Types of Employee Turnover

 

Employee turnover are of two folds.

                                                                                                

    Source -Psychological Bulletin

            Involuntary turnover

Involuntary turnover occurs when an organization is not satisfied with employee performance and makes the decision to fire him (Tsai and Wu 2010). Staff layoffs, compulsory retirement schemes are also examples for involuntary turnover. Organizations are prepared and are ready to handle involuntary turnover and it does not affect the productivity of the organization as it is pre planned and as it is a part of the organizations strategy. In fact, when less performing employees or misfits for the organization culture are fired, the productivity of the organization will improve.

 

Voluntary turnover

When an employee quit the job from an organization, it is stated as voluntary turnover (Noe et al., 2006). Voluntary turnover is a situation where employees leave organizations willingly, on their own. It occurs when the employee has an alternate opportunity to suit his requirements best. Voluntary turnover is the challenge that the organizations are required to face and control. It is the subject matter of study in human resource management. The problem of voluntary turnover stretches beyond the gamut of employee and organization. (Udechukwu et al., 2007). Voluntary turnover is the end result of the employee thinking to quit and intention to search as Mobley explained in his research in 1982.

Scholars and academics have been studying the turnover intention of employees as precursor of turnover behavior for the last few decades. Early studies on turnover behavior indicated that employees would initiate the process of terminating the relationship with their employer /profession only when they have a perceived desirability to do so and there is a perceived possibility of such ease of movement (March and Simon 1958). This perceived desirability to terminate the employer employee relationship is known as turnover intention in present studies and literature.

As a result of various studies conducted to identify the turnover behavior of the employees, different models have been developed to explain this behavior. Varying factors have been identified as reasons for this quitting behavior as an outcome of these studies. However, one common factor has emerged out of all studies as the antecedent of actual turnover behavior. That is the turnover intention. (Shweta 2009). Therefore, it has become imperative for the HR managers to identify the reasons that trigger the intention to quit if they are serious of curbing voluntary employee turnover in their respective organizations.

The intention to leave and the actual quitting the job may occur due to various reasons. In certain instances, the intention to leave may not materialize and employees may not quit the job if the reason that trigged the intention to quit is satisfied either by the employee or the employer.

Salary expectations, working conditions, work life balance, individual capacity and capabilities, lack of individual motivation, stress, security and self-esteem may be some reasons for employees to leave jobs. The reasons may vary from individual to individual, industry to industry and from geography to geography. But in overall we can categories these reasons into two broad categories as individual factors and organization factors for our study. There is the third category which the reasons are beyond the control of the individual or the organization, we can name it as external factors. External factors are political, calamities, social perceptions, etc. When the intention to quit due to the above reasons gradually increase and reaches a climax t he actual quitting behavior will occur.

  

References.

1.  March, J. & Simon, H. (1958). Organizations, Wiley & Son, New York.
2.  Mobley, W.H. (1982), Employee Turnover: Causes, Consequences, and Control, Addison-             Wealey, Reading, MA.
3.  Mobley,W.H., Griffeth,R.W., Hand,H.H. and Meglino, B.M. (1979), Review and concept    analysis of the employee turnover process, Psychological Bulletin, Vol 14, pp 224-47.
4.   Noe,R.A.,Hollenbeck,J.R., Gerhart, B. and Wright, P.M (2006). Human Resources Management:  Gaining a Competitive Advantage. 4th edn. New York.
5.  Shweta J.H.A. (2009), Determinants of employee turnover intentions: A review Management  Today, Vo. 9, No. 2, pp. 26-33.
6.  Tsai,Y, Wu, S (2010). The relationships between organizational citizenship behavior, job   satisfaction and turnover intention. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 2010 Dec;19(23-24) pp3564-74.. 
7.  Udechukwu, I.K. & Mujtaba, B.G. (2007), Determining the probability that an employee will stay or leave the organization: A mathematical and theoretical model for organizations, Human Resource Development Review. Vol 6, No 2, pp 164-84.