Do you remember the days when employees stayed at a company so long they started naming their children after each other? They had dinner at each other’s houses. This is back when they had lunchtime drafts and I’m not talking about the ones that land you in the military. They collected the gold watches. Of course you don’t.

Nowadays, half the world’s employees work in a coffee bar. People lean over toward their neighbor and say, “I’ve seen you here all week. What do you do professionally?… Hmm. Do you have a card? I’ll give you a call next week about that opening you mentioned at your company. I’ve been at mine two years and I think it’s time for a change.”

These types of exchanges aren’t the only reason companies do so many employee autopsies. Here are nine more.

It’s Wednesday at 5:00 PM and you want to know why she isn’t at her desk. If you ever have a thought such as it’s 5:00 PM and I wonder where she is, your next thought ought to be I’m probably wondering that because I did such as lousy job hiring. Hire the right employee who you can trust and you’ll never have time to ask yourself where she is at 5:00 PM because you’ll be too busy wondering how she produces such fantastic !

It’s Saturday (pick any time) and you’re upset he didn’t respond to the email you sent five minutes ago. If why doesn’t everyone work the weekend is on your top three pet peeves, I think you should work in a bar. No. Not a coffee bar. An actual bar.

You never say thanks on any day of the week. Feeling appreciated is one of the most important happiness factors to any employee. There are many ways to show it—pay raises, bonuses, new opportunities, additional training, gift cards, a plant on the desk, so on and so forth. I also find a simple, “Thank you so much for your effort. I want you to know how much I truly appreciate it,” is priceless.

You haven’t given your employees a pay raise in over two years. Nay the tough economic markets where you need to be creative when business isn’t booming, but in normal and heated economic and employment markets you better consider this a grave issue.

You play favorites and you don’t even hide it well. I realize favorites sometimes become favorites for good reason, but let’s keep the scales balances a bit.

You not only don’t communicate, but you flat out lie. Employees know whenever everything isn’t “fine.”

Your “bosses” shouldn’t be bosses. My company milewalk keeps statistics for every imaginable employment-related item. I could probably tell you how many flies enter your building during lunchtime based on the number of employees you allow to leave your premises during that hour. Based on our assessment of over 11,000 candidates, 80% cited their boss as one of the top three reasons they’d be opening to leaving their current job (or left their previous one). If four out of five people are willing to leave their job because of their boss, don’t you think you should have, build, or train good bosses?

Your corporate culture is based on fear. Passive-aggressive, do-as-I-say, and you’re-really-in-trouble-now environments never work. They n-e-v-e-r work because people don’t respond well long-term to these types of treatment. Show a little love, trust, support, positive energy, and good cheer and your employees will respond.

Your recruitment process stinks. Pick the right employees and they can practically run themselves. Pick the wrong ones and you’ll pay the price in the short, mid, and long terms. I’ve written so many articles on how to improve this item, go grab a few or call me.

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