Staff turnover is a human resource management aspect which occurs in any organisation. It involves the replacement of incumbents who have vacated their posts and left the organisation by the appointment of new incumbents in those posts The purpose of the study was to investigate factors influencing the high staff turnover at Walter Sisulu University and to explore strategies which could be utilized to address it. Management has a responsibility of ensuring that staff turnover remains at acceptable levels within the organisation. Causes of labour turnover and their consequences were investigated. High staff turnover could have negative consequences for an organization. It can dent the image of the institution and also have a negative impact on the productivity, especially when it involves the loss of highly skilled and productive workers. Measurement of staff turnover and models of turnover are also discussed and analysed. Job dissatisfaction as a determinant of voluntary turnover is categorically discussed as well as its components. The relationships between management, job satisfaction, performance and turnover as well as the possibility of reducing staff turnover are also explored. An empirical study was undertaken to determine individual, job, organisational and environmental factors influencing staff turnover among staff at all levels at WSU. Interviews were used in gathering data and the findings include the fact that the high staff turnover at this university is attributed to, among others, job dissatisfaction, lack of job security, lack of development and promotion opportunities. Recommendations were made to address factors that may have an impact on staff turnover at WSU as well as strategies that could be utilised to retain staff.

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Management in Strategic Marketing Johannesburg, 31 March 2016 / The purpose of this study was to understand the impact of sales staff turnover on customer equity in the South African luxury automotive industry. The concept customer equity has three elements that load onto it, namely; value equity, brand equity and relationship equity. For the purpose of this study, the focus was on relationship equity as this is the one customer equity element that the Sales Executives are able to influence. Rust, Zeithaml, and Lemon (2001) are of the view that customer equity drivers vary in importance for different industries. In relationship orientated industries (e.g. banking and automotive industry), relationship equity may be the most important driver of customer equity. Relationship equity is also known as retention equity as it entails the customers conscious decision to stick with a certain brand even after having conducted thorough research and analysis of other brands (Lemon, Rust, & Zeithaml, 2001). The study used a quantitative research method and the data is founded on the results from 73 surveys received from customers who own luxury vehicles, namely Audi. The data was analysed utilising multiple regressions, using the independent t-test to accept or reject the proposed hypotheses. Understanding the impact of sales staff turnover on relationship equity in the automotive sector is critical as this industry currently suffers from very high Sales Executive turnover. Original Equipment Manufacturers and dealer management need to understand the impact of this high staff turnover on the customers and ultimately potential future sales so that they may be able to mobilise effective strategies to minimise any negative impact caused by sales staff churn. The theoretical framework for this study is taken from a model by Vogel, Evanschitzky, and Ramaseshan (2008), which looks at the 3 drivers of customer equity and how these drivers effect customer loyalty intentions and future sales. This study found that sales staff turnover has a strong, significant relationship to relationship equity, meaning that sales staff turnover negatively affects relationship equity for the organisation, and therefore negatively affects the customer experience. / GR2018

Health Professionals are critical in the provision of health services, more especially when it comes to nurses who are next to the patient most of the time. It is critically important for the Eastern Cape Department of Health to ensure that skilled health professionals such as doctors, pharmacists, nurses and the like are retained and the staff turnover regarding this category of staff is appropriately managed. The difficulty to attract and retain health professionals is negatively affecting service delivery in the Eastern Cape department of Health and leaves the department with an unacceptably high vacancy rate. This often put more of a burden on to the health professionals who remain within the organization. Some of them will end up leaving the organization. There is a great shortage of health professionals in South Africa and it becomes easier for the health professionals to get employment elsewhere, particularly in the private sector which appears to have a competitive advantage as compared to the public sector. In this study, both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to gather information through the utilization of a questionnaire and interviews were conducted mainly to confirm the results obtained. The results of the study have assisted to reflect factors that could be influencing the health professionals to leave health facilities of the Eastern Cape Department of Health. The respondents were drawn from the two areas within the Health Department, and these are, Mthatha and Port Elizabeth areas. One hundred (100) questionnaires were issued to the health professionals and sixty three responded. Documents that were received from the department were helpful in determining the turnover rate. The study has revealed that the Eastern Cape Department of Health may succeed in retaining the health professionals if they can be made to feel that their job is important. It appears that health professionals would like to be given enough opportunity to perform their functions and participate in the decision making processes of the department. Some factors may be contributing to the staff turnover and these are, lack of career opportunities to develop, challenges in the workplace, conflict with the management and colleagues. It is always important for the organizations to recognize its employees by giving them space to practice their profession and create a comfortable workplace that could have an impact in influencing the employee to remain within the organization. Employee turnover can be minimized, if employees can be exposed to a healthy workplace environment that will assist if fostering happiness, and in the process, enhance their motivation. It is imperative for the Eastern Cape Department of Health to focus on the training and development of its employees in order to increase the efficiency and competitiveness. As the employees gain the necessary skills to perform their job, productivity may improve. The performance of the employees should be properly managed, and the resultant incentives and rewards must be fairly distributed. This could promote harmony in the workplace and that could help in building relationships among employees. If employees are satisfied, there is an increased chance that they will stay within the organization and it becomes difficult for other competitors to attract them. Employees must be given adequate space to participate in the decision making processes of the organization, and by doing so, their loyalty to the organization could be increased.

Ongoing instability in the nursing workforce is raising questions globally about the issue of nurse turnover. It is against this background that this research examines the impact of learning, advancement and quality of work-life on turnover intentions among nurses in selected hospitals from Eastern Cape. Little research has been conducted to investigate the impact of the above mentioned subjects on turnover intentions among nurses in the South African health sector. Research questions as well as hypotheses were formulated as the means to gain data on the subject. The research employed a quantitative design with a sample size of 160 nurses and 159 were returned. The data analysis consisted of both descriptive and inferential statistics. The main findings of the study showed a positive relationship among job satisfaction, work-life rewards, learning and advancement opportunities and job satisfaction. However, there were negative relationships between job satisfaction and turnover intentions; work-life rewards and turnover intentions; and also among learning, career advancement and turnover intentions. Finally, suggestions were made to the top management in the Health sector to come up with strategies and mechanisms that improve nurses’ quality of work-life and offering them training and advancement opportunities through organisational change programs.

The aim of this study explore the role of job satisfaction , organizational justice in determining employee turnover among administrative staff at Walter Sisulu University at Ibika campus in Butterworth , in the Eastern Cape Province. A sample of 70 administrative staff was drawn for the population of 170. Results of the study indicated that the study variables are significantly and positively correlated with one another. Job satisfaction was found to be significantly and positively correlated with employee turnover. Organizational justice was also found to be significantly positively correlated with employee turnover. Likewise, a positive and significant relationship between job satisfaction and organizational justice was found. The findings of this study will assist Ibika campus management in reducing employee turnover and increase the retention of administrative staff at Ibika campus and the entire Walter Sisulu administrative staff at large.

Ongoing instability in the nursing workforce is raising questions globally about the issue of nurse turnover. It is against this background that this research examines the impact of learning, advancement and quality of work-life on turnover intentions among nurses in selected hospitals from Eastern Cape. Little research has been conducted to investigate the impact of the above mentioned subjects on turnover intentions among nurses in the South African health sector. Research questions as well as hypotheses were formulated as the means to gain data on the subject. The research employed a quantitative design with a sample size of 160 nurses and 159 were returned. The data analysis consisted of both descriptive and inferential statistics. The main findings of the study showed a positive relationship among job satisfaction, work-life rewards, learning and advancement opportunities and job satisfaction. However, there were negative relationships between job satisfaction and turnover intentions; work-life rewards and turnover intentions; and also among learning, career advancement and turnover intentions. Finally, suggestions were made to the top management in the Health sector to come up with strategies and mechanisms that improve nurses’ quality of work-life and offering them training and advancement opportunities through organisational change programs.

The study emanated from the researcher’s experience and involvement in clinical nursing and nursing management. The researcher noted how heavy losses of recruited professional nurses might have had an influence on the quality of service delivery. It is a costly and time-consuming task to recruit enough nurses into the profession and retention of staff is especially difficult. There had been a significant increase in the number of professional nurses leaving the district hospitals either to primary health care service, private hospitals or other countries. Before the commencement of the study the turnover rate at the district hospital where the study was conducted, almost doubled the accepted norm, which was ten percent of the staff. For those reasons the researcher decided to conduct a study named, “Accelerated staff turnover among professional nurses at a district hospital.” The constant heavy losses of qualified nurses from the profession constitute one of the serious challenges for nursing managers. The researcher wanted answers to the following question: “What were your experiences of your job as a professional nurse at the district hospital?” The objectives of the study were: · to explore and describe factors leading to high staff turnover of professional nurses at a district hospital · to develop guidelines to help retain professional nurses. The design of this study, which was conducted in one of the district hospitals in the Makana Local Service Area in the Eastern Cape, is qualitative, descriptive and contextual. Informed permission for conducting the research was obtained from relevant authorities and participants were asked to sign a consent form before the researcher proceeded with the study. Participants that met the selection criteria were selected by means of purposive sampling. Data was obtained by means of semi-structured telephonic interviews that were audio-taped and later transcribed verbatim. To ensure trustworthiness of the study, the researcher applied the four strategies as proposed by Lincoln and Guba (De Vos, 2002:351) namely, credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability. Collected data was analysed according to the descriptive method proposed by Tesch (in Creswell, 1994:154). The services of an independent coder, who was provided with transcripts and a protocol to guide data analysis, were utilised. A consensus meeting was held between the researcher and the independent coder to discuss the identified themes and sub-themes. Following the data analysis, a literature control was undertaken to highlight the similarities to and differences in comparison between this and previous studies. Four major themes and sub-themes were identified through analysis.

The harsh realities currently facing public hospitals such as budget cuts, understaffing and poor working conditions, have resulted in nurses experiencing low morale and finding it increasingly difficult to stay in the public health sector. The obvious targeting of South African nurses by recruitment agencies with job offers to work overseas is causing a massive skills’ drain that the country cannot afford. The situation is further compounded by the fact that the government is freezing posts of those nurses who have resigned. Consequently, nurses who are currently working in these hospitals have to cope with unreasonable workloads. Public hospitals are nowadays faced with the challenge of delivering quality health care within the constraints of gross staff shortages, and an increasingly competitive global health environment. The main objective of this study was to identify strategies that can be implemented by hospitals in order to reduce turnover, thereby enhancing retention of staff. Interviews were conducted with the matrons-in-charge of the hospitals under study to investigate strategies that are in place to improve retention. Secondary data regarding staff turnover in the hospitals under study was collected and analysed. It emerged that there are no concrete strategies in place to lower turnover. Hospitals are indeed experiencing staff turnover and posts that were vacated by those nurses that have resigned are frozen. The literature survey revealed three strategies that can be utilised to retain employees, namely, motivation strategies, effective leadership strategies and human resources strategies. Based on various literature reviews, it was concluded that the three strategies are interrelated. The empirical survey was conducted at the three selected hospitals, to determine the extent to which the retention strategies identified in the literature survey are being utilised. All three are invariably used in the hospitals. It is evident that the leadership behaviour in these hospitals affects the level of motivation of employees. The extent to which some of the human resources strategies are utilised invariably leads to low morale and dissatisfaction among employees. Lastly, research findings were assessed with the aim of drawing conclusions so that appropriate recommendations could be made. Recommendations focused on the retention strategies that can be implemented to boost morale of employees and enhance retention.

MCur / Department of Advanced Nursing Science

The present study explored the relationships between pay satisfaction, affective organisational commitment, voluntary turnover intention, and attitudes to money in a South African context, as well as whether attitudes to money acted as a moderator and affective organisational commitment as a mediator in the relationship between pay satisfaction and voluntary turnover intention. All participants received a web link to an online survey host in which a questionnaire was presented. The questionnaire included a self-constructed demographic questionnaire, the Pay Satisfaction Questionnaire (Heneman & Schwab, 1985), the Organisational Commitment Questionnaire (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979), an adapted six-item questionnaire assessing voluntary turnover intention, and the Money Ethics Scale (Tang, 1992). The final sample (n = 190) consisted of respondents from a corporate company, as well as a snowball sample from social networks (Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn). The results suggested that pay satisfaction may best be viewed as a multi-dimensional construct both internationally and within a South African context. The study provides further support that this is robust across different types of samples and contexts and in different organisational fields. Furthermore, pay satisfaction was positively related to affective organisational commitment and negatively related to voluntary turnover intention. Voluntary turnover intention was also significantly and very strongly negatively related to affective organisational commitment. Moreover, affective organisational commitment mediated the relationship between pay satisfaction and voluntary turnover intention. This supported international findings regarding these relationships. Although one of the subscales of pay satisfaction, pay benefits, was significantly and negatively related to ‘good’ attitude to money, overall pay satisfaction and the other subscales did not significantly relate to money being seen as ‘good’. Pay satisfaction and all its subscales were also not related to money being seen as ‘evil’, an ‘achievement’, ‘respect’ for money, ‘budget’, ‘freedom’, or overall attitude to money. Furthermore, overall attitude to money and all of the subscales were not significantly related to either organisational commitment or voluntary turnover intention. In addition, further analyses found no moderating effect for attitudes to money in terms of the relationship between pay satisfaction and voluntary turnover intention. These results were unexpected given the limited theory available and further research is required.