New Directions for Theories for Why Employees Stay or Leave

Abstract

We critically review classic and contemporary theory and research on employee turnover and retention and frame a future research agenda that generates new directions for these theories. We first review first- and second-generation turnover models that shaped conventional understanding of why employees voluntarily quit, classifying reasons as representing perceived desirability of movement or ease of movement. We next review the more contemporary unfolding model and its derivatives (i.e., shocks research, leader-departure effect, turnover event theory) that upended traditional explanations of how and why employees quit. After reviewing classic and contemporary turnover models, we shift our focus to job embeddedness, which over the past 20-plus years has taught us a great deal about why employees stay. We synthesize original job embeddedness research before appraising its extensions and recent developments. We conclude with a discussion of how organizations can cultivate the “right” kind of staying.