Are we being the most effective managers we can be?

If you have a toothache, you seek a dentist. If you are ill, you go to the doctor. These relationships are established.


If a person is struggling with their career, they get another job.

A friend recently said that he wished he had been a doctor or dentist because they have a steady stream of customers. No need to use sales. He used this as a great way to explain demand and how pain drives sales.


It got me thinking about the work we do as managers and coaches. Most people in organisations are living a cotton-wool buffer between them and the pain, and don’t feel the pain in a way that they can relate to Change Agents.


If a person is struggling with their career, they get another job. If a person is fed up with not delivering value, they get another job. If a person is struggling with their manager, they get another job.


There may be a period of moaning, disenchantment, and disengagement, even a period of trying to make a small difference to make things better, but eventually, they get another job.


This is reflected in the attrition numbers in organisations. Most organisations have an attrition rate of between 30-50%. This means that in one year, between 3 and 5 people out of 10, will not be working in the organisation.

The pain is transferred from the person to the organisation. This doesn’t include the number of people who are quietly quitting.

Source: https://www.livecareer.com/resources/careers/planning/quiet-quitting

The organisation feels this pain in cost and delay. The cost of hiring someone can be as much as a year’s salary for that person. Some of that cost is tangible, but a lot of it is not. Costs such as lost knowledge, longer delivery times when that person is not there, and other staff time spent retraining the new person.


The pain is not linear to the problems; they are systemic, so people leave or quietly quit.

The pain is allocated (sometimes) months later in delayed work and higher costs to new people and projects, NOT to the person who left.


The only way to solve these problems is for someone to examine the issues systemically and understand why people are leaving.


I was surprised to learn that most people leaving do not have exit interviews. Speaking to HR professionals, I have noticed that even when random and occasional exit interviews are taken, they are not collated or collected so that any patterns can be derived from them.


Who are organisations using to locate systemic problems and make these problems better?


It used to be Agile or Enterprise Coaches who discovered this stuff and tried to resolve it. Now, it is up to managers to make the changes that they need to so that their staff is supported and heard.


Learning what coaching is and how to add coaching to your skillset for developing and really listening to others is a great place to start.


If enough managers do this, shifting an entire culture and sorting out these problems is possible. At least for the managers who do learn coaching, they can rest easy that these stats won't apply to them.


We look forward to connecting and learning about you soon.

Make the change!