Why do enterprises welcome back staff that had earlier quit, and the caution that needs to be exercised

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Boomerangs, also known as former employees have always been there in the Talent market. Earlier, the concept of boomerang employees was a little out of the ordinary. Boomerang employees were sometimes branded with the notion that they couldn't make it outside the safe space of their former employer. 

Although the concept of boomerang employees is not new, the Covid-related layoffs and attrition, along with the Great Resignation, have increased the number of workers who want to return to their previous employers. Post Covid-19 pandemic, Talent market has rebound, and certain industries and organisations have started to experience shortage.  

As per the 2022 Global Talent Shortage Report by ManpowerGroup - 

Global talent shortages reach a 16-year-high as 3 in 4 employers report difficulty finding the talent they need. The Global average is 75 per cent and Asia Pacific at 82 per cent. 

Organisations are finding it difficult to fill open roles. One of the untapped pool of talent is Boomerangs. Boomerang employees are making a high comeback in the face of Great Resignation. 

The Corporate Culture and Boomerang Employee Study by Workplace Trends gives the following boomerang employee statistics: 

• 5 per cent of employees have boomeranged back to a former employee 
• 40 per cent of employees say they would consider boomeranging back to a company where they had previously worked. This includes 46 per cent of Millennials, 33 per cent of Gen Xers, and 29 per cent of Baby Boomers. 
• 76 per cent of HR professionals say they are more accepting of hiring boomerang employees today than in the past. 

Other research shows nearly one in five people who quit their jobs during the pandemic have returned to their previous employer. At JLL, we hire 10 per cent of Boomerangs every year and 7 per cent of our current People are Boomerangs. 

While no organisation plans for a critical and valuable employee to exit, it can be beneficial for the company as well as the employee when they return after some time away.   

Many employees are returning to their previous organisation. Also, there has been an emerging trend in Talent Acquisition space to target former employees. It is a win-win situation for both employers and employees in below ways:  

1.   Reduced recruiting Costs:  Much less time is consumed in hiring former employees and is much more cost effective. Companies save a lot on recruiting costs by reaching out to former employees instead of using other recruiting channels. It’s expensive to attract, onboard, and retain talent hired externally.  

2.   Easy and Efficient Onboarding: Onboarding is much easier. These employees already know the company culture, values, processes and nuances and understand that the organisation’s goals are aligned to theirs as well. They are well-aware of their roles and expectations but might to need learn about new changes at workplace. 

3.   Productivity: Boomerang employees can get up to speed quickly. They are more committed as compared to external hires. Their performance is better than external hires. An added advantage is that when Boomerangs join they come with fresh perspective and insights.  

There are a few things to consider when hiring Boomerangs: 

1.   Understand why they exited: The risk in hiring boomerang is that they might exit the organisation again. So, it is very critical for organisations to understand the exit reason – compensation, performance and why they want to be back. Unfortunately, some returning employees don’t truly care about your company or its values. In some cases, employees can do that to simply earn a promotion elsewhere and then return to the company with a better job title and pay than had they just stayed. Considering these factors while hiring former employees will help drive the right onboarding and re-entry processes. 

2.   Refresher of policies and process: A refresher of policies and processes is a needed to ensure the Boomerangs are well-versed with the new policies and process and changes that organisations have gone through since they left.  

Organisations can cultivate the Boomerang effect with below recommended best practices to welcome back former employees. 

1.   Great Employee experience – Organisations that want their employees to return need to provide a great and positive employee experience. People who have not had good employee experience are less likely to return to their previous employer. At JLL, we strive to provide best employee experience through our various people initiatives like MyFlex, Flex for your day, BenefitHub, Physical and Mental Wellbeing programmes, Employee Connects, Inclusion at Workplace, Going Beyond platform, Celebrating who we are (DEI week), Virtual Celebrations etc. 

2.   Learning and Development of Employees – At JLL, we continued to invest in our employees’ developmental needs with several Learning & Development programmes like Real Leadership framework, LinkedIn Learning, Accelerate Mentoring Program, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion session etc. 

3.   Open and transparent Communication: JLL endorses a culture of open communications with our employees through various digital platforms and a variety of communication tools (On ground and electronic, organisation-wide and personalised) to help each employee; experience and imbibe the JLL story both in their work and professional manner. Exiting employees too want to feel heard. So regular communication is critical and essential. Before they leave the office, employers need to make efforts that makes exiting employees feel good about themselves and the Organisation.  

4.   Keep doors open for high-performing employees: Organisations need to ensure that they make effort to create a positive exit experience for all employees. Negative exit experience can wear away employer brand and employees wouldn’t want like to return to company. 

5.   Successful onboarding: This can increase an employee's discretionary effort by more than 20 per cent and drive employee performance by up to 15 per cent. Furthermore, committed employees work 57 per cent harder and are 9x’s less likely to leave. 

Early this year, we launched MyOnboarding programme – Welcome Onboard at JLL. It has four elements: 

* MyOnboarding platform which brings the global onboarding resources together into one engaging platform to guide new hires & hiring managers from preboarding through the first 3 months 

* Welcome Onboard MyLearning playlist, which features the revamped ‘Getting to Know JLL’ course, now called ‘OneJLL: Who We Are’.  

* Welcome Onboard webinars which provide a unified OneJLL onboarding experience tailored to the local audience. 

* Welcome Onboard survey to capture feedback from new joiners at the end of their first 90 days. This survey will be in alignment with the JLL People Survey.

We also have a dashboard that provides information about the total MyOnboarding Users, engagement rate, percent  of new joiners in MyOnboarding.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in the article above are those of the authors' and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of this publishing house