The cost of employee turnover (and how to avoid it)

Employee turnover doesn’t just leave a gap on the roster — it creates pressure across your business, increasing costs, lowering productivity, and affecting morale.

For frontline industries like Retail, Hospitality, Healthcare, and Education, turnover is especially damaging. These sectors depend on steady, motivated teams to keep operations running smoothly and customers satisfied. When employees move too often, businesses lose expertise and see a decline in efficiency.

The good news? Turnover isn’t inevitable. With the right mix of people strategy and technology, businesses can retain their best talent and control one of their biggest hidden expenses.

The true cost of turnover in frontline roles

Every time an employee walks out the door, it costs more than a replacement ad. According to Gallup, replacing an employee costs anywhere from 50% to 200% of their annual salary depending on their role and skill level. For high-turnover industries like Retail and Hospitality, those figures add up fast.

Here’s where the costs pile up:

• Recruitment and onboarding: advertising, interviews, background checks, and training

• Lost productivity: new hires can take months to reach full efficiency

• Lower morale: existing staff often feel overworked when others leave

• Customer experience impact: in service-driven industries, fewer hands can mean longer wait times and inconsistent quality

In Healthcare, for example, high turnover among caregivers and nurses can even affect patient outcomes, while in Retail, it often shows up as lost sales or poorer customer service. When turnover becomes part of the culture, it’s not just expensive — it’s also disruptive.

Why frontline employees leave

It’s tempting to assume employees leave for higher pay. But research from PwC’s Future of Work survey found that the main reasons people quit aren’t always due to wage or salary. It often comes down to a lack of growth, poor management, and burnout.

Frontline staff, in particular, face unique pressures:

• Unpredictable shifts and limited flexibility

• Few development opportunities

• Poor communication from management

• Burnout and health-related issues

• Insufficient recognition or feedback

• Inefficient HR systems that make simple tasks frustrating

Keen to know more about the cost of disengaged workers? Download our guide here.

How to prevent turnover in frontline businesses

Here are four proven strategies frontline businesses can implement to reduce staff turnover.

1. Get onboarding right from day one

The first days of employment shape long-term commitment. Yet many frontline businesses still rely on manual paperwork and inconsistent processes. According to SHRM, one in three new hires leave within six months. This is often due to poor onboarding.

The Humanforce Onboarding & Offboarding solution eliminates friction from this process. Custom workflows ensure every new hire gets a structured start — tailored to their role, location, and department. By automating admin and compliance steps during the pre-boarding phase, HR teams free up time to focus more on strengthening engagement and culture.

And when employees do move on, a customised offboarding process can be built to include exit interviews, capturing valuable feedback and helping businesses understand and address recurring issues before they lead to more departures.

2. Make performance conversations continuous

In fast-paced frontline industries, managers and employees both don’t have the time to wait for annual reviews. Frequent feedback helps frontline workers stay aligned, motivated, and valued.

With Humanforce Performance Management, managers can set clear goals, track progress, and deliver real-time feedback all in one place. Regular check-ins help identify skills gaps early and show employees that their development matters — it’s as easy as setting up recurring one-to-one check-ins at desired intervals.

When performance is transparent and developmental, employees feel more supported and are more likely to stay.

3. Prioritise engagement and act on feedback

Engaged employees are 21% more productive and 59% less likely to leave, according to Gallup’s Global Workplace Report.

The Humanforce Employee Engagement solution lets organisations measure engagement levels, run surveys, and track sentiment trends across teams. Managers can identify hotspots — like departments with declining morale — and intervene before disengagement turns into resignation.

For frontline workers, engagement often comes down to feeling heard. When feedback leads to visible action, trust grows, and turnover drops.

4. Build smoother everyday operations

Clunky HR systems are a quiet cause of turnover. If staff struggle to access payslips, request leave, or swap shifts, they are likely to become frustrated.

The Humanforce HCM suite was custom-built for frontline workplaces. We understand the frustrations that frontline workers and managers face. Our solutions are designed to make work easier and life better for this long-neglected workforce segment.

For example, the Humanforce Core HR solution brings all employee data and workflows into a single hub, from personal information to scheduling and compliance. Employees gain autonomy through self-service features, while HR gains oversight through real-time data. This transparency helps build trust and reduces admin friction — two small but powerful contributors to better retention.

The Humanforce Work App, meanwhile, puts everything workers need to do their jobs effectively into one convenient place. They can check rosters, clock in and out, bid on available shifts, request leave, and communicate with their manager and team all from their mobile device.

Beyond software: building a culture that makes people stay

While businesses can rely on technology today, the foundations of an engaging workplace lie in its culture and the experience it provides for its employees. To truly curb turnover, leaders must cultivate cultures where frontline employees feel seen and supported.

That means:

• Training managers to lead with empathy and recognition

• Providing career pathways, even in traditionally high-churn roles

• Ensuring fair scheduling and workload distribution

• Communicating transparently about goals and change

As Harvard Business Review notes, even small signs of care — a thank-you, a consistent shift pattern, a career chat — can transform how frontline workers view their job.

With burnout rates continuing to rise across frontline industries, prioritising employee wellbeing is key to improving retention and satisfaction. Humanforce Benefits* includes Thrive, a financial wellbeing app that empowers workers with flexible pay, cashback rewards, and exclusive discounts. It also provides smart budgeting tools and the ability to pick up additional shifts as they become available — helping employees feel more supported, financially secure, and in control of their work–life balance.

*Humanforce Benefits is currently available to Australian customers only

Reducing employee turnover is an ongoing commitment

Turnover is a natural and unavoidable part of business, but it doesn’t have to be excessive. By investing in better onboarding, continuous feedback, engagement measurement, and intuitive HR systems, frontline businesses can transform retention from a pain point into a competitive advantage.

Humanforce helps businesses do exactly that, by connecting every stage of the employee journey in one unified platform. When your people feel supported, valued, and empowered, they don’t just stay — they thrive.

About Humanforce

Humanforce is the all-in-one platform for frontline and flexible workforces, offering a truly employee centred, intelligent and compliant human capital management (HCM) suite – without compromise. Founded in 2002, Humanforce has a 2300+ customer base and over half a million users worldwide. Today, we have offices across Australia, New Zealand, the US, and the UK.

Our vision is to make work easier and life better by focusing on the needs and fulfilment of frontline workers, and the efficiency and optimisation of businesses.

To learn more about how Humanforce’s solution can help automate people processes in your business, please contact us.