Outsourcing Staff Attrition

Filed in archive Outsourcing News on March 18, 2005

In a study on worker retention in the Indian outsourcing market, over 50 percent of respondents said that lack of growth, desire for better job content, mismatched expectations, and dissatisfaction with policies were the top reasons for leaving their jobs. Additionally, 39 percent of respondents said that night shifts, monotony of work, and salary were factors for quitting.

Conversely, nearly 36 percent of respondents said that joining a global work environment and infrastructure is the main reason for choosing an outsourcing job. Only 35 percent supported the popular notion that salary, incentives and lifestyle are the foremost reasons for joining the outsourcing sector.

The study also revealed that 60 percent of respondents were led to the outsourcing sector through advertising and workforce consultants. It was noted that advertisements do not accurately describe jobs in the outsourcing industry and may have lead to mismatched expectations.

Ashish Sonal, country manager at Hill & Associates, commented on worker turnover: "Attrition not only pushes up costs incurred on the training of employees but also affects productivity along with the ideal level of 'knowledge maturity' of the organization and the employees. The sector needs to employ a higher degree of due diligence at the hiring stage."