Professional and business services employees are thinking twice before quitting

Corporate employees are quitting less.

The latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary (JOLTS) from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, released on June 4, showed that the total number of quits in April was 3.5 million, hardly changed from 3.4 million in March, and the quit rate for all industries remained at 2.2% for the sixth consecutive month.

The professional and business services industry, in particular, saw the biggest monthly decline, down 131,000, or 19%, to 560,000 in April. That’s the industry’s biggest monthly drop in the last year, with the next biggest, 70,000 quits, occurring between October and November 2023.

Corporate employees may be hesitant to quit their jobs in a labor market as tight as it is now, and may be even more reluctant in the lead-up to the presidential election, given the economic uncertainty it may produce, according to Laura Mazzullo, founder of East Side Staffing, who specializes in recruiting and consulting for professional companies.

“Number one, they’re scared to change in a volatile job market; they might think it’s not going to be better than what [they] already have,” Mazzullo told HR Brew. “The second piece is they’re afraid that the new company they’re going to jump to could suddenly go into financial turmoil and lay them off.”

Advice for HR. While employees may be staying put, Mazzullo recommended that companies use this quiet time to invest in them.

“These slower periods are when you can be more innovative, and be more strategic, and invest in learning and development,” she said. “It’s when you can look at everything, really, with an analytical lens and decide, ‘Okay, what needs to change? Are we optimizing our workload? Do we need different technology? Do we need people trained in certain areas?’”

HR leaders and executives need to spend more on upskilling, training, and coaching their employees, Mazzullo said, because doing so will help retention in the long run. Executives who “hold tight to the purse strings,” she said, are going to see their employees quit as soon as the market improves.