exit interviews (and taking necessary actions as you identify problems in your organization as a result) congratulations. For the rest of us, we can all learn a little.