Turnover is disruptive and expensive. It affects every business, but it is exceptionally high in sales teams. Losing team members erodes employee engagement and damages the company culture, ultimately impacting the productivity of the remaining group. It diverts management time and affects the continuity of support for customers.
Employee attrition can have a snowball effect. It's called the Turnover Contagion Effect. That means that employees are more likely to leave if their colleagues do, costing businesses through lost engagement, productivity, and culture. However, there is an impactful way to minimize the cost of salesperson turnover: employee learning and development.
Fox Selling System's The Real Cost of Turnover: How Employee Learning and Development Increases ROI reports the average turnover rate for salespeople is 35%. By itself, that metric may not seem notable. However, when you understand that it is almost three times the turnover rate of other industries, it becomes apparent that there is a significant problem. So, why are so many salespeople quitting?
By far, the most common reason for salespeople leaving a position can be chalked up to a perceived lack. What does that mean? 70% of employees cited a lack of promotion or career growth opportunities. 70% believe they lack the skills to succeed.
In financial terms, attrition costs businesses an average of $115,000 per employee to replace them. It requires updating job postings, recruiting, interviewing, and onboarding. You'll likely also have to pay more for a new high-performing salesperson. Add to that the impact on team productivity while trying to assimilate the new salesperson into the team and support their customers until they are fully onboarded.
The solution is to empower your sales reps with the knowledge and skills to succeed. Industry-specific training provides enrichment and development that leads to motivation, commitment, and job satisfaction, key factors for success and career advancement. In turn, that engagement results in decreased turnover. But those aren't the only benefits from training.
A quality training and development program improves new hire productivity by removing the most common barriers to rapid and effective onboarding. It does so by counteracting a lack of industry experience while accelerating relationship-building with customers. In addition, training and development help to strengthen company culture and improve your brand. That puts your business in a solid position to recruit and retain top talent.
Training benefits your employees, your customers, and your bottom line. The numbers prove that purchasing a quality training program for your employees is a sound investment. A study by Accenture found that companies achieve a $4.53 return on every $1 spent on training and development. That comes out to an impressive ROI of 353%.
Any manager who has lost an employee to attrition is aware that there is a cost. It diverts time, attention, and resources, but not just from the manager. It extends to many areas of the company that provide support to recruiting, hiring, training, and onboarding. That's aside from the impact it has on your team. Turnover degrades productivity, impacts morale, and potentially causes others to start thinking about leaving.
The most common reasons for employee turnover have to do with what your company is not providing, such as skills training and career growth opportunities. There is a simple solution for both: a high-quality training and development program. What makes a training program high quality? Flexible options for live training or online, anytime skills training, industry-specific scenarios and examples, and tools that enable both coaches and sales reps to meet and exceed expectations by providing excellent service to their customers.
It isn't only current employees that benefit from a superior training program. With the right tools and learning framework, you can overcome obstacles to onboarding that impact productivity, as well. You create a high-performing team that reflects positively on your management, your culture, and, ultimately, your brand. Learn more by downloading our infographic: The Real Cost of Turnover: How Employee Learning and Development Increases ROI.