Abstract:
Employee turnover influences both employees and the performance of an organization. When
employee turnover occurs in an organization, the remaining employees have to acquire new
skills. Organizations endure the loss of certain skills that are not easy to replace and bear the
cost of recruitment and performance level equal to the person who has the left the organization.
Employee turnover is a major component that destabilizes the performance of organizations.
Government departments in Tanzania have been struggling with the issue of retaining skilled
employees, as they have been moving to better paying corporate organizations in the private
sector. When employees depart from an organization, the remaining employees tend to
perform additional work until another employee is recruited, which influences the performance
of the organization. The study aims to assess the effect of employee turnover on performance
in Tanzania, a case study of NSSF Headquarter in Dar es Salaam and make
recommendations on how to reduce employee turnover and improve performance in the
organization. The study’s objectives are to identify the factors that cause employee turnover
and identify performance challenges faced as a whole because of employee turnover. The
study will benefit our country and other government departments in Tanzania to enhance
performance. The study is exploratory and descriptive in nature. The study undertook mixed
methods approach, which is qualitative, and quantitative research design. For data collection,
a structured questionnaire was used that comprised of closed-ended and open-ended
questions, and 30 head of department, managers and leaders in NSSF Headquarter
participated in the study. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and thematic
analysis was used to analyze data. The findings show that the causes of employee turnover
on organization are lack of career advancement, lack of promotion, unsatisfactory salary,
unsatisfactory working conditions, and work stress. Additionally, the performance challenges
were wastage of resources, reduction in work productivity, disruptions in service delivery,
increased workload and spending too much time training new staff. The study recommended
that the Organization should improve on mechanisms of getting feedback from its staff
members regarding problems that have been identified as causes of high staff turnover rates.
