Exit Interview to find out why people leave

In this organization, exit interview is conducted to

employees who are about to leave the organization by

means of resigning. We do not do it for retirees or those

terminated on disciplinary grounds. As the name implies,

the primary intent is to find out why they leave this

'great' organization, what they dislike about the

organization -- be it management style, company policies,

low salary, no progression, et cetra. The management

wants to know the whys so that they can improve. We do

not make an attempt to persuade the staff to stay.

All this while exit interview is conducted by HR

executive in charge of employee relation alone. She is a

young lady who does it because she has to do it, I think.

Last 2 weeks in the monthly people planning meting, CEO

asks line managers to also get involved in the exit

interview. He was alarmed by the high attrition rate got

reported in that meeting. He also stressed that those

interviewers must be well-prepared and well-equipped. So

from now on, exit interview will be conducted by HR

person and one line department manager (from different

department than that of interviewee).

So I stepped up to this challenge on one busy morning

prior to the weekend in the month of July 2007. The

subject is a senior operator in an operation department

who is leaving for Qatar to join a company called RasGas.

He is 35 years old. I've seen him before but cannot

recalled his name. My first impression of him is that of

a cool person. He listens more than he talks and it is

very rare to find such a person these days. And when he

opens the mouth, the word coming out is very structured

and planned and carries confidence too. Nothing adhoc and

vague. Yes, he is full of wisdom. He says he leaves this

organization because of many things he is not satisfied.

Salary is the main one. He said he earns RM3000 now and

that will be four times higher come next month. His main

job is to start up and operate the gas processing plant

in Qatar. He needs to work only every alternate month,

which is only 6 months in a year. At the end of the

working month, he will be given a flight return ticket

home. At the end of rest month he will fly back to Qatar

to work for another month before going home again in the

following month. So the cycle continues. He also mentions

about people issues in his current department. He said

one of the manager practises favoritism amongs operators.

He runs the department like the police state. He appoints

spies to spy on his enemies. I am quite surprised. I know

my CEO does not like to know this, so I won't mention it

to him. How come the middle managers do such a thing? It

is all but confirms the front-line survey result on

managers in this organization. (Refer to previous blog).

Too bad.

Another thing worth mentioning is the many type of

assessments he has to go thru before he can be promoted

to higher position. That really turns him off.

He also mentioned some trainings he requested but denied

due to favoritism.

When I questioned his loyalty to this organization, one

of our shared values, he simply said, "I am professional,

my loyalty is only to the employer of the day".

At the end of the interview, I wished him all the best

and whispered to him if I could get the contact number of

his recruiter in Qatar. He looked taken aback but

willingly obliged to my request.

Lesson Learnt: MONEY is always the number one pull factor for people to leave the organization. Bad managers could be the number one push factor.