Do Good or Poor Performers Leave: A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship Between Employee Performance and Turnover

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title

Academy of Management Journal

Volume

30

Issue

4

Publisher

Academy of Management

First Page

744

Last Page

762

Publication Date

1987

Abstract

A meta-analysis designed to estimate the direction and magnitude of the correlation between turnover and employee performance was conducted. The sample size-weighted mean correlation across 24 studies involving 7,717 individuals was found to be -0.28, suggesting that turnover is lower among good performers. Considerable unexplained variance in correlation coefficients across studies remained after correction for sampling error and attenuation. We found some support for three potential moderators: type of turnover, time span of measurement, and level of unemployment. Further, subgroup analyses suggested that a potential confound in meta-analyses--the degree of departure from a 50-50 split on a dichotomous dependent variable--may have important effects in some situations.

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