Exploring the current drivers of workforce turnover

Professor Jarrod Haar, Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Mahuta, Associate Professor David Brougham and the University of Otago’s Dr Azka Ghafoor led the research to understand the reach of the Great Resignation trend and the changes that have occurred in working attitudes since the beginning of the pandemic.

This work builds on Professor Haar’s wellbeing@work research that has been going since early 2020 and reports on seven waves of data. Each survey wave included a minimum of 1000 employees across a range of careers and industries who were roughly representative of the Aotearoa workforce in terms of gender, age and geographical spread.

The results showed 34.7 per cent of employees were experiencing high levels of quitting thought in the first wave of May 2020, with the highest amount recorded in November 2021 at 52.6 per cent. The most recent survey results from June 2023 show the number of employees seriously considering quitting has now lowered to 34.4 per cent.

Professor Jarrod Haar says while the results show a return to levels before the pandemic, employers are not out of the woods yet.

“While it’s good news that the workforce’s thoughts of quitting have started to subside, over half (55.9 per cent) are shown to have moderate to high levels of quitting thoughts. That said, 21.1 per cent of employees have no thoughts of quitting which is the highest figure seen in three-and-a-half years.”

The most recent data has shown there is no difference influencing those in the high quit thoughts category in terms of ethnicity, gender, sector (private, public or not-for-profit), work location (all office, all home or hybrid work) regionally or between managers and employees.

Differences were observed regarding education, with postgraduate and Bachelor qualified employees reporting higher quit thoughts than Polytechnic and high school qualified employees. While income showed no difference in the results, financial stress showed significant difference with those experiencing high levels being 2.7 times more likely to consider quitting.

“These differences show a link between high quitting thoughts and opportunity seeking, with those more qualified more likely to look for better employment and those with financial stress more likely to search for better pay,” Professor Haar says.

The June 2023 survey wave was the first instance where a question around considering Australia due to the change in citizenship rules was possible.

Survey respondents were asked whether they would consider moving given the recent attention towards gaining citizenship in Australia, with results showing roughly one third of New Zealanders considering it. This group was shown to be 2.6 times more likely to be seriously considering quitting their job.

Employability and job insecurity were two key factors influencing turnover across the seven waves of data. While employee thoughts around how easily they may get a job was at its lowest in June 2023, the rate is still high with 45.9 per cent of the workforce believing they have high mobility. The employees in this category are 2.6 times more likely to be in the high quitting group.

An interesting result of the latest wave is that despite the current climate with layoff announcements, the number of respondents in the high job insecurity group is at its lowest in three-and-a-half years, at 23.3 per cent.

Professor Haar says the most recent data shows it’s an interesting time for businesses and HR professionals.

“The Great Resignation does appear to be gone but the spectre of high turnover remains despite growing layoffs. Strangely, job insecurity is low, and this is a factor as is a general positive sense of employability. This encourages people to make changes around their job. Further, financial stress and the ‘lure of Australian citizenship’ also appear to be at play, making for a curious remainder of 2023.”