Report: Analyzing and Addressing Staff Turnover Issues at Amazon

This report delves into the significant staff turnover issues faced by Amazon, a multinational technology company. It identifies the problem through observable symptoms such as high employee turnover rates, referencing studies that place Amazon among the top companies with this challenge. The report analyzes the problem using Maslow's Need Hierarchy Theory and Herzberg's Motivation-Hygiene Theory to understand the underlying causes, such as inadequate pay, lack of motivation, and perceived inequalities within the workplace. The report proposes interventions based on these theories, including strategies to address physiological needs through better compensation, enhance safety and security, foster a healthy work environment, and promote employee engagement through programs and benefit adjustments. The conclusion emphasizes the importance of applying motivational theories to design effective employee retention policies and suggests renovations in recruitment policies to reduce turnover, offering insights into Amazon's challenges and potential solutions to improve employee retention.

Running Head: STAFF TURNOVER ISSUES IN AMAZON
STAFF TURNOVER ISSUES IN AMAZON
Name of the Student
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Author Note

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Staff turnover is a major matter of concern, to most of the multi-national companies
operating in the fast and competitive international business environment. Employee turnover
refers to the measurement of the time period, during which employees remains engaged with a
company or stick to their roles in that company. The purpose of this study is to throw lights on
the issues of employee turnover Amazon, a multinational technology company that has expanded
its wings on e-commerce, cloud computing. It also operates in the domain of digital streaming as
well as artificial intelligence. Recent studies have revealed that, business experts consider
Amazon at the second position in terms of employee turnover, while estimating the staff turnover
rate amongMulti National Companies.
A brief introduction of the organization:
Amazon is a popular multinational company, based in America. The headquarters of the
company is in Seattle, which is situated in Washington. Since its inception in the year 1994 by
Jeffrey P. Bezos., as a marketplace for the books over internet, the company has spread its wings
over e-commerce, cloud-computing as well as digital streaming along with artificial intelligence.
Amazon is one of those multinational companies that are well known for adopting technological
innovation for the purpose of expanding its business. Along with this, Amazon is world’s largest
marketplace for e-commerce. As estimated in terms of revenue and market capitalization,
Amazon is one of the biggest AI assistant providers as well as a plat for cloud computing.
Amazon is considered to be the biggest revenue earning e-commerce company. In the year 2015,
the market capitalization s well as revenue of Amazon surpassed that of the Walmart, one of the
highest revenue earning retailer in the country of United States.

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Description of the problem:
Employee turnover in Amazon:
It is already evident that, employee turnover rate indicates to the ratio of the number of
workers leaving a company compared to the number of new employees with whom the vacant
position are replaced. According to Cho et al. (2017), Amazon is considered to be at the second
position, in terms of the rate at which employees are leaving their jobs in Amazon. The
comparison has been done on the basis of the rates of staff turnover in Fortune 500
Companies.According to O’Connor (2013), pointed out that, the excessive work load as
compared to the pay scale of the employees, lack of monetary as well a non-monetary motivation
can be considered as the major factors contributing to the employee turnover problem
encountered by Amazon.
According to Kim (2015), if the pay scale of a company is compatible with the burden of
works imposed on them, they feel that their hard work is valued and they feel engaged with the
work, where as a low pay scale makes them feel less engaged with the organization and they
leave the job losing interest in their job. All these indicate to the fact that employees are leaving
Amazon as they are feeling less motivated and engaged with the company.Hence, it is evident
that Amazon requires a strong employee retention policy and the company needs to prioritize
employeemotivation while designing an effective employee retention policy.

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Analysis in terms of theories on motivation
Maslow’s need hierarchy Theory
After an analysis of the issues faced by Amazon, it is evident that the company needs o to
restructure its employee retention policies depending on the theories as well as concepts of
motivation, so that employee turnover can be controlled. On or such theory of motivation is
Need Hierarchy Theory of Motivation propounded by Maslow. Need Hierarchy Theory of
Motivation, has been developed depending on the concept of human needs. According to this
theory, human needs can be categorized into a sequential hierarchy, following a descending
order- low to high clusters. This is alternatively termed as ‘five need clusters model’ (Mowday
Porter and Steers 2013).
’
In other words, the needs depicted in the diagram are basic human needs showed from the lowest
to the highest order. At the bottom of the pyramid containing the clusters of human needs, there
is physiological needs. Physiological needs refer to the requirement of every individual to satisfy

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their biological drives. This include- the demand for food, demand for water, demand for cloth,
demand for shelter. This need is capable of exerting a deep impact on human behavior. The
fulfillment of this need completely depends on the remuneration employees are earning. If
employees can easily fulfill their physiological needs and can save for their future needs as well,
they feel motivated as well as engaged with their occupation. Safety as well as security needs are
depicted in the next cluster. This refers to the need of the employees to be protected from any
kind of physical damage accidents during work. If employees receive medical benefits that will
protect them if they become injured while working, or if the family of the deceased employees
receive family pension, in case of the death of the employee in accident during duty hours, this
will meet the basic safety as well as security needs of the employee and they will be motivated to
fulfill their responsibilities to the company. The next layers are ‘social’, ‘self esteem’ as well as
‘self-actualization’. These are other aspects that are directly connected with employee
motivation. The company needs to allow the employees a healthy social-life, recognition for
their efforts to the company as well as leisure time to take rest and socialize. As per the esteem
needs of the employees, it can be said that, employees should get a healthy workplace
atmosphere, so that they are able to work with dignity. The company has to look after the fact
whether the atmosphere of the workplace is allowing the employee to continue their duties
without any kind of humiliation that curb the esteem of the employees. For this purpose the
company needs to redesign its norms or rules.

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Herzberg’s motivation hygiene theory, is another theory related to the motivation of the
employees. According to this theory, employees should get a healthy workplace
atmosphere, so that they are able to work with dignity. The company has to look after the
fact whether the atmosphere of the workplace is allowing the employee to continue their
duties without any kind of humiliation that curb the esteem of the employees. For this
purpose the company needs to redesign its norms or rules (Huffman Casper and Payne
2014).
Design of an intervention
The intervention should be intended to solve or improve the situation
In order to throw lights on the interventions that can be made to prevent employee turnover first
the other reasons responsible for the employees to become demotivated, should be discussed.
Kim (2015), has marked the biased attitude of the former CEO of the company Jeff Bezos,
towards some employees. According to Kim (2015), this gave birth to inequality in workplace
and agitated employees who felt that they are less valued. Again, De Gieter and Hofmans (2015),
consider that, the lack of empathetic attitude of the CEOs after Jeff Bezos has also contributed to
the employee turnover problem encountered by Amazon.
Hence, one of the interventions to prevent employee turnover is that, Amazon needs to
keep in mind the fulfillment of the physiological needs of the employees as depicted in the Need
Hierarchy Theory of Motivation. Physiological needs include- the demand for food, demand for

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water, demand for cloth, demand for shelter. The fulfillment of this need completely depends on
the remuneration employees are earning. If employees can easily fulfill their physiological needs
and can save for their future needs as well, they feel motivated as well as engaged with their
occupation. This indicates that the company should make provision for increment in the
remuneration as well as monetary non-monetary incentives, in order to prevent employee
turnover and retain the draining of talents (Pereira Malik and Sharma 2016).
Again, for the safety cluster depicted in the Need Hierarchy Theory of Motivation.
Another intervention can be suggested employees to be protected from any kind of physical
damage accidents during work. If employees receive medical benefits that will protect them if
they become injured while working, or if the family of the deceased employees receive family
pension, in case of the death of the employee in accident during duty hours, this will meet the
basic safety as well as security needs of the employee and they will be motivated to fulfill their
responsibilities to the company (Shuck et al. 2014).
Another intervention can be made to foster healthy work culture where employees can
work with dignity. This will fulfill the esteem needs of the employees and motivate them to work
with a positive attitude. Self-esteem needs implies, employees should get a healthy workplace
atmosphere, so that they are able to continue their duties without any kind of humiliation that
curb the esteem of the employees. For this purpose, the company needs to redesign its norms or
rules (Gialuisi and Coetzer 2013).
Apart from that Amazon needs to arrange employee engagement program. The company
needs to renovate its policies regarding employee benefit. The company needs to make provision

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for the family pension of the deceased along with pension for the retired employees (Bryant and
Allen 2013) Again, If employees receive medical benefits that will protect them if they become
injured while working, or if the family of the deceased employees receive family pension, in case
of the death of the employee in accident during duty hours, this will meet the basic safety as well
as security needs of the employee and they will be motivated to fulfill their responsibilities to the
company. The next layers are ‘social’, ‘self esteem’ as well as ‘self-actualization’. These are
other aspects that are directly connected with employee motivation (Mowday Porter and Steers,
2013).
Analysis and Conclusion:
Analyzing the situation of the high employee turnover rate of Amazon, it can be
concluded that, lack of motivation is one of the major causes why employees are leaving
Amazon. In order to eliminate this cause, Maslow’s need hierarchy Theory along with the
Herzberg’s motivation hygiene theory should applied while designing the policies for retaining
employees (Waldman Carter and Hom 2015). There are other factors that contribute to the
massive employee turnover that the company is facing. Cao Chen and Song (2013), has
mentioned that, often workers are hired in Amazon, on the basis of the temporary contracts of 11
months. They leave the company after their tenure is over. The objective of this policy is to incur
saving on the medical coverage as well as the paid leaves of the employees serving only for 11
months. In its course of broadening saving policies as well as benefits, the company is actually
suffering from employee turnover. Hence, Cao Chen and Song(2013) has suggested for a

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renovation in the recruitment policy of Amazon so that the chances of employee turnover can be
minimized.

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