“We’ll take a pass, too much turnover.” If I had a $100 for every time I hear that I would probably be retired or at least self-employed by now. Of course that is a double entendre joke – I do work for myself and $100 is an adjusted rate due to inflation. I apologize for immediately digressing. My point is that it is up to us as recruiters to educate our clients what is an acceptable or average amount of turnover.

From this point forward, any statistic I quote will be taken from this article:http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/nlsoy.pdf . Please take the time to read through the article. There may information in it that is valuable to you yet not pertinent to me and my business. Another reason to read it is so you process the information and then come up with your own rebuttal to your clients when they say, “we’ll pass too much turnover.” And if you happen to work at an agency and need to get your candidates through a screener, you should share this article with that person on behalf of your entire team – be the hero!

This information was provided by a study sponsored by the Bureau of Labor Statistics U.S. Department of Labor. The following stats jumped out at me:

“Individuals born from 1957-1964 held an average of 11 jobs from age 18 – 44.”

The numbers break down as follows:

• 4.4 jobs while ages 18-22
• 3.2 jobs while ages 23-27
• 2.6 jobs while ages 28-32
• 2.4 jobs while ages 33-38
• 2.0 jobs while ages 39-44

Job duration tends to be longer the older a person is. When they started a new job, however, these baby boomers continued to have many short duration jobs even at middle age. Of those who started jobs between the ages of 39-44, 33% ended in less than a year and 68% ended in fewer than 5 years.

This is a longitudinal study, which means that the same people were surveyed over a period of time. Thus, the ages of the respondents change with each survey round. They were initially surveyed every year and later on, every other year.

The article breaks down the number of job changes by age, ethnicity, education, and sex. I focused on the age group with which I deal with most often: senior people. During the 2008 & 2009 interviews, participants were ages 43-52.

This is even better news if you place younger or less experienced people. The trend is that generations X and Y change jobs even more often, so you may want to look for other studies from the U.S. Department of Labor if that is your area of focus. The next time you are told that the client will take a pass due to too much turnover, take control of the situation by educating your client on the facts. Don’t take no for an answer that is unreasonable based on this study, and don’t let them off the hook. Go get’em.