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BIJ
25,8
2950
Received 10 November 2017
Revised 8 February 2018
Accepted 3 March 2018
Benchmarking: An International
Journal
Vol. 25 No. 8, 2018
pp. 2950-2967
© Emerald Publishing Limited
1463-5771
DOI 10.1108/BIJ-11-2017-0302
Criticality of detailed staff
turnover measurement
Robert Gandy and Patricia Harrison
Liverpool Business School, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK, and
Jeff Gold
York Business School, York St John University, York, UK
Abstract
Purpose – Scrutiny of staff turnover in large organisations is traditionally reactive, involving benchmarking
against peers at institution level. Not being an outlier tempts the inference that turnover is “satisfactory”.
However, individual departments exhibiting varied, counterbalancing patterns might be masked; meaning
situations that present challenges and require action could be missed. The purpose of this paper is to
investigate the degree to which headline staff turnover can mask internal variations in a large post-1992
English university with over 2,000 staff.
Design/methodology/approach – The methods scrutinised related mainstream benchmarking sources,
and analysed turnover for both new recruits and staff leaving, as well as net turnover. The inverted
Nomogramma di Gandy helped highlight overall patterns and identify outliers. Staff categories and
characteristics examined included: age, gender, diversity, staff type and contractual status.
Findings – It was found that (wide) internal variations were masked between university departments and
between different gender and age groups, with Generation Y presenting issues for future recruitment
and retention. Localised high turnover rates were found, with particular issues involving research staff.
A proactive approach is essential, analysing local data to reflect internal structures, and staff categories and
characteristics. Understanding internal and external staff dynamics supports organisations to meet strategic
aims and objectives, and target local action.
Originality/value – The approach and findings provided lessons for staff management relevant to
universities, which are critical to many, if not most large organisations in the UK and internationally,
particularly in times of uncertainty.
Keywords Benchmarking, Generation Y, Higher Education, Inverted Nomogramma di Gandy,
Staff turnover, Large organizations
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Staff turnover is a key workforce measure for all organisations (Gates, 2004; Allen et al.,
2010), potentially providing valuable insights into what is happening within a workforce,
generally retrospectively, by examining why staff have left (Veleso et al., 2014). However,
there is often “scant attention given to turnover” (Lawrence et al., 2013, p. 513) possibly
because it is a concept taken for granted. Nevertheless since it involves comparatively
straightforward formulae with many published, high-level benchmark analyses, it could be
considered to reveal savings or sources for improved efficiency. Research has shown that
high staff turnover can be harmful for an organisation’s performance (Glebbeek and Bax,
2004), especially among core staff (Siebert and Zubanov, 2009). Organisations can examine
staff turnover when seeking reductions through natural wastage (Hancock et al., 2013;
Sutherland, 1998), rather than compulsory redundancies. For example, a major
multinational company based in the UK with an annual natural wastage rate of
20 per cent, found that one small unit with a harsh environment had such a high staff
turnover that it had skewed this figure; when the unit was excluded the natural wastage for
the rest of the company was only c.5 per cent (Gandy, 2009). Staff turnover can increasingly
be seen as a feature of what is referred to as people analytics that enables a more complex
understanding of the key patterns of human resource (HR) data, allowing better decisions
relating to workforce planning (de Romrée et al., 2016).
 The purpose of the research presented in this paper is to challenge the largely Detailed staff
predominant use of benchmarking headline staff turnover rates by investigating the degree turnover
to which such rates can mask internal variations in turnover in large organisations. It does measurement
this by analysing the actual situation in one such organisation in Higher Education (HE) in
the UK. Accordingly, the research looks at variations between university departments and
between the different gender and age groups, the latter being particularly important given
the evolving age-diverse workforce of the sector. It uses data from a large post-1992 HE 2951
institution in the UK, with over 2,000 staff (Armstrong, 2008). We begin by considering the
issue of staff turnover in the context of HE and the value of benchmarking. We then
consider the research that we conducted in a large HE organisation, followed by a
discussion of the results; before concluding on the importance of a complex approach to
staff turnover to enable appropriate responses.

2. Staff turnover in higher education

The measurement of staff turnover is one of a number of workforce planning techniques to
provide data relating to the flow of people in organisations, but also as a way to understand
workforce problems. The loss of talented staff in particular has important cost implications
so an understanding of turnover can help the formulation of responses to staff retention
(Bratton and Gold, 2017).
Research exists about staff turnover and factors influencing why people leave their jobs
(Cardy and Lengnick-Hall, 2011), and factors influencing people to remain with a company
(Cotton and Tuttle, 1986), particularly where there are recruitment difficulties and escalating
skills shortages (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 2015a). However, there
is little in-depth quantitative research into staff turnover, and the degree to which headline
organisational rates can mask internal variations. An organisation’s understanding of its
workforce is vital and can engender benefits at both an operational and strategic level
(Hancock et al., 2013; Raju et al., 2015). The approach, findings and lessons for staff
management that are set out, are therefore relevant to many, if not most large organisations
in the private and public sector, both in the UK and internationally.

2.1 Workforce in universities

Universities are increasingly competing in a global market (Marginson, 2013), with
management styles and approaches being adopted from the private and industrial sectors.
In the UK this is reflected in competition for academic staff with strong research skills
(Mahroum, 1999; Ackers and Gill, 2005) and the application of performance indicators
such as number of PhD-educated academic staff (Breakwell and Tytherleigh, 2010). In the
UK, HE academic staff are more weighted towards older age groups, with 21 per cent aged
55 years and over, and only 25 per cent aged under 35 years in 2008/2009 (Higher
Education Statistical Agency, 2010); but since April 2011, employers cannot issue
retirement notices to their employees (Age UK, 2015). Younger employees exhibit very
different attitudes to the length of time they will stay in a job: those born between 1977
and 1994, namely, Generation Y or “Millennials” (Schroer, 2015), are more likely to be
unsatisfied with their work and report higher levels of turnover, compared to other
generations (Brown et al., 2015). In addition, the vast majority of Generation Y employees
plan to stay less than five years with one employer, and more than a third (37 per cent)
plan to stay no more than two years (London Business School, 2014). As Generation Y
employees are likely to incrementally increase as a proportion of UK workforces, including
HE, it is probable that staff turnover rates will also increase. Therefore, it is critical to
know who is staying and leaving (Cardy and Lengnick-Hall, 2011), because it can be both
costly and problematic to recruit and train new talent (Groysberg, 2010; Collings, 2015);
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (2015a, p. 27) reported considerable
BIJ variance in the spend of organisations on recruitment, quoting median costs of £7,250 for
25,8 senior positions and £2,000 for other employees. In the USA, the estimated recruitment
and start-up costs of universities replacing science faculty members varied between
$300,000 and $700,000 (Ehrenberg et al., 2006).
A related issue is that many younger academics start their careers with fixed-term
contract, research posts; acquiring permanent academic posts after a period of time, many
2952 moves or multiple job holding (Metcalf et al., 2005). Given the increasing focus on research in
many universities (Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, 2016),
this situation suggests that HE institutions’ staff turnover patterns will be influenced by the
number of departments with significant research profiles.

2.2 Benchmarking
Universities routinely benchmark staff turnover (UNESCO, 1998), but by definition, the vast
majority will not be outliers. Unfortunately, concentration on headline figures can mislead,
because net turnover can mask widely varying situations: the number of new staff and staff
lost can both be large or both be small and have the same difference between them. For
example, a net turnover rate of minus 5 per cent can be the result of a 2 per cent turnover
rate for recruited staff and a 7 per cent turnover rate for staff lost (see formulae below); it can
also be the result of a 23 per cent turnover rate for recruited staff and a 28 per cent turnover
rate for staff lost. Such scenarios have different implications for HR management; not least
is that the latter involves far more recruitment resources than the former. It is contended
that there is a genuine risk that a university will consider being a non-outlier as “acceptable”
and not take related matters further, when detailed scrutiny of turnover below institution
level might point to situations that require attention.
There is evidence of HE institutions working collaboratively with each other to improve
overall performance although this tended to be in an informal way. It was primarily from the
early 1990s that the development of benchmarking in HE enabled formalised comparisons.
The main reasons included: greater international competitiveness; the development of an
interest in enhancing quality; and the rapid growth of information technology which made
data collection and management possible (UNESCO, 1998). The methodology of
benchmarking with its conceptual emphasis on openness of analysis, organisational
learning and an examination of processes, rather than a narrow focus on input or output
data, encouraged some commentators to be optimistic about its application in universities:
arguing that such a methodology fits a university culture more comfortably than other
forms of change management (UNESCO, 1998).
Hence, HE institutions have adopted a benchmarking approach to support HR and
other management functions. Several professional, private and public organisations
benchmark staff turnover in HE in the UK, using university-wide data; namely, the
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (2016), DLA Piper (2015), the Higher
Education Statistical Agency (2018), the Universities and Colleges Employers
Association (2014) and the Workforce Employment Relations Study (2013). In addition,
to support HE institutions, HESA created the Higher Education Information Database for
Institutions (2015); a data explorer which creates pre-structured analyses and reports of
HESA data. Staff turnover is only one of many HR-related topics analysed by each of
the aforementioned.
Consequently it was necessary to examine each of these as part of the research, to
establish the opportunities for universities to benchmark staff turnover and stability
below institution level, across the HE sector. This necessarily included the benchmarking
data collected and how staff turnover was calculated, to see if there were differences in
data, definitions or analyses, and whether they could support (full) analyses below
institution level.
3. Methods Detailed staff
The research involved a large post-1992 UK HE institution (Armstrong, 2008), with five academic turnover
faculties and three support/managerial divisions (excluding “Other”). It covered the full academic measurement
year immediately preceding the Research Excellence Framework (2015), namely, 1 August 2012
to 31 July 2013, in part because it was suspected (some) universities recruited staff to specifically
contribute to their REF score, thereby increasing their allocation of related resources.
2953
3.1 Data
The university studied provided anonymous staffing data, as follows: anonymous identifier,
age, gender, start date, leaving date, reason for leaving, disability status, ethnic origin,
nationality, grade name, job name, department, location, full time equivalent (FTE),
employment category and nature of fixed term. The categories assigned to each data are not
set out here, but are evident from the resulting analyses. They reflected the actual data
available on the university database.
For some data, categories were merged for the analytical purposes. FTE was translated into
hours worked per week (based on a 35-h week) in four categories: under 16 h; 16 h and up to
24 h; 24 h and up to 30 h; and 30 h and over. These categories were chosen because: people need
to work 16 h and over, or 24 h and over, to gain certain government working tax credits (Welfare
Rights on the Net, 2015), and Workforce Employment Relations Study (2013) differentiates
part-time staff as working fewer than 30 h per week and full-time as 30 h or more per week.
Ages were aggregated into ten-year groups starting with age 20 years (with “Under
20 years” and “60 years and over” at either end of the range). Separate analyses were
undertaken for staff aged “35 years and under” for Generation Y.
There were 13 different types of contract, but nearly all staff had either a permanent or a
fixed-term contract. Therefore, all other forms of contract mentioning “permanent” were
aggregated with the former and all other forms mentioning “fixed-term” were aggregated
with the latter for analytical purposes. This left one other category, namely, Joint Contract.
For confidentiality purposes faculties are anonymised using broad descriptors, e.g. “An
Arts Faculty”, with their constituent departments named “An Arts Faculty: Dept A.1”, etc.
The same applies for management divisions.

3.2 Measurement of turnover

Staff turnover rate is defined as the number of employees who leave a company during a
specified time period divided by the average total number of employees over that same time
period (Department for Work and Pensions and ACAS, 2014). Therefore, it measures
specific changes in the sizes of cohorts of staff. The data required can be very simple and
readily available within any organisation. The (minimum) data required is:
• S – number of staff at start of period;
• L – number of staff lost/leaving during period;
• N – number of new staff starting during period; and
• F – number of staff at finish of period.
The turnover rate relating to lost staff is calculated as follows:
Lost Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers ¼ ð2L  100Þ=ðS þF Þ: (1)
The corresponding turnover rate for recruited staff is:
New Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers ¼ ð2N  100Þ=ðS þF Þ: (2)

Therefore; the net turnover rate calculation is: ð2  ðN–LÞ  100Þ=ðS þ F Þ: (3)
BIJ Any staff that both started and left university employment during the period covered were
25,8 counted against both “lost staff” and “new staff”. The focus was on all staff starting or
leaving the university, irrespective of their reason for leaving (i.e. it included reasons other
than “voluntary”, such as redundancy), because it was important to understand the full
picture. Casual staff, management consultants and similar were excluded.
The regularly used measure the “Percentage Stability Index” was also calculated
2954 and quoted. This reflects how experienced employees are being retained, and is calculated
as the number of workers with one year’s service (or more), divided by number of
workers employed one year ago, multiplied by one hundred (Department for Work and
Pensions and ACAS, 2014).

3.3 Constraints
The data relate to individuals employed by the university and represent “headcounts”,
rather than FTEs. Also, the measurement of turnover formulae (above) take the “average
number of staff” as the mean of the number of staff at the start and end of the period,
namely, (S+F)/2, which is a simple, straightforward and commonly used calculation.
Furthermore, no data available was on the destination of staff that left voluntarily and their
reasons for leaving. Historically, the university commissioned external consultancies to
undertake exit surveys of such leavers, but responses were too poor for useful analysis.

3.4 Presentation of turnover rates

A diagrammatical approach was included; using the scattergram-related inverted
Nomogramma di Gandy (NdiG), which has been used to demonstrate turnover for
international trade, populations and staff. It requires minimum data, and shows many data
on one diagram, acting as an exploratory data analysis tool for considering problematical
issues (Gandy, 2009).
The X axis is “Lost Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers”, above, and the Y axis is
“New Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers”, above. Accordingly, a company/
organisation might be considered “self-sufficient” or “self-contained” if it has not gained or
lost staff. In such circumstances, the inverted NdiG value would be (0, 0), and the further
away from this point, the greater the turnover. This attribution to the axes means
organisations with expanding staff appear above the 45° diagonal, whilst those contracting
appear below. The associated tables collate data into meaningful categories: “Staff at 1
August 2012”; “Leavers”; “New Staff”; and “Staff at 31 July 2013”.

4. Results
Table I sets out the above data and indices for age, gender, disability, ethnic group, type of
contract, weekly hours and type of staff, with the related patterns shown in Figure 1.
Total staff decreased from 2,346 to 2,277 over the period. This 3 per cent reduction was
the net effect of 10 per cent of staff leaving with 7 per cent replacement. There were staff
reductions in each age-sex group except the under 20s, and males aged 20–39 years. It is
noted that 57 per cent of female leavers were under 40 years of age, compared to 43 per cent
for males.
The age profile of academic staff was slightly older than non-academic staff, with mean
ages of just over 47 and 45 years, respectively; the mean for males was marginally greater
than for females in both cases. Research staff had a mean age of just over 38 years, but with
a mean of 41 years for males and 35 years for females. For staff aged 60 years and over 124
(56 per cent) were full-time staff, of which males accounted for 76 (61 per cent). By contrast
females accounted for 64 (65 per cent) of the 98 part-time staff.
 Staff at
Detailed staff
1 August New Staff at 31 % Net Stability turnover
2012 Leaversa staffa July 2013 distributionb X Y turnover index (%) measurement
University grand
total 2,346 233 164 2,277 100.0 10.1 7.1 −3.0 91.0

Age and gender

Males
Under 20 yrs 0 0 6 6 0.3 0.0 200.0 200.0 –
2955
20–29 yrs 56 16 23 63 2.8 26.9 38.7 11.8 78.6
30–39 yrs 213 27 34 220 9.7 12.5 15.7 3.2 90.1
40–49 yrs 350 22 18 346 15.2 6.3 5.2 −1.1 93.7
50–59 yrs 324 13 5 316 13.9 4.1 1.6 −2.5 96.0
60 yrs and Over 125 22 7 110 4.8 18.7 6.0 −12.8 83.2
Grand total 1,068 100 93 1,061 46.6 9.4 8.7 −0.7 91.7
Generation Y 182 33 45 194 8.5 17.6 23.9 6.4 85.2
Non-Generation Y 886 67 48 867 38.1 7.6 5.5 −2.2 93.0
Females
Under 20 yrs 0 0 4 4 0.2 0.0 200.0 200.0 –
20–29 yrs 87 28 23 82 3.6 33.1 27.2 −5.9 77.0
30–39 yrs 294 48 22 268 11.8 17.1 7.8 −9.3 83.7
40–49 yrs 409 21 15 403 17.7 5.2 3.7 −1.5 94.9
50–59 yrs 359 18 6 347 15.2 5.1 1.7 −3.4 95.8
60 yrs and over 129 18 1 112 4.9 14.9 0.8 −14.1 86.0
Grand total 1,278 133 71 1,216 53.4 10.7 5.7 −5.0 90.5
Generation Y 268 60 43 251 11.0 23.1 16.6 −6.6 80.6
Non-Generation Y 1,010 73 28 965 42.4 7.4 2.8 −4.6 93.1
Disability status (Exc not stated)
Disabled 136 3 5 138 6.1 2.2 3.6 1.5 97.8
Non-disabled 1,416 97 35 1,354 59.5 7.0 2.5 −4.5 93.1
Ethnic group (Exc not stated)
White 1,975 167 118 1,926 84.6 8.6 6.0 −2.5 92.3
Other ethnic
minority 132 13 10 129 5.7 10.0 7.7 −2.3 90.2
Type of contract
Fixed contract 224 101 70 193 8.5 48.4 33.6 −14.9 64.3
Permanent contract 2,120 132 94 2,082 91.4 6.3 4.5 −1.8 93.8
Joint contract 2 0 0 2 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0
Weekly hours
Under 16 h 195 30 24 189 8.3 15.6 12.5 −3.1 86.7
16 h and up to 24 h 216 17 14 213 9.4 7.9 6.5 −1.4 93.5
24 h and up to 30 h 138 17 8 129 5.7 12.7 6.0 −6.7 88.4
30 h and over 1,797 169 118 1,746 76.7 9.5 6.7 −2.9 91.4
Type of staff
Academic 886 70 81 897 39.4 7.9 9.1 1.2 92.7
Administration 916 90 53 879 38.6 10.0 5.9 −4.1 91.3
KTP Associate 2 1 3 4 0.2 33.3 100.0 66.7 50.0 Table I.
Manual 224 8 3 219 9.6 3.6 1.4 −2.3 96.4 Staff turnover
Research 141 51 22 112 4.9 40.3 17.4 −22.9 68.1 statistics for key
Technical 177 13 2 166 7.3 7.6 1.2 −6.4 93.2 staff characteristics
Notes: aIncludes new staff who also were leavers during year; bPercentage distribution relates to staff (1 August 2012–
at 31 July 2013 31 July 2013)

The greatest turnover was in the younger age groups, particularly those aged 20–29 years.
It can be seen that the limited differences in net turnover rate between Generation Y and
other staff masked large differences between the graphical indicator values, with
Generation Y being outliers for both males and females. The net turnover rate for staff
classified as disabled was positive, involving low levels of turnover. This compares with
BIJ 50

25,8
45

40

2956
New Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers

35 Males Age Groups

Males Generation Y
Males Non-Generation Y
30
Males Total
Females Age Groups

25 Females Generation Y
Females Non-Generation Y
Females Total
20 Type of Contract
Weekly Hours
Type of Staff
15
Disability
Ethnic Group
10 University Grand Total

5
Figure 1.
Turnover patterns for
categories of staff & 0
staff characteristics 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50
Lost Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers

negative turnover for non-disabled staff. The differences in turnover patterns for staff
with permanent and fixed-term contracts were marked, but the latter only accounted for
8.5 per cent of the workforce.
Classifying staff working 30 h and over per week as “full-time” (Workforce Employment
Relations Study, 2013) meant just over three-quarters of all staff were “full-time”. The
greatest turnover involved part-time staff working less than 16 h per week, despite their net
turnover being similar to the university mean. The greatest negative net turnover was for
staff working 24–30 h.
The university increased its academic staff, balanced by reductions in administration
and research. The low turnover rates for academic staff compare with high rates for
research staff, arguably representing fairly stable and more volatile situations, respectively.
There were 90 research staff with fixed-term contracts at the beginning of the year, and
67 at the end. So although they accounted for only 3.8 per cent of the total staff at the
beginning of the year, they accounted for 18.5 per cent of the staff leaving and 12.2 per cent
of the staff starting. Part-time research staff on fixed-term contracts yielded substantial
turnover, with a net turnover of −74.3; accounting for 29.7 per cent of part-time staff that left
and 13.0 per cent of such staff that started.
The varying patterns within and between faculties/divisions are evident from Table II
and Figure 2, which serves to highlight the importance of drilling down into the
organisational structure. Turnover rates for the support/managerial divisions were all lower
than those for the academic faculties bar one, with all those above the university mean
attributable to faculties. For individual academic departments it became evident that the
five with the highest patterns of turnover, namely, Science Faculty Departments S.1, S.3 and
S.5, and Technology Faculty Departments T.1 and T.6, also had high percentages of
fixed-term contract and/or research staff.
 Staff at Staff at
1 Aug New 31 July % Net Stability % Fixed % Research
2012 Leaversa staffa 2013 Distributionb X Y turnover index contractc staffc

University grand total 2,346 233 164 2,277 100.0 10.1 7.1 −3.0 91.0 11.7 6.5
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.1 24 1 1 24 1.1 4.2 4.2 0.0 95.8 8.0 0.0
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.2 77 6 9 80 3.5 7.6 11.5 3.8 92.2 8.1 1.2
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.3 101 9 5 97 4.3 9.1 5.1 −4.0 91.1 4.7 0.0
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.4 74 13 5 66 2.9 18.6 7.1 −11.4 82.4 5.1 0.0
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.5 52 3 3 52 2.3 5.8 5.8 0.0 94.2 1.8 1.8
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.6 5 0 0 5 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 80.0 20.0
An Arts Faculty: Dept A.7 55 6 6 55 2.4 10.9 10.9 0.0 94.5 4.9 3.3
Total – An Arts Faculty 388 38 29 379 16.6 9.9 7.6 −2.3 91.0 6.2 1.2
An Education Faculty: Dept E 189 25 16 180 7.9 13.6 8.7 −4.9 89.4 12.2 4.4
Total – An Education Faculty 189 25 16 180 7.9 13.6 8.7 −4.9 89.4 12.2 4.4
A Health Faculty: Dept H 222 39 9 192 8.4 18.8 4.3 −14.5 82.9 13.9 15.6
Total – A Health Faculty 222 39 9 192 8.4 18.8 4.3 −14.5 82.9 13.9 15.6
A Science Faculty: Dept S.1 35 1 9 43 1.9 2.6 23.1 20.5 97.1 22.7 22.7
A Science Faculty: Dept S.2 91 4 1 88 3.9 4.5 1.1 −3.4 95.6 4.3 4.3
A Science Faculty: Dept S.3 63 8 14 69 3.0 12.1 21.2 9.1 88.9 20.8 11.7
A Science Faculty: Dept S.4 72 5 4 71 3.1 7.0 5.6 −1.4 94.4 15.8 13.2
A Science Faculty: Dept S.5 79 29 15 65 2.9 40.3 20.8 −19.4 63.3 43.6 31.9
Total – A Science Faculty 340 47 43 336 14.8 13.9 12.7 −1.2 86.8 21.7 16.4
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.1 81 9 13 85 3.7 10.8 15.7 4.8 88.9 22.3 23.4
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.2 66 2 0 64 2.8 3.1 0.0 −3.1 97.0 10.6 10.6
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.3 85 8 3 80 3.5 9.7 3.6 −6.1 91.8 18.2 8.0
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.4 6 0 0 6 0.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 33.3
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.5 46 2 0 44 1.9 4.4 0.0 −4.4 95.7 2.2 0.0
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.6 16 2 2 16 0.7 12.5 12.5 0.0 87.5 33.3 44.4
A Technology Faculty: Dept T.7 7 1 0 6 0.3 15.4 0.0 −15.4 85.7 0.0 0.0
Total – A Technology Faculty 307 24 18 301 13.2 7.9 5.9 −2.0 92.5 15.7 14.2
A Finance Division: Dept F.1 8 0 0 8 0.4 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 12.5 0.0

(continued )
measurement
turnover
Detailed staff

2957

31 July 2013)
(1 August 2012–
and divisions
statistics for faculties
Table II.
Staff turnover
 BIJ
25,8

2958

Table II.
Staff at Staff at
1 Aug New 31 July % Net Stability % Fixed % Research
2012 Leaversa staffa 2013 Distributionb X Y turnover index contractc staffc

A Finance Division: Dept F.2 293 12 13 294 12.9 4.1 4.4 0.3 95.9 4.6 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.3 68 5 1 64 2.8 7.6 1.5 −6.1 92.6 5.8 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.4 2 0 0 2 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.5 27 2 1 26 1.1 7.5 3.8 −3.8 92.6 10.7 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.6 17 3 0 14 0.6 19.4 0.0 −19.4 82.4 5.9 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.7 23 1 0 22 1.0 4.4 0.0 −4.4 95.7 17.4 0.0
A Finance Division: Dept F.8 8 1 1 8 0.4 12.5 12.5 0.0 87.5 0.0 0.0
Total – A Finance Division 446 24 16 438 19.2 5.4 3.6 −1.8 94.6 5.8 0.0
A Senior Management Division: M.1 4 0 0 4 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 25.0 0.0
A Senior Management Division: M.2 1 0 1 2 0.1 0.0 66.7 66.7 100.0 0.0 0.0
A Senior Management Division: M.3 4 0 0 4 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 0.0
A Senior Management Division: M.4 6 1 0 5 0.2 18.2 0.0 −18.2 83.3 0.0 0.0
Total – A Senior Management Division 15 1 1 15 0.7 6.7 6.7 0.0 93.3 6.3 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.1 45 12 6 39 1.7 28.6 14.3 −14.3 84.4 33.3 3.9
A Student Services Division: Dept S.2 69 1 2 70 3.1 1.4 2.9 1.4 98.6 2.8 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.3 33 6 4 31 1.4 18.8 12.5 −6.3 87.9 24.3 2.7
A Student Services Division: Dept S.4 67 1 0 66 2.9 1.5 0.0 −1.5 98.5 1.5 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.5 118 7 17 128 5.6 5.7 13.8 8.1 94.1 5.9 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.6 31 4 2 29 1.3 13.3 6.7 −6.7 93.5 18.2 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.7 2 0 0 2 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.8 29 1 0 28 1.2 3.5 0.0 −3.5 96.6 6.9 0.0
A Student Services Division: Dept S.9 39 2 1 38 1.7 5.2 2.6 −2.6 97.4 10.0 2.5
Total – A Student Services Division 434 35 32 431 18.9 8.1 7.4 −0.7 94.5 10.5 0.9
Other 6 1 0 5 0.2 18.2 0.0 −18.2 83.3 0.0 0.0
Notes: aIncludes new staff who also were leavers during year; bPercentage distribution relates to staff at 31 July 2013; cPercentages relate to all staff employed during
the year
 50
Detailed staff
45
turnover
Arts Faculty Departments
measurement
40
Total - An Arts Faculty

Total - An Education Faculty

New Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers

35
Total - A Health Faculty

Science Faculty Departments

2959
30
Total - A Science Faculty

25 Technology Faculty Departments

Total - A Technology Faculty

20 Finance Division Departments

Total - A Finance Division

15 Student Services Division Departments

Total - A Student Services Division

10
Senior Management Division: Departments

Total - A Senior Management Division

5
University Grand Total
Figure 2.
0 Turnover patterns for
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 faculties and divisions
Lost Staff as Percentage of Average Numbers

There was a significant positive correlation between net turnover and the percentage
stability index (p o0.01, r ¼ 0.52), which may be expected because faculties/divisions losing
most staff would have lower levels of stability compared to those with (large) positive
turnover where most original staff will be retained.

4.1 Benchmarking sources

Critical scrutiny of the five named organisations’ surveys that benchmark staff turnover in
HE highlighted variations in the data, staff categories and formulae used (see below list
“Summary of how existing benchmarking sources deal with staff turnover”). Their coverage
of HR topics and HE institutions varies, as does the frequency of surveys. They use different
definitions of staff turnover formulae, with some concentrating on voluntary leavers and some
including involuntary leavers (e.g. staff redundancies). Some accept “best estimates” if exact
data are not available. Presentational details also vary, e.g. the percentage stability index is
not always calculated. Importantly, none measure staff turnover for both starters and leavers:
Summary of how existing benchmarking sources deal with staff turnover.
• Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (2016)
The CIPD is a professional body for HR and people development, with more than 140,000
members worldwide. It describes employee turnover as the proportion of employees who
leave an organisation over a set period (often on a year-on-year basis), expressed as a
percentage of total workforce numbers. It also highlights related variations, e.g. whether the
term encompasses all leavers, both voluntary and involuntary, including those who resign,
retire or are made redundant. It has active research and survey functions with a wide range
of reports reflecting the full range of HR interests, which evolve over time; its 2015
resourcing and talent planning survey report for the UK and showed nationwide trends in
median staff turnover, using the standard “crude wastage” method, namely, number of
leavers in a set period multiplied by 100 and divided by the average number employed in the
same period (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 2015b). However, there are
no regular surveys and reports for the HE sector.
BIJ • DLA Piper (2015)
25,8 This commercial benchmarking company invites annual data submission from
subscribing universities. Its 2014 report involved 76 responses from HE institutions.
Staff turnover data are institution wide and relates to voluntary leavers only, i.e. it
excludes those who leave for reasons of redundancy, dismissal, normal or early retirement
and end of fixed-term contract. The stability index is calculated as the percentage of
2960 (current) employees, who were in the employment of the institution at the beginning of the
12-month period covered. A range of related questions are also asked. Presentations
include means and quartile distributions.
• Higher Education Statistical Agency (2018)
This is the central source for the collection and dissemination of statistics about publicly
funded UK HE; collecting data about the full range of HE topics, with staffing being one.
Staff record data have been collected for academic years since 1994/1995 from subscribing
HE institutions, and involves comprehensive details of each member of staff (which
were consistent with the internal data used for this research). It was optional for
institutions to include or exclude atypical non-academic staff, but from 2015/2016 such
staff were excluded. A specific section on the HESA website shows annual publications
and products for staff in HE, with many tables providing specific details of starters and
leavers, from which turnover rates can be calculated. However, this tends to be limited to
institution level.
• Universities and Colleges Employers Association (2014)
This is a membership organisation whose mission is to represent, negotiate for and promote
the interests of UK HE institutions as employers to all stakeholders. Its workforce survey is
published every few years (the predecessor to the 2013 was for 2008). It quotes HESA
turnover data and covers all staff that leave, including redundancies. Some presentations
include new joiners. Data are presented nationally, and includes means, medians and ranges
for different categories of staff. There was no stability index data.
• Workforce Employment Relations Study (2013)
This is a multi-sponsored project, with input from the various sponsors, that covers all
sectors in the UK. Its surveys take place every 4–7 few years; the first was for 1980 and its
most recent, sixth report related to 2011. “Best estimates” are accepted if exact data are not
available. It does not specifically ask for staff turnover rates but headline rates can be
calculated from the data, as can the stability index. Its first findings report did not include
staff turnover or stability index figures.
HEIDI operates at a cost centre level for “Total Staff” data, and any institution can be
chosen. It involves FTEs and full-person equivalents (Higher Education Statistical Agency,
2015), neither of which is the same as the headcount data used in the research. Cost centres
are not the same as schools and, different universities call their departments by different
names. Also, for confidentiality and data protection reasons, details of starters and leavers
are only available at an institutional level, and the small numbers involved mean no related
demographic data analyses are available. Unfortunately, this means that HEIDI cannot be
used to benchmark the data used in the research analyses.

5. Discussion
Although the results relate to a large post-1992 UK HE institution, some patterns and issues
may apply to most HE institutions and large organisations, albeit with different emphases
reflecting their nature, organisation and size. Therefore, lessons from this research have
general relevance.
5.1 Benchmarking sources Detailed staff
The review of existing benchmarking sources (see the above list “Summary of how existing turnover
benchmarking sources deal with staff turnover”) highlighted that there are variations between measurement
how different universities measure their staff turnover, according to the benchmarking
agency used. It can be argued that none of the formulae and data used are incorrect because
there is no universally specified single definition of staff turnover. Of course there will be
consistency between the universities using the same agency, but where comparisons might be 2961
made between universities that use different agencies there is a risk that like is not being
compared with like, which could lead to erroneous inferences. Although some of the variations
are comparatively small, this is more likely to happen where they are more marked, e.g. where
one source includes involuntary leavers and another does not.

5.2 Justification for detailed analysis

The review of existing benchmarking sources also demonstrates that opportunities for
universities to benchmark staff turnover and stability across the HE sector below institution
level are negligible. But detailed analysis is essential, as concentrating solely on
benchmarking outputs risks key inter-departmental variations being missed. Hence, a
complementary approach is required: external macro-comparisons with other universities at
headline institutional level; and internal micro-comparisons between faculties/departments
and divisions (allowing for variations in data definitions and calculations).
Tables I and II demonstrate wide variations in turnover patterns between different
faculties/departments and divisions within a university, and between different categories of
staff; with the wide differences in X and Y values for Generation Y and other staff, for both
sexes, being perhaps the best example. Hancock et al. (2013) highlighted both positive
consequences (e.g. reduced compensation costs) and negative consequences (e.g. impact on
cost and organisational performance) of high staff turnover. They concluded that on balance
the negative effects outweighed the positive effects. Therefore, a transparent, detailed
understanding of staff turnover is essential.
Turnover needs to be calculated for both new staff and leavers because these can vary
considerably, and simply focusing on net turnover can mask important differential patterns.
The inverted NdiG enables initial exploratory data analysis which sets out such variations in
one presentation and allows attention to be drawn immediately to any outliers; with
expansion and contraction, respectively, reflected by being above or below the diagonal
(Gandy, 2009). However, the diagram does not reveal the causes for such variations; it
simply points to where more detailed analysis might be required, which could involve both
soft and hard data, some of which was not part of the basic data set used in this research.
This could include exit surveys of leavers if there is confidence in the response.
The issues worthy of more detailed investigation identified by this research are
potentially generic for universities. They include the varying patterns between age and sex
groups for the different types of staff, and the relationship between fixed-term contracts and
research posts. Each has implications for recruitment, retention and staff management.
Moreover, there is the need to identify potential areas of concern in respect of organisational
health; for example, very high turnover in a department might reflect dissatisfaction with
the management style and practices. Conversely, very low turnover may reflect a
department that has grown stale and needs fresh blood. Such diagnoses would not be
apparent solely from staff turnover figures; the figures would simply act as pointers and
prompts for where further enquiry might be required.

5.3 Age-diverse issues

The results showed that there are diverse staff turnover dynamics taking place, particularly
across the different age groups, with some gender factors in play. The highest turnover was
BIJ in the younger age groups, which Generation Y straddle, and the number of women leaving
25,8 exceeded the number of men for both the 20–29 and 30–39 years age groups, although
women were in the majority for both age groups. To a certain degree it is to be expected that
there may be greater staff turnover in younger staff as they move jobs as part of their career
progression, change career entirely or leave to raise a family. However, such reasons for
leaving were not known for many: 106 (45.5 per cent) were recorded as “Resignation”.
2962 Metcalf et al. (2005) found that 15 per cent of permanent academic staff thought their
moving to another UK university in the next year was “quite likely”, “very likely” or
“definitely”; 9 per cent of permanent staff and 24 per cent of fixed-term contract staff
anticipating leaving. A similar proportion of leavers left the HE sector as remained, and
business-related areas were particularly vulnerable to losing staff to other sectors.
Of course, Generation Y people were only just entering the workplace at the time of Metcalf
et al.’s research, i.e. 2004. Therefore, questions arise: whether high staff turnover for Generation
Y simply reflects staff moving in the early stages of their career, or is it a characteristic of the
generation which will continue into the future (in which case staff turnover will incrementally
increase over time)?; and whether the HE sector can afford to lose such skills and potential?
By comparison, the potential for older staff in the university to continue in employment
beyond the traditional retirement ages presents a very different scenario, because turnover
may reduce if staff opt to continue in their posts. In this university, 27 per cent of employees
aged over 60 years were actually over 65, with the oldest being 73. Chartered Institute of
Personnel and Development (2015b) suggests more benefits than disadvantages to the
employment of older workers. Nevertheless, there are challenges in relation to termination of
contracts with employees who are employed over the age of 65 years as they can,
potentially, remain working indefinitely. Traditionally older men in the university have been
employed mainly full-time and older women mainly part-time, but this may evolve
differently in the future as older workers desire flexible working practices that create
work/life balance. HR functions must recognise the distinctiveness of this life stage and
adapt policies and procedures so as not to lose such important esoteric knowledge.
It follows that there will probably be opposite trends in staff turnover for the two age
groups; but will they counterbalance each other? These inter-generational differences
highlight the need for HR policies in HE to adopt a life-span perspective (Hertel et al., 2013),
and as the number of Generation Y employees steadily grows, managers should pay more
attention to their needs and management processes should be adjusted accordingly (Meyers
and Van Woerkom, 2014). Consequently, the same retention strategy cannot be applied for
everybody anymore (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 2015a).
Management processes should ensure that the skills of all staff are in line with the
requirements of the university both strategically and operationally.

5.4 Contractual and structural issues

The results evidenced a relationship between staff having fixed-term contracts and research
contracts, and the taking on of new staff (indicator Y), which appears to suggest that the
growing tendency, identified by Metcalf et al. (2005) in 2004, to recruit to research jobs and
fixed-term contracts has continued. Five academic departments had high figures for each of
the three indicators (see Table II), namely, Science Faculty Departments S.1, S.3 and S.5, and
Technology Faculty Departments T.1 and T.6.
The inference of this finding is that research staff are recruited on fixed-term contracts to
support research projects that departments have won/gained funding for, which are
themselves for a fixed period. Inevitably the cycles of research project funding will vary, and so
such departments will be recruiting and shedding research staff in line with project plans and
funding availability; consequently, in any one year some projects will be starting, some will be
continuing and some will be finishing, which will reflect in the staff turnover accordingly.
Any department that has won research funding will actively look to publish as many papers as Detailed staff
possible from such research projects, with a view to increasing its score for the Research turnover
Excellence Framework (2015); the REF being the five-year cycle system which assesses the measurement
quality of research in UK HE institutions. Jump (2013) argued that the REF drove the use of
temporary contracts, as well as an agenda of accountability. Therefore, high staff turnover
can reflect a positive situation, and should not automatically be assumed to be negative,
although this can obviously sometimes be the case, particularly if an organisation is facing 2963
unprecedented change. HE may face such a situation in the wake of the UK’s Brexit vote
(European Union Referendum Act, 2015), given that 16 per cent of academic staff employed in
the UK are from the European Union (EU) (Stokstad, 2016); which serves to reinforce the above
argument for detailed analysis.
Anecdotally, there is a belief amongst some academics that the Research Excellence
Framework (2015) incentivised the recruitment or “head-hunting” of researchers, and the
gaming of the system. This is because the REF allowed the credit related to publications to
sit with the author rather than the university, and therefore, where a researcher moved to a
new university it was the new employer rather than the old one (where the research actually
took place) which gained the credit. As the movement of talent tended to be approximately
two years before the REF date, the main movement period for talent for the 2014 REF was
2012/2013, which was the period covered by this research. Therefore, it may be that there
was a related spike in staff turnover across the HE sector in that year. This would be the
subject of further research, but the possibility should be kept in mind when considering
the results. The influence of the whole issue of portability of outputs has been recognised
and the rules concerning the REF and staffing may possibly change for the 2020 cycle,
following the publication of the Lord Stern Review (Department for Business, Energy and
Industrial Strategy, 2016), where the question of portability features prominently.
The high turnover witnessed for Generation Y employees and fixed-term research posts
are obviously inter-related to some extent, given that entrants to academia tend to be
recruited to fixed-term contracts in research. Being on a fixed-term contract significantly
reduces satisfaction, and if nearly a quarter of academics on fixed-term contracts leave UK
HE employment (Metcalf et al., 2005), then universities face a combination of challenges in
relation to staff turnover and skills and talent recruitment and retention. This will only be
exacerbated by uncertainties surrounding the outcomes of reforms to the Teaching
Excellence Framework, with its focus on pedagogic practice (Universities UK, 2016), and
Brexit (a decision the majority of university staff and students did not desire (Goodfellow,
2016)). The latter includes funding, the future recruitment of EU staff (Connolly, 2016) and
retaining UK-based EU staff who may not wish to remain in a non-EU country (Matthews
and Morgan, 2016). It follows that, whilst universities naturally compete with one another
for the best staff, the loss of personnel across the whole sector needs to be addressed, if this
leads to skills shortages in key areas.

5.5 Intelligence about staff

Whilst this research has provided in-depth analysis for a large UK university, the approach
and lessons are critical to many, if not most large organisations in any sector across
the world. This is because there is a need for HR functions to evaluate the performance of
human capital, of which turnover is only one aspect, as highlighted by Hesketh (2014).
He found that the necessary systems were “largely absent”; something subsequently endorsed
by Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (2015c) which stressed the related
challenges involved as HR is expected to become more business focussed. There should be
greater attention on well-thought determinants for young staff retention, with management
practices customised to this end. Whilst this may be the emphasis, the wider applicability of
such management processes to all age groups must also be taken into account.
BIJ 6. Conclusions
25,8 It has been demonstrated that focusing on headline staff turnover rates for a large
organisation, such as a university, can mask wide variations for individual departments.
There are many intertwined contributory influences and dynamics within the specific
context of HE’s growing age-diverse knowledge workforce. These include differential and
opposing staff retention patterns at either end of the age spectrum, gender, the levels
2964 of research and contributions to the Research Excellence Framework (2015), the usage of
fixed-term contracts and the type of university.
Traditionally, scrutiny of turnover has been reactive, but a proactive approach needs to
be adopted to underpin a university’s HR management. Whilst universities and
organisations should benchmark themselves against their peers, it is imperative that they
also analyse local data, to reflect local context. Understanding the internal and external staff
dynamics is essential to meet strategic aims and objectives, particularly in anticipation of
the uncertain impacts of: the Lord Stern Review (Department for Business, Energy and
Industrial Strategy, 2016) on the REF; the Teaching Excellence Framework (Universities
UK, 2016); and Brexit (European Union Referendum Act, 2015); and should enable a
university to pinpoint where local action might be necessary, although some issues would
benefit from sector-wide consideration and action, e.g. how to retain talented staff that are
coming to the end of fixed-term contracts.
Such an approach should similarly help large organisations to evolve their management
and HR policies and practices to meet future staffing challenges (e.g. addressing the needs of
the increasing numbers of Generation Y staff and dealing with staff working beyond
retirement age), and better manage their recruitment budget, given that high staff turnover
directly impacts on this. Whilst this research has looked in detail at a UK university, the
issues of staff management in times of uncertainty are common across all large
organisations across the world, albeit with variations between countries and sectors.
Therefore, it is reasonable to infer that the approach and findings of the research are critical
to many, if not most large organisations in the UK and internationally.

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Corresponding author
Robert Gandy can be contacted at: rob.gandy@ntlworld.com

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