According to a study from Gallup, 66% of US employees are not engaged in the workplace. Furthermore, 13% are actively disengaged. These employees are doing the bare minimum to stay employed, or maybe even less. And you can bet that they’re the ones most likely to take the cash to quit.
Supporting employees to own their role and purpose builds trust and loyalty within your organization. When workers are empowered, productivity and engagement soar. The happier employees are, the lower the turnover and its associated costs in both dollars and efficiency. The retention of staff simplifies succession planning and promotion. Promoting from within the organization creates more loyalty and closes the loop of autonomy.
After the first 90 days new team members have learned a lot about our team values, their roles, and measurements for success. We encourage people to thrive, create self driven career advancement plans, and growth strategies for multiple years within our organization. This isn't for everyone. At 90 days we offer people 1,000 to quit. 90 days is often enough time for new hires to know if they will get to thrive within the organization. With that said, we're a high autonomy company and this isn't for everyone but sometimes it takes longer to realize. That's why in years 2-5, we increase this offer by 1,000 at their annual review.
The first weeks at Buffalo Market, team members interact with many leaders and peers and resources are invested both to screen good candidates and train them. The last thing we want to do is have people take this offer unless it is truly a bad fit. In that case, it is a nice way to have a system in place to already encourage people to make a healthy decision for our company and for them. After 90 days a team member already has a sense of what is good for the company and if their values and skills match the needs. Rather than allow mismatches to fester, we want to resolve them quickly.
No. Team leaders during review processes can remind team members of this option as an invitation if there are doubts.
The intention behind their pay-to-quit program is to build an aligned culture around individual growth, happy work environments, operational excellence, autonomy, and accountability. Any offer for employees to leave should ultimately work towards retention and serve to strengthen culture.
We want people who are truly connected to our company mission and team values. Depending on individuals this might not be right for them based on personal interest or timing. When discussing growth potential with an underperformer who doesn't self select pay to quit we ultimately have a conversation that for us to mutually decide to retain them, they'll need to change the way the work and grow. Sometimes these decisions can be obvious but the pay to quit program is designed to look for the less obvious occurrences.
Our favorite outcome of Pay To Quit is what it means for those who chose not to take it. Those opting to pass on the opportunity are committed to their growth and success within the organization and here lies a goal that is truly aligned with the needs of the company.