"Preventable Resignations" at 42%: Where Is the Real Cause of Frequent Turnover?

Structural signals of compensation, managers, and onboarding hidden behind attrition rates

There are organizations where people constantly leave. Job postings are always open, and the HR team greets new faces every quarter. Even before a vacant position is filled, another resignation letter lands on a desk, and remaining team members slowly grow exhausted amid increased workloads and frequent handovers. Management generally interprets this problem in two ways: one is generational theory, arguing that "the younger generation is just like that," and the other is compensation theory, arguing that "we just need to pay higher salaries." However, data shows that both interpretations are only half right. Frequent turnover is not a matter of individual whims or simple wage gaps, but rather the result of accumulated structural signals within the organization.

The most notable analysis comes from the global research organization Gallup. According to Gallup's survey of employees who voluntarily left their companies, about 42% responded that "the company or manager could have done something to prevent the resignation." In other words, a significant portion of voluntary departures were not unavoidable exits, but "preventable departures" where the organization had room to intervene. The message this figure sends to management is clear: turnover rates are not uncontrollable external variables, but largely controllable internal metrics. If nearly half of departing people could have been "retained," frequent turnover may be the result of choices rather than fate.

So, what are the common signals of organizations that generate frequent turnover? This article analyzes that structure focusing on three axes: compensation, managers, and onboarding. These three axes may seem to operate independently, but they are closely intertwined to determine an organization's retention power.

Before examining that, the cost of turnover must be addressed. The price an organization pays when a single employee leaves goes far beyond simple job posting costs. Gallup estimates the cost of replacing a departing employee based on job category: roughly 200% of annual salary for leaders and managers, about 80% for technical professionals, and around 40% for frontline workers. This includes not only direct hiring and training costs, but also invisible costs such as productivity losses from workflow gaps, lowered morale among remaining team members, and the loss of accumulated knowledge and relationships. This is why frequent turnover is a matter of management performance, not just an HR issue.

Compensation Is Part of the Cause, Not the Entirety

When diagnosing an organization with frequent turnover, compensation is always the first thing mentioned. Salaries lower than competitors, increase rates below the industry average, and compensation systems that appear unrelated to performance undoubtedly accelerate talent outflow. If an organization has compensation significantly lagging behind market levels, it is difficult to prevent turnover no matter what other efforts are made. This is because while compensation is not a sufficient condition for keeping employees, it is a necessary condition that collapses everything if it drops below a certain level. No matter how great colleagues and meaningful work there are, there is no justification for staying in front of compensation that cannot sustain livelihood.

However, a common misconception arises here: the expectation that raising compensation alone will solve the turnover problem. Gallup's analysis asks us to be cautious about this expectation. The primary reasons for leaving cited by departing employees included not only compensation, but also career growth opportunities and the quality of daily communication with managers. In other words, compensation is just one of many causes, not a standalone variable. In organizations where a certain level of competitive compensation is secured, non-monetary factors often operate as the decisive variables separating retention and departure. This is why it is not uncommon to find organizations where core talent continues to exit despite matching salaries to the top of the market.

The domestic situation also supports this. According to a 2024 survey conducted by the Korea Enterprises Federation of 1,500 regular workers in their 20s to 40s nationwide, 69.5% of respondents answered that they were considering changing jobs. By age group, those in their 20s were the highest at 83.2%, followed by 72.6% for those in their 30s, and 58.2% for those in their 40s. This means that younger generations accept job changes as an everyday choice. What is noteworthy is that they are not merely chasing higher salaries. Stagnation in growth, absence of vision, and fatigue from daily relationships work together complexly to create "readiness to leave." The era when staying at a single company for a long time was considered a virtue has passed, and job hopping has established itself as a natural means of career management. In this environment, compensation is merely one term in this complex equation.

Therefore, checking compensation is the starting point of turnover diagnosis, not the endpoint. While objectively verifying compensation levels relative to the market, one must not conclude that this alone will solve the problem. If turnover is frequent even though compensation is at the market average level, the cause is likely elsewhere. When management clings only to the familiar answer of compensation, the more fundamental causes remain out of sight. This is why diagnosis beyond compensation is necessary.

The Real Variable Is the "Manager" Environment

When looking into the structure of frequent turnover, the most consistently appearing variable is the direct manager. Gallup analyzes that roughly 70% of the variance in team-level employee engagement is driven by managers. This is why even within the same company, the same compensation system, and the same welfare system, some teams retain people for a long time while others experience constant departures. This is because the "company" experienced by employees is effectively refracted through the lens of their manager. Rather than grand corporate visions or welfare systems, the relationship with the immediate supervisor encountered every day directly dictates whether an employee stays.

The problem is that this variable called the manager is often neglected. In the Gallup survey, about 45% of voluntary quitters answered that they had not spoken with a manager or other leader about their job satisfaction or future at any point during the three months immediately preceding their departure. This means nearly half of the employees received no signal from the organization during the most critical period when they were making up their minds to leave. Moreover, even in cases where such conversations took place, the proportion of practical discussions regarding career futures or retention conditions was not high. Formal meetings may have taken place, but conversations that could actually capture the employee's heart were absent.

The reason this point matters is that resignation is usually a gradual process rather than a sudden event. The moment an employee submits a resignation letter is the end of the decision, not the start. It takes months for someone's heart to leave, yet during those very months, organizations often make no intervention. The implication of Gallup's analysis is clear: managers must not wait for employees to express their intention to leave first. Since employees rarely speak up first, the responsibility to initiate appropriate dialogue falls on the manager. If complaints are heard only during an exit interview, that conversation is already too late.

Here lies a trap that management easily falls into: blaming the individual character or will of the manager. However, managers failing to conduct 1-on-1 meetings is often an issue of capability and systems rather than will. For managers who have never been taught what to ask, what signals to capture, or how to execute follow-up actions, the command to "talk frequently with employees" is empty. Many managers arrived at their positions because they were recognized for execution performance, never having received systematic training in managing people. In fact, global data repeatedly points out that managers' own engagement levels are on a downward trend, and the proportion of those who have received formal manager training is less than half. When the managerial layer shakes, the departure of subordinates is a scheduled outcome.

Therefore, the point an organization facing frequent turnover must touch first is not the compensation table, but the capabilities of the managerial layer. When the structuring of regular 1-on-1s, training in feedback and career dialogue, and minimum tools allowing managers to capture early signals are in place, a significant portion of preventable departures can be reduced. Before demanding managers to "do well," teaching them "how to do it" and securing the time for it must come first. Enhancing the capability of a single manager can become a lever changing the retention rate of an entire team. Conversely, the more talented the talent, the less they endure an incompetent management environment. If an organization is one where core talent with many options in the market departs first, it must take that signal most heavily.

The First 90 Days: Frequent Turnover Begins with Onboarding

The third axis is onboarding. Surprisingly, a significant portion of frequent turnover is decided in the early employment period. Various HR studies repeatedly confirm that a substantial number of new hires leave the company within 90 days of joining, and decisions regarding retention are formed relatively early after entry. The experience of the first few weeks dictates retention for the next several years. It happens far more often than expected that the cost and time invested in recruitment go to waste in just a few months.

The experiences new hires undergo in organizations with poor onboarding are generally similar. What is expected of them is unclear, they do not know who to ask, and they cannot feel how they contribute to the organization. The greater the gap between expectations formed during the recruitment process and the actual work environment, the faster disappointment arrives. When growth opportunities or work descriptions heard during interviews differ from reality after joining, employees feel emotions close to betrayal. Employees who experience such early disconnection, even if they do not leave immediately, begin looking for the next opportunity without dropping anchor in their hearts. Recovering initial trust once it has cooled is not easy.

Conversely, well-designed onboarding belongs to the most cost-effective retention investments. Clear role expectations, the design of early success experiences, and intentional connections with peers and managers help new hires quickly build a sense of belonging. Instilling the conviction that "I can grow here" during the early employment period serves as a retention driver stronger than any retroactive compensation increase. Employees who experience small achievements during the first 90 days and understand how their work connects to the organization plant their roots much deeper. Onboarding is not a mere administrative procedure, but the first message the organization sends to a new member.

Here the manager's role appears once again. What dictates the quality of onboarding is not checklists made by the HR team, but the attitude and intervention of the direct manager who personally greets the new hire. The presence of a manager who explains clear expectations in the first week, resolves initial disorientation together, and acknowledges small successes is more powerful than any system. Ultimately, the three axes of compensation, managers, and onboarding do not stand apart; they mesh together at the point of contact called the manager. The manager is the person explaining compensation fairness, the person responsible for daily engagement, and the first gateway connecting new members to the organization.

Organizations That Treat Turnover Rates as "Warning Signals" Survive

Summarizing the discussions so far, frequent turnover is not a problem of a single cause, but a structural issue. Compensation destroys everything if it falls below a certain level, but it cannot guarantee retention on its own. Managers are the company experienced by employees and the most powerful variable separating engagement and departure. Onboarding is the first gateway for dropping retention anchors. When these three axes shake simultaneously, an organization becomes one "where people constantly leave."

The shift in perspective required of management lies right here. It is about treating turnover rates not merely as retrospective outcome metrics, but as early warning signals foreshadowing organizational health. If departures repeat under a specific department, specific tenure, or specific manager, that is not coincidence but a pattern to be diagnosed. Simply observing turnover data separated by department, tenure, and manager allows organizations to pinpoint the epicenter of problems much faster. Behind the lumped-together numbers of company-wide average turnover rates, the reality of departures occurring intensively at specific points is often hidden.

Of course, it is difficult to conclude that all these analyses apply identically to every organization. The patterns and optimal levels of turnover vary depending on industries, job duties, organizational scale, and growth stages. A certain level of turnover is also a natural flow injecting fresh vitality into an organization. Considering all turnover as failure that must be prevented is another extreme. The core is not the absolute figure of the turnover rate itself, but reducing the proportion of "preventable departures" within it. Above all, managing the departure of core talent that organizations wanted to keep—namely "painful turnover"—is crucially important.

From this perspective, questions management might check are surprisingly simple. In which department and under which manager is our organization's turnover rate uniquely high? What reasons did departing employees commonly mention during exit interviews? Are managers regularly talking with team members about careers and satisfaction? What kind of experience are new hires having during their first 90 days? If one cannot answer these questions with confidence, the organization is likely already missing preventable departures. What is not measured cannot be managed, and what is not asked cannot be prevented.

The figure of about 42% mentioned by Gallup's analysis is not despair, but the scale of opportunity. Nearly half of those leaving are people who would have stayed if the organization had asked a little earlier and intervened a little sooner. Before looking into the compensation table again, one must first ask when the manager last had a serious conversation with an employee. The answer to frequent turnover often starts not from grand institutional overhauls, but from a single question handed over before leaving. The difference between an organization where people constantly leave and one where they stay for a long time may well depend on whether that single question was asked and whether those answers were listened to. Ultimately, retaining talent does not begin with grandiose strategies or unconventional systems, but stems from daily small attention and a single sincere conversation.