Baby Please Don’t Go: 4 Take-Aways

One of the single most distressing meetings in business is when a talented and once-enthusiastic--but now-resigned and departing--employee stops in to say a final goodbye.

As you chat, you begin to realize that many of the reasons he or she is leaving the company could have been adjusted, avoided, removed or improved. Later, as you read through the formal exit interview, you realize that all of the reasons the employee left could have been addressed if you, or others in the organization, had listened better and not fallen asleep at the switch.

The result of listening and making appropriate changes would have left the company stronger and the employee happier staying than leaving.

After a few decades of managing, there’s a fundamental truth about open-door policies that I can relay to you: The door only swings out.

You can announce an open door, speak-with-any-manager-about-any-issue policy at every new employee orientation and company meeting from now until doomsday, but the truth is, maybe 5% of employees will ever take advantage of the offer.

That’s like the return from a knock-out direct mail piece. Which means, of course, that 95 of every 100 get thrown in the trash. That maybe ok with 4-color direct mail inserts, but it’s a non-starter with flesh-and-blood people.

Here is the recipe for the only truly workable open-door policy. Stand up from the desk. Walk out the door of your office. Walk up to someone working for the company and ask the most important question in corporate America: “How are things going?”

Since you are an intimidating senior manager, they will inevitably say, “Fine.” That leaves you with the brilliant follow-up: “Tell me what you’re working on.”

Now you have a conversation because, in most cases, “what you’re working on” is real and interesting and worth discussing. Somewhere in the next half-hour you will ask again, “So, how are things going?” and this time you might get a real answer. And that can be followed by “Are you having any fun?” Which will allow you, eventually, to deliver the other most important question in corporate America: “How can I help?”

Now you have an open door policy. And now you can begin to avoid the dismal meeting that takes place at the departure of a great employee.

There is a good article in the October 15, 2007 Forbes about how Deloitte & Touche is tacking the issue of turnover, and the practical, sensible things they are doing to keep employees happy and motivated. Here are 4 take-aways:

1. After nearly two years as a management consultant in Deloitte & Touche USA's Pittsburgh office, Shantrez Miller was restless. She yearned for more money, excitement and a job in New York City. "I had outgrown what I was doing," says Miller, 27.

Miller went to Kathy D. Henn, a career coach in Pittsburgh. They spent 45 minutes together, and Miller filled out self-assessment tests on the firm's Web site. Henn helped her identify job opportunities at Deloitte and customize her résumé. When a new job didn't pan out within three months, Miller left Deloitte, but Henn stayed in touch. Six weeks later Miller came back to Deloitte as an account administrator in its Manhattan office. Henn "made me ask myself, 'What is it that I really want to do?' and then helped me figure out a plan, map it out and go for it," says Miller, who is now bringing home three times as much as she made in Pittsburgh in 2004. Miller is also enjoying a more visible position at the company, one of the priorities she identified during her self-analysis.

2. Career coaches are all the rage among executives with itchy feet. But Deloitte doesn't want disgruntled employees to go outside for professional hand-holding, so it has Henn and 24 other career coaches on its own payroll. Cost of counseling to employee: none. Payoff to Deloitte: lowered turnover. Before the counseling program was installed five years ago, staff turnover at the auditing and consulting firm was 20% a year, costing the company $900 million in recruiting and training expenses. Turnover is down to 15% now, average for the accounting industry. Deloitte spends roughly $2 million a year on the career-coaching program.

3. Initially Deloitte execs blamed defections on the lure of Internet startups: 58% of its workers are 34 years old or younger. But when Deloitte scrutinized exit interviews, it learned that two-thirds of departing employees were bolting for positions they could have nabbed at Deloitte.
.
4. To date Deloitte claims that 9,700 employees--23% of its ranks in the U.S.--have been through the coaching process. Smith says 760 of those folks report that they would have left the firm if Deloitte hadn't had the coaching system. The company feels confident enough about morale that it just opened a contest in which Deloitte employees create short, unfiltered films that express the organization's culture. It will air the winning video on YouTube.

So, here’s the script for your new open-door policy:

Let the door swing out.
Find someone doing something valuable. (Hoping this step is easy.)

Then ask:

How are things going?
What are you working on?
How are things going?
Are you having any fun?
How can I help?

Posted by Entrepreneur Generations

Tweet