at·tri·tion
P Pronunciation Key (
-tr
sh
n.
- A rubbing away or wearing down by friction.
- A gradual diminution in number or strength because of constant stress.
- A gradual, natural reduction in membership or personnel, as through retirement, resignation, or death.
- Repentance for sin motivated by fear of punishment rather than by love of God.
[Middle English attricioun, regret, breaking, from Old French attrition, abrasion, from Late Latin attrti
, attr
at·trition·al adj.
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Attrition
The reduction in staff and employees in a company through normal means, such as retirement and resignation. This is natural in any business and industry.
Investopedia Commentary
This type of reduction in staff is one way a company can decrease labor costs: the company simply waits for its employees to leave and freezes hiring. Such a method contrasts the more severe labor-reduction techniques, such as mass layoffs. Waiting for attrition is usually better for company morale.
Source: Investopedia.com. Copyright © 1999-2005 – All rights reserved. Owned and Operated by Investopedia Inc.
[Attrition] is natural in any business and industry. But no matter how you think of it, attrition is not good for morale. No matter what the departing people say ("I wasn’t looking; something just came up…", which is akin to, "It’s not you, it’s me…"), something about the current state of events just didn’t measure up to the other opportunity for them. And this inevitably causes others to ask themselves, "Does he see something [that drove him away] that I don’t see?", "Are there better opportunities out there for me too?", "Am I stagnating?", "What am I doing?", etc.
Obviously, from a management perspective, you hate to see people leave (unless they’re underperforming). People that have ramped up on the product, understand how things work, are, to some extent, valuable. (Some are obviously more valuable than others.) Training new employees is not a particularly productive for the team as a whole. The investment had already been made and you were reaping the rewards.
One of the Messenger folk mentioned to me once that it was amazing how fast Messenger can grind you down. Most probably this is due to our relatively fast release cycles and constant barrage of fires to fight. This post wasn’t spurred by anything in particular–it was more a multitude of things: the several people that have left the team over the years, and others that are now taking that big step (I’ve seen people come and go); Dare’s post about leaving within 5 years; Mid-Year Reviews coming up; and so on. A time for reflection…
I guess the good news is that We’re Hiring! Work on the MSN Runtime, the Messenger Edge Team, the Presence Platform, or the Bot Platform!
red hot place 