Description

Mixed methods to the rescue: Addressing the problem of employee turnover using marital research

Irit Alony*,+, Helen Hasan! and Andrew Sense#

*Faculty of Business, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia;

+CSIRO ICT Centre, Clayton South, VIC, Australia;

!School of Economics, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia;

#School of Management and Marketing, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia

Abstract

Decades of turnover research have identified sets of factors that lead to voluntary employee separation. However, the predictive power of existing turnover models is extremely limited, and does not go far beyond 30%. In contrast, marital research has developed a MMR tool for predicting dissolution which has an accuracy of over 90%, based on a couple’s reflections on their past. This paper presents this complex prediction method in current MMR terms, and details the process of adjusting it into employment setting. The paper presents the main issues to consider when adjusting this tool, and provides a detailed description of the concurrent, sequential, conversion, and integrated aspects of it. The paper concludes with remarks highlighting the value this description offers to the MMR toolkit, and to researchers of relationships in general.

Keywords: mixed methods, employee turnover, turnover prediction, employment relationship