The writers at MIT Sloan Review did some studies on why people were quitting during the Great Resignation.
What they found was that a toxic culture is the biggest killer of someone’s motivation to stay put.
In this article about how a ‘toxic culture’ is what is driving the attrition most often, there is more to evaluate. What is ‘toxic?’ What does that even mean? They tell us.
‘A toxic corporate culture is by far the strongest predictor of industry-adjusted attrition and is 10 times more important than compensation in predicting turnover. Our analysis found that the leading elements contributing to toxic cultures include failure to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion; workers feeling disrespected; and unethical behavior.. toxic culture is the biggest factor pushing employees out the door during the Great Resignation.’
Respect is crucial; do your people feel respected at work?
From the same article, I found this graphic above. Which is built from the researchers’ results of going through free text on Glassdoor, a website for employees to leave reviews about their employers. I read it all the time. Or is it just me, reading all this stuff about how people are so angry about their jobs.
What the authors of the article said was interesting, though, when they pinpointed the ‘what’ of toxicity. The main ingredient that tells you if you have a non-toxic work culture is in these lines: ‘In our previous research, we found that respect — or the lack thereof — was the single strongest predictor of how employees as a whole rated the corporate culture. This further analysis demonstrates that whether you analyze culture at the level of the individual employee or aggregate to the organization as a whole, respect toward employees rises to the top of the list of cultural elements that matter most.’