Employee turnover is at an unprecedented high. Global consulting firm Gartner predicts employee turnover will increase by almost 20% above the national average this year. That’s 37.4 million Americans predicted to quit this year alone. What happens to the business owners and managers left behind when employees exercise their rights to move on? The answer is that they put on more hats, work longer hours, and potentially, burn out. What can you do to buck this trend?

How to Reduce Wearing Multiple Hats When an Employee Leaves

How to Protect Yourself When Employees Leave

The first thing to consider when facing lots of turnovers is simple: Protect your health, protect yourself. If you’re burning out, the business will suffer greatly. Self-care can include all the usual things like easing up on caffeine and getting more sleep. But in this market, it should also include outsourcing key initiatives such as hiring a staffing company to help you source new employees. 

Running lean or wearing multiple hats places strain on everyone in your organization and can lead to:

• Performance gaps in critical areas as we shift our focus toward putting out whatever is on fire next.
• More turnover as managers become overwhelmed, they are more vulnerable to the latest call from a hungry recruiter.
• Missed opportunities simply because there is literally no time to take on that great new revenue-generating innovation.

Businesses can operate for a while with deliberate strategies designed to stretch their employee’s workload. But the reality today is that these situations are now less strategic and more born out of necessity. Unfortunately, the temporary increase in workload can become permanent if you fail to find the replacement job candidates you need.

If you are a manager wearing a lot of hats currently, what can you do to improve the workload distribution?

• Get a handle on your workload by regaining control of your schedule. If you are forced to wear too many hats it becomes a reactionary process. You run from task to task with little thought of delegation or process improvement. Instead, consider setting aside an hour or two to go over your tasks, meetings, and general workload. During this time, do not answer the phone or instant messaging. Your goal is to regain control of your schedule and find ways to make it more efficient.
• During this time, you should also prioritize tasks. Set blocks of time aside to coordinate and complete specific tasks. Ideally, group like-minded tasks together to save on the fatigue that comes from context switching throughout the day. 
• Think about where or to who you can delegate these tasks. Do you have a lot of manual reports? Are there meetings you can skip? Can some meetings be virtual instead of tacking on drive time to an office?
• Ideally, you want every working hour booked thoroughly. Plus, each day should have key accomplishments that you’re trying to achieve. 
• Finally, once this process is complete, go take a walk. Clear your mind for the tasks at hand and try to focus only on what is in front of you. This kind of mindfulness will help you get a handle on that feeling of being overwhelmed from wearing too many hats.

Ready to Reduce Employee Turnover?

Exelare is here to help improve your efficiency. Our state-of-the-art KPI dashboards can give you a bird’s eye view at the data you need to start your work each day. Talk with our team about how Exelare can help you and your team improve productivity even if you’re wearing too many hats.