A cooler job market hasn’t stopped employees from looking to leave

The job market has cooled down more than analysts originally expected this year, but that hasn’t stopped employees from looking for new opportunities.

More workers look to leave. Some 51% of US employees said they were watching for or actively seeking a new job when Gallup surveyed them in May. This represents the highest share of employees expressing a desire to leave their organizations since 2015.

The rising number of employees looking to leave can be explained in part by a period Gallup is calling “the great detachment,” said Ben Wigert, director of research and strategy, workplace management. Record low levels of job satisfaction, connection to the mission and purpose of their organization, and clarity of work expectations are “creating this detachment from the organization, where employees are struggling to navigate the changes and challenges of their everyday work alongside aligning what they do to mission and purpose,” Wigert said.

At the same time, there are fewer job opportunities out there for these dissatisfied employees, and “they’re essentially feeling more discontent and stuck than ever,” he added.

How to prevent workers from leaving. Amid this period of heightened worker discontent, there are ways HR can try to prevent their employees from heading for the exit, Wigert said. Of the employees Gallup surveyed who voluntarily left their organizations within the past year, 42% said management could’ve done something to prevent their departure.

The number one tactic that would’ve convinced workers to stay put was—unsurprisingly—providing additional compensation and benefits, with 30% of employees surveyed reporting their manager or organization could have done this to prevent them from leaving.

Wigert noted, though, that most actions Gallup identified as having the potential to retain employees concerned “things that the manager could have done to manage them more effectively.” Interpersonal interactions with managers, as well as organizational issues and career advancement, also ranked high on the list of issues that voluntary leavers would’ve liked to see their organizations address.

Pursuing a “meaningful conversation with each of your employees about their work” each week might help managers address some of these issues, Wigert said. “When that happens, you’re much more likely to engage people…and retain them.”

A cooler job market reinforces the need for HR pros to invest in their existing talent, HR Brew recently reported. Broad macroeconomic trends don’t affect employees’ satisfaction with their jobs as much as other factors, such as “competitive benefits, flexibility, and opportunities for advancement,” Bekka Rosenbaum, chief strategy officer at job training nonprofit JVS, told us.