Good morning, Paul!
The exodus of employees from the ranks of those hired hasn’t been like anything we’ve ever seen. We’ve had high unemployment before, but we haven’t had employees, willfully and intentionally turning in their resignations and leaving the security blanket of being gainfully employed to either search for other job opportunities, start a business of their own, or even just simply take time off from work.
Even as recent as during the month of February, 4.4 million Americans quit their jobs, according to the Labor Department’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover survey. That phenomenon was coined the Great Resignation.
Well, now, Paul, there’s a new moniker for another pandemic-driven employment phenomenon. This one relates to those who quit returning shortly thereafter to become re-employed by the companies they just left. That’s right. Taking their old jobs back. And these employees are now known as boomerang employees. That is employees who left their jobs and shortly after it came right back. And the number of these boomerang employees keeps rising. In fact, according to a new LinkedIn Workforce Insight survey, boomerang hires are a moderate of 4.3% of all job switches last year up from less than 2% in 2010. Not so surprisingly, well, the grass isn’t always greener.
But surprisingly, the companies, these employees abruptly left are willing to take many of these employees back. Why? Well, boomerang hires bring several advantages. These returning employees know the drill, they know their roles and responsibilities and understand how to execute their jobs. And they don’t require time-consuming and costly training in order to become productive and contributing employees.
So now, Paul, boomerang employees, they’re formerly part of all of this pandemic chaos that continues to reshape life and business as we know it.
I’m Jeff Sloan, founder and CEO of startupnation.com, and that’s today’s Business Beat on the Great Voice of the Great Lakes, WJR.
