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#Written by David Tam, 1997. #
#davidkftam@netscape.net Copyright 1999#
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David Tam
Thursday, March 20, 1997.
Business Press Review
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Church, Sandra. "Retail workers more loyal than most". The Globe and Mail.
Friday, March 14, 1997. B9. ------------------
This article is about a study on employee loyalty in Canadian companies.
Surprisingly, the results of the study have shown that employees in retail
stores are more loyal than the average employee in a typical company.
40 % of retail workers have been with their employer for more than 11
years. In comparison, this number is only 30 % for the entire Canadian work
force. In more detail, 21 % in retail have stayed between 11 and 20 years. 18
% is the Canadian average. 18 % in retail have stayed more than 20 years, in
comparison to the national average of 12 %.
This study, probably implemented as an exercise in human resources
research, was originally intended to examine the needs of employees in the
retail industry (such as on-going training).
These findings were contrary to my expectations of the retail industry. I
believe that the general opinion is that employees of retail firms must deal
with a very harsh environment due both to the harsh Canadian shopping
environment and from the employers as well. Employer pressures include
layoffs, wage freezes, longer working hours, uncertain job security, etc...
Upon further analysis, it may be discovered that, although employees in retail
firms stay longer, this may be due to the fact that they are not qualified for
jobs in other sectors. It may, in fact, reflect an impending doom for the
stagnant retail industry.
Take for instance, the high technology sector. In this healthy, booming
industry, employees are constantly moving from one company to another. As
mentioned in the lectures, there is a shortage of these employees, and as a
consequence, skilled employees have more choices and may look for more
satisfying jobs. Mr. Kathnelson has mentioned that it was very difficult to
retain highly skilled employees in his firm. If this industry was examined for
employee loyalty in the same manner as mentioned in the study, it would seem to
have very poor results. This would occur despite the fact that the high
technology industry is very healthy and that employee satisfaction may be very
high, especially amongst entrepreneurial companies.
From the above reasoning, believe that the study mentioned in the article
does not provide very much useful information from a human resources point of
view. While addressing employee turn-over rates, it does not address issues of
employee satisfaction.
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